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Reviews (3)
30 July 2009
The Kodak Z1285 = a decent investment. (Edited)
9 of 9 found this helpful Well, I was in the market for a digital camera and after pricing several at Wal-Mart, I stumbled on this camera and snagged it as the price was very reasonable for a 12 MP camera.
The camera takes excellent HD photos and the menus are easy to navigate. I took a picture with some moving vehicles and the camera did an excellent job capturing the cars with no high-speed blur evident. That is good for people wanting to take the camera on a cross-country trip as the camera will not have any difficulties with the vehicle being in motion.
The digital zoom was also better than I expected, having used that mode at maximum zoom on the moon. There was some washing out due to the flash, however, I suspect that without the flash, the extreme closeup of the moon would have turned out nice.
The camera's internal memory is sufficient to hold about 50 pictures in 12 MP mode, and, of course, a lot more as you select lower MP. I was very happy to see that a 2 GB SD card could hold 540 pictures in 12 MP and over 3,000 in 1.2 MP mode. I would recommend the higher MP modes, though. Anything above 6 MP will give high quality shots.
The video mode works well once you have a SD/HC card in there. I now use a 4 GB card and that provides upwards of 30 minutes of video assuming that the card is empty.
Storm chasers will love the camera, especially the ability of the camera to use a very high shutter speed to capture lightning and a slower speed to hopefully capture a series of lightning strikes.
A few cons are need to be mentioned, though. Make sure that you get high capacity batteries for use with this camera. Standard alkaline batteries are not able to power the camera very long. You may get as few as three shots before the camera goes down, depending on the alkaline battery initial strength.
One major con discovered is that the camera has difficulty with night shots using the flash. Pictures are not well exposed with the flash, and if the object is producing it's own light, the camera will wash out the object, resulting in a poor picture. If you're moving, don't bother trying to get a shot with or without the flash. With the flash, it's grainy and without the flash, the camera increases the exposure time, resulting in severe blur. The camera does tell you that it's best to steady itself for a night shot, and that's good advice.
The users manual is lacking in detail and even recommends that users visit the Kodak website to get a more detailed manual. Kodak seemed to be more interested in providing basic information in English, Spanish, Portugese(Brazilian), and French instead of giving users a more in depth version of a manual.
Also, in USB mode, you can't take pictures with it and the camera does not tell you if it's still on battery power or drawing current from the computer. It might have been better for the firmware to tell you if it was on internal power or not.
A final minor issue is that whenever the batteries are replaced, the unit goes back to factory defaults and any special settings you may have set disappear.
10 September 2010
Decent product, but, has minor issues
Well, I ordered this item to be able to take on long trips cross country and I've discovered a few things.
First, the device gets very warm while watching any DVDs. It has a serious heat issue, actually. You may not want to put it on your lap for example during a long ride, unless the vehicle is cold (like if you were in the northern USA or Canada).
Second, the DVD has to be firmly seated or the laser will not be able to read the DVD. That's a minor concern, though, and is probably a standard thing with portable DVD players.
Outside of the first issue, though, the picture on the little screen is as crisp as possible. It came with two set of external connections, for standard RCA plugs and S-Video. The switch, though, for the LCD and external is where the battery connects, so, you have to remove that to switch from the little screen to a bigger screen.
30 July 2009
The Kodak Z1285 = a decent investment. (Edited)
7 of 7 found this helpful Well, I was in the market for a digital camera and after pricing several at Wal-Mart, I stumbled on this camera and snagged it as the price was very reasonable for a 12 MP camera.
The camera takes excellent HD photos and the menus are easy to navigate. I took a picture with some moving vehicles and the camera did an excellent job capturing the cars with no high-speed blur evident. That is good for people wanting to take the camera on a cross-country trip as the camera will not have any difficulties with the vehicle being in motion.
The digital zoom was also better than I expected, having used that mode at maximum zoom on the moon. There was some washing out due to the flash, however, I suspect that without the flash, the extreme closeup of the moon would have turned out nice.
The camera's internal memory is sufficient to hold about 50 pictures in 12 MP mode, and, of course, a lot more as you select lower MP. I was very happy to see that a 2 GB SD card could hold 540 pictures in 12 MP and over 3,000 in 1.2 MP mode. I would recommend the higher MP modes, though. Anything above 6 MP will give high quality shots.
The video mode works well once you have a SD/HC card in there. I now use a 4 GB card and that provides upwards of 30 minutes of video assuming that the card is empty.
Storm chasers will love the camera, especially the ability of the camera to use a very high shutter speed to capture lightning and a slower speed to hopefully capture a series of lightning strikes.
A few cons are need to be mentioned, though. Make sure that you get high capacity batteries for use with this camera. Standard alkaline batteries are not able to power the camera very long. You may get as few as three shots before the camera goes down, depending on the alkaline battery initial strength.
One major con discovered is that the camera has difficulty with night shots using the flash. Pictures are not well exposed with the flash, and if the object is producing it's own light, the camera will wash out the object, resulting in a poor picture. If you're moving, don't bother trying to get a shot with or without the flash. With the flash, it's grainy and without the flash, the camera increases the exposure time, resulting in severe blur. The camera does tell you that it's best to steady itself for a night shot, and that's good advice.
The users manual is lacking in detail and even recommends that users visit the Kodak website to get a more detailed manual. Kodak seemed to be more interested in providing basic information in English, Spanish, Portugese(Brazilian), and French instead of giving users a more in depth version of a manual.
Also, in USB mode, you can't take pictures with it and the camera does not tell you if it's still on battery power or drawing current from the computer. It might have been better for the firmware to tell you if it was on internal power or not.
A final minor issue is that whenever the batteries are replaced, the unit goes back to factory defaults and any special settings you may have set disappear.