Kodak Z710 Review

The Kodak EasyShare Z710's body is styled somewhat like a miniature SLR camera, and contains both a 7.4 megapixel CCD imager (7.1 MP effective), and a Schneider-Kreuznach Variogon-branded 10x optical zoom lens with a powerful 38 - 380mm equivalent focal range. Including the 5x "advanced" digital zoom gives a total zoom range of 50x. For framing images, the Z710 offers both a 201,000 pixel electronic viewfinder, and a 2.0" LCD display. Images are stored on Secure Digital / MultiMediaCards, or in 32MB of internal memory.

The Kodak Z710 has a generous 17 scene modes (sport, portrait, night shot, landscape, flower, backlight, candlelight, manner/museum, text, beach, snow, fireworks, children, party, night portrait, night landscape, self portrait) to help beginners achieve the results they're looking for without the need to understand subtleties like shutter speeds, apertures and the like. If you want even more control though, then aperture- and shutter priority modes are available, as well as a fully manual mode. Program exposure mode is also available.

By default the Z710 determines exposures with a multi-pattern TTL metering system with center-weighted and center spot options available. It also offers 2.0EV of exposure compensation in 1/3EV increments. Five white balance settings are available including an auto mode, and ISO sensitivity is controlled automatically or manually, ranging from 64 to 400, with the ability to trade off some resolution for extra sensitivity - ISO 800 at 1.9 megapixel resolution. The EasyShare Z710 also offers a movie mode, capturing VGA or QVGA clips with audio, at a framerate of 10.5 fps for VGA (640 x 480 pixels), and 20 fps for QVGA (320 x 240 pixels) resolution.

Power for the Z710 comes from two AA batteries, or one lithium battery CRV3. List pricing for the Kodak EasyShare Z710 is set at US$250.