Olympus C-740 Ultra Zoom3.2 megapixels, a sharp 10x zoom lens, tons of features, and an affordable price!<<Design :(Previous) | (Next): Optics>> Page 4:ViewfinderReview First Posted: 03/02/2003, Updated: 07/17/03 |
Viewfinder
The
C-740 Ultra Zoom has both a 0.44-inch electronic viewfinder and a rear panel,
1.5-inch, TFT color LCD screen. The EVF has approximately 114,000 pixels, while
the rear panel screen sports 180,000. The EVF display behaves a little oddly
with moving objects or during rapid panning of the camera. It doesn't look all
like a refresh rate issue, but the image blurs noticeably when you move the
camera, or when an object moves quickly across the field of view. When things
become more or less stationary again, the display seems to sharpen. It's really
quite a subtle effect, and didn't interfere with my shooting at all, but it
was a little disconcerting nonetheless. The electronic viewfinder (EVF) accommodates
eyeglass wearers with a diopter correction adjustment and a comfortably high
eyepoint, leaving enough room between your eye and the finder for most eyeglass
lenses to fit in, although I did notice a little vignetting around the edges
while wearing my own glasses. The tiny display is identical to that of the larger
LCD monitor, complete with menus and exposure information. The EVF remains active
only when the LCD monitor is switched off, as the Display button switches between
the two views.
My
regular readers will already know that I'm no fan of electronic viewfinders.
They seem to be a necessary evil with long-zoom cameras, as it'd be prohibitively
expensive and bulky to include an optical viewfinder with an 10x zoom to match
the lens. EVFs do have the dual advantages of providing true "through the
lens" (TTL) viewing, as well as the same information display as on rear-panel
LCDs, but to my mind the negatives usually outweigh the positives. My biggest
objection to EVFs is that they are generally useless for low light shooting,
but the EVF on the C-740 Ultra Zoom seemed to be much better than most in this
respect (as did the C-730 Ultra Zoom's). The display would get rather dark while
the camera's autofocus was working, but at other times seemed quite capable
of providing a usable display, even under very dark conditions. (Down to a level
corresponding to a one second exposure at ISO 400, dark indeed.
The C-740's LCD monitor is activated by the Display button located just off its lower right corner, which subsequently disables the EVF display. A detailed information readout on both monitors highlights a number of exposure settings, including the currently selected f/stop, shutter speed, and exposure compensation adjustments across the top of the screen. (Note though, that specific exposure parameters are not displayed in any of the "scene" modes.) Part of the information display disappears within a few seconds of half-pressing the Shutter button, and through the Record menu, you can set how much information remains in the display. In Aperture and Shutter Priority modes, the chosen aperture or shutter speed appears as a constant, while the second, automatically determined exposure value updates continuously to respond to changes in subject or lighting. The Manual mode displays both of the selected f/stop and shutter speed values, while the right-hand set of numbers reports the amount by which the camera thinks the image will be under- or overexposed, up to +/- 3 EV units. (When you're more than three EV over or under, these numbers turn red and remain fixed at +/-3 EV.) The C-740 also features a optional live histogram display, which graphs the tonal distribution of the current composition. This is useful in determining any over- or underexposure that may occur with the current exposure settings, letting you correct the exposure before actually taking the shot.
When
using the LCD monitor to review captured images, you can zoom in up to 4x on
displayed images and then scroll around the enlarged image using the arrow buttons.
This is extremely handy for checking focus, small details, or precise framing.
There's also an Index display option, which shows either four, nine, or 16 thumbnail-sized
images at a time. A very handy "quick view" function lets you check
the last picture taken in Record mode by pressing the Display button twice in
quick succession. The image will remain displayed on the LCD until you revert
back to Record mode by pressing the Display button again, or by half-pressing
the Shutter button.
Like
some other Olympus digicams, the C-740 also offers the ability to resize or
crop your images post-exposure. This is very handy, as it's almost always possible
to improve your photos by cropping (trimming) them a little. On the C-740, a
cropping menu option lets you trim away as much as 30 percent or so of the image
area, and even change the composition from horizontal to vertical, or vice versa.
In cropping mode, a bold green outline indicates the current crop area, and
the zoom toggle zooms the crop in or out, while the four arrow keys let you
move it around the image. Once you've got the crop adjusted to your liking,
the camera will save a new image onto the card, with just the cropped area in
it. (Your original photo is left undisturbed.) Likewise, using another menu
option, you can resize previously-shot photos, to create smaller versions more
suitable for emailing.
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