Casio Exilim EX-ZR100 review

A compact camera from Casio that’s packed full of features for any event

Casio has released the latest in its high-speed Exilim series, and it’s full of features that can really improve a beginner’s photography. It’s quite large for a compact, but with so much packed into it that can be forgiven.

The handling of the EX-ZR100 is adequate, with buttons for play, camera mode, video mode, high speed capture mode, and separate buttons for the shooting and settings menus. However, it can take a while to find key features inside the menus, when the left and right controls on the d-pad are unused.

In Auto mode the camera picks the best settings, but there are also 32 ‘Best Shot’ modes, such as Scenery and Portrait that choose settings specific to your subject. This is missing an ‘Indoor’ selection, although ‘Party’ will suffice. There’s also an HDR mode that will combine multiple exposures, but this did result in slightly washed out colours. It did, however, greatly boost areas that would otherwise be in shadow or overexposed.

The high speed capture mode is clearly the camera’s selling point, as you can really freeze moving subjects, with a recording speed of 40 frames per second. With anti-shake settings and high ISO and shutter speeds also, you can really capture movement well. With an impressive 12x optical zoom, too, you can certainly get in close to your subject.

There are a range of more advanced settings, such as metering, manual mode, super macro focusing and more. There’s even HD video included, and you can optimise your clips for YouTube. This really is an all-round camera, and the images are crisp on the LCD screen and when printed out. The price is relatively high for a compact, but for your money you get an impressive feature set, and sharp results make the EX-ZR100 an excellent compact camera that can take great pictures in nearly any situation.