Top line point and shoot camera

Author's Rating:

Pros: 3 Mpixel CCD, excellent zoom lense, outsanding picture quality in auto mode.

Cons: Lack of manual control options, fixed ISO sensitivity (100)

The Bottom Line: 
If you are looking for the good replacement for your 35 mm point-and-shoot camera, FinePix 3800 is the best choice.

Author's Review
I bought Fujifilm Finepix 3800 to replace my 35 mm point and shoot Samsung camera which died unexpectedly. I did lot of research on the net in order to find a digital camera with good picture quality and relatively low price. Operation in the point and shoot mode was another requirement, since my wife is the main user this camera.

I got FinePix 3800 from buydig.com for ~$300 $19.95 shipping to CA from NJ. I did not have any problems with the vendor. I got the camera in 4 days, no one called me to sell overpriced accessories.

The camera was ready for shooting right after the batteries were inserted. I had only to set the date and time. Outdoors, camera makes excellent photos in the auto mode. You just point it, set the zoom, press the button halfway to set the AF and AE, and take the picture. Of course, you can switch the camera to the manual mode and play with the settings, but if you are a novice, you do not need the manual mode to get a perfect picture.

Zoom works fast, I did not notice image distortions in the tele mode. Wide mode has minor distortions at the edges of the frame. But they are common for all wide angle lenses. IMHO, Fujinon lens is better than similar objectives by Canon and Nikon.

Flash recharges quickly, it's not very powerful, but its energy is enough for most of indoor and outdoor shots. Fill-in and red-eye reduction modes work just fine.

Preset scene modes (portrait, fast-motion scene, night shot, etc.) work as designed, and might be helpful for beginners.

Macro mode is excellent. I read some skeptic comments about it here. But in my camera, it's excellent. You only have to remove the filter adapter, if you are going to use the flash. Otherwise, you'll get a shadow at the bottom of the frame.

Shutter lag is short. (less than a second)

Camera uses 4 AA batteries (included) or NiMH rechargeables (not included).

All drawbacks of this camera are related to the indoor shooting. First, CCD is rated for only 100 ISO sensitivity. It means that you have to use the flash for the indoor pictures. In suppressed flash mode the exposure time is too long and images are usually smeared. Second, in low light conditions you may notice the CCD noise (it does not mean that CCD is bad, it's just not enough light). Third, passive focusing system does not work well in low light conditions(no focus light). Sometimes, you have to press the shutter button just to focus the image in the viewfinder. Autofocus slows down and increases the camera lag. However, if the object is more than 2 meters (yards)away from the camera, focus will be OK.

These are all drawbacks that I have found.

Computer connection and software are good. Besides using Fuji software, you may use the camera as a removable storage media. In this case, you simply copy and delete files in the xD card, as you do with files on your hard drive. Software for creation of photoalbums on VCDs and data CD-ROMs (HTML albums) is excellent. It allows to view your pictures on the regular TV using DVD/VCD player, or on the computer using your internet browser. However, VCD resolution is quite low, SVCD or XVCD/DVD option would be also very useful.

Conclusion: If you need excellent point-and-shoot camera, Finepix 3800 is the best value for it's price. It works better than most of 35 mm point and shoot cameras. And, of course, you do not have to process the film. 6x4 prints from the digital media cost only 18 cents at Costco.

But if you need a semi-pro camera with a lot of manual controls, more expensive cameras will be the better choice (IMHO, even $200 SLR 35 mm camera with good optics makes better pictures and is more flexible than any 5 Mpixel camera for $1000. Photofilm quality is still unbeatable.).