Nikon Coolpix L100

Author's Rating:

Pros: Price, size, comfortable in your hand.

Cons: Picture quality is terrible.

The Bottom Line: 
Unfortunately this camera takes terrible pictures no matter what setting or mode you use. Disappointed.

Author's Review
I have been in the market for a nicer camera for a while. I have been through a few Kodak cameras, and have reviewed my previous camera- it was a lemon. I have looked at and considered a Nikon, a Fuji, and a Canon. I finally decided to go with a Nikon, Coolpix L100 series camera. It was a little more expensive than some of the other similar looking cameras, but I was convinced by a salesgirl, that the 15x zoom made this camera a better choice, that Nikon was a better brand by for for the extra 40 dollars. So, I bought it, $269. The camera comes with 4 batteries, a neck strap, a lens cap, and a USB cord- no carrying case or memory card comes with it.

The sales girl told me that although the instructions say that you can not use rechargeable batteries, that she uses them and they work just fine. I did not buy the rechargeables that she tried to sell me, so I do not know if she was correct or not.

I was very excited to have my new toy! I followed the instructions how to get it set up- it has a 3" lcd display, and the menu to set up the date and time is very simple. Navigating through other menus is a little tricky, but I figured it out. I put the batteries and SD card in, hooked up the neck strap, and I was ready to start taking pictures!

The camera has many different modes, indoor, outdoor, panoramic, night time, landscape, beaches and snow, portrait, etc. It has a "smile detector" and it will also tell you if someone's eyes are closed. (It does nothing to correct that, it just says "Someone's eyes are closed".) I started by taking just some random shots. The first few pictures were very yellow and blurry. I read the manual, and checked my settings, everything was set up properly, so I tried a few more shots. My daughter was standing perfectly still, yet the picture was blurry. There is a few second lag between click and capture.

I went outside and tried taking some still shots of some flowers around the yard, they were grainy and blurry no matter how still I was or how still the plants were. No settings that I tried rectified the blurry and the yellow shots. I searched the manual again to see if maybe I did not have something set up properly, but no matter what I tried, the photos were blurry. Even the ones that were not blurry, they were grainy and of poor quality- very dull- not sharp at all. The colors were also not good, when I took a picture of my daughter, she looked almost orange! Again, I reviewed the manual and looked for some settings that maybe I could change, I tried changing the mode to "Indoors" and that did not help.

I am very disappointed in the camera. I am going to return it to the retailer where I bought it, and I will do some more research and see if I can find a camera that works for me. I am just a mom, I like to take pictures of the children and pets mainly, so I do not need anything fancy- but I do want something that takes nice quality pictures and is easy to use- I know that this camera is out there- and I will find it!.