Hp PhotoSmart 945: For the Professional, Without the Price!

Author's Rating:

Pros: Affordably professional, excellent quality and nice design.

Cons: Needs a hotshoe. Doesn't store files in superior TIFF format.

The Bottom Line: 
This camera is perfect for the professional on a budget.

Author's Review


The HP 945 is just the digital camera for the enthusiast looking for all the features of a professional digital camera without paying the extravagant price at that level. The camera comes jam-packed with many features to manually set your camera for creative pictures in most any condition or you can override them all and let HP’s superior built-in technology take over. It’s like having a professional by your side helping you take the perfect picture automatically. Remember, the perfect picture doesn’t always wait for you to think, adjust your settings and then snap the picture, so it should be obvious the benefit of having this technology at your finger tips.

The manual controls are fine to tweak in order to add a certain creative element to your pictures or where the automatic controls aren’t responding appropriately to a unique condition. When you have time to set up a picture and it’s lighting(i.e., still life, portraits) and control is within your grasp, use these manual controls to your advantage. I recommend purchasing a good book on digital photography to understand the mechanics behind the camera; the how and whys of the photographic process.

You’ve come to expect a certain level of quality with HP products and you expect innovation with each new line of HP digital cameras. HP delivers again with the 945! You have the benefit of experience of each previous line of camera along with the new technology derived from HP’s extensive research and development labs. With a large company like HP you can be assured that millions of dollars are being funneled into the development of each new camera they market. Much of the profit that is gained through accessory items for your HP camera or computer is spent to develop this new technology.

HP doesn’t just reinvent the wheel, they forge ahead with totally new ideas leaving them on the cutting edge. Examples of this innovation are evident with their instant-share technology which gives the user complete control of the path or destination of their picture files. The user simply programs the camera and HP software (installed on the computer) takes care of the rest when the camera is docked( HP Photosmart 8881 dock must be purchased separately). The dock also recharges the batteries. The Photosmart 945 supports direct printing with HP Photosmart printers too.

Although, these features may come across as being novel, they can be very practical to those people who value time and appreciate organization. Think about how often you’ve had to move your files from one place to another when HP’s Instant Share technology could organize them right from the get go. I’ve harped on this many times in other reviews I’ve written and I’m not sure if I’m reaching the ears of my audience, but isn’t this the reason why we come to rely on computers? To save time, to organize our lives and to free us for more creative pursuits. Across the board, with all their products, HP strives again to bring together and link them with compatible software to make it easier for the user. The technology runs in the background, you know it’s there, but you aren’t a slave to it’s complexity. HP builds simplicity into all it’s products and they are reasonably free from inherent pitfalls of that technology due to the diligent standards of quality control at HP. Where this technology falls through, you can rely on HP’s gold standard service to back you up. They have a reputation to uphold and many years of business has proven this out.

If I’ve convinced you of HP’s reliability, then go ahead and take a deeper look into the product itself. Study the facts sheet and compare it to the other company’s with a similar product. I think you will agree in most, if not all, cases, HP will hod up to it’s competitor. Many companies will window dress their product and give their product’s technology fancy names. I’ve tried to file through this dressing many times and come away only half impressed. HP spells it out for you! Their technology and what it does is clearly explained. Their are no surprises when you come home and try it out. That’s one of the main reasons I buy HP: I know what I’m getting.

Other Features:

Resolution: 5.3 MegaPixels. This is ample resolution to print any size picture up to 20” x 30.” Perfect for the large capacity printers offered by many manufacturers these days including HP. The resolution is also great for editing in programs like Adobe Photoshop. Because of the high pixel count, processes like selecting become a snap and cropping is practical because the file is large enough to permit it without degrading the quality.

Zoom: The 945 offers both digital and precision optical lens zooming for a total of 56x zoom. The 8x lens zoom is what’s important here because your file size remains the same at zoom setting, where as you lose megapixels and hence over all picture quality when using digital zoom. Digital is fine if you don’t plan to print large output prints or do extensive cropping and digital zoom does add just that little extra control that might be needed to take a particular picture, but most of the time you can do your final editing at the computer. Digital, optical or both? This is where, you, the photographer should make the call.

Lens: Speaking of lenses, HP doesn’t cut corners in quality. HP manufactures the 945, as they do with all their cameras, with the highest quality lenses for that make. The 945 features the Fuji Photo Optical Co.,Ltd. lens. Guaranteed sharp and vibrant pictures.

Burst Mode: This is a new feature to HP’s digital camera line. It’s a great feature because it’s allows you take many pictures of a subject quickly without the camera having to reset itself. After the burst, the images are then sent to camera’s memory, rather than one at a time, which is time-consuming and disadvantageous to capturing scenes which can change on a dime. If you wanted to capture Roger Clemen’s final pitch in the World Series game 4 just as he released the ball toward the pitchers mound, burst mode is what you’d use or if junior is about to take his first step, burst mode might capture him easier.

Vignette Correction: Due to the idiosyncrasies of lenses, some camera’s will take on a vignette effect in the final composite. This is fine if you planned on having this vignette effect, but let’s be honest, it can mostly be an unattractive attribute. HP’s has again come to the rescue with Thiel own trademarked technology to correct this, specifically designed around the lenses characteristic, this protection will ensure an even picture in all areas of the final print.

Compatibility: What good is a camera if it doesn’t work with your computer? For maximum compatibility, I’d recommend tailoring your entire system around HP products ( an HP computer and HP peripherals), but if that isn’t practical for you, don’t fret. HP digital camera will work with just about any computer and any operating system(See spec. sheet or dealer for more info).

Software: On Windows systems, HP provides it’s own photo and imaging software which is developed to work across other HP products such as scanners and printers. Newer Mac systems come with iPhoto software bundled with the computer. This software provides much of the necessary editing, printing and organization processes that “Photo and Imaging” software provides for Windows, so HP didn’t port P&I to the Mac. P&I does surpass iPhoto’s application in one critical area, that being of picture output templates. If you want this extended capability for Mac’s OSX operating system search for a program called “Portraits and Prints.” For a nominal fee($19USD), this shareware program can be purchased. HP also includes cross platform versions of HP Memory Disk Creator and ArcSoft’s Fun House. Both programs give you a creative outlet for your digital images and give them a final polish that you can be proud of and share. The memory disk creator is especially useful because it gives you the ability to create an actual compact disk called a vcd(video compact disk) to be played as a slideshow on most DVD players to TV. The modern day equivalent to the old analog carousel projection slideshow in the living room. Now, you can bore your friends to death digitally (just kidding.)

Memory and File Format: The 945 boasts 32MB of SecureDigital to store your image files in compressed JPEG using the EXIF 2.2 standard to maintain digital tags. What did I just say? Well, simply put, all of your image files are recorded to a universally accepted format that can be read pretty much on every computer with any operating system! For most purposes, the JPEG format is fine, but being a “compressed” format, it has certain advantages and disadvantages. The advantage is since it’s compressed, you are able to fit more pictures in memory. The disadvantage is some loss of information and quality. The loss of quality is negligible, but is enough to be a fair consideration to the professional. The recommended format is TIFF, a format which is found on higher priced digital cameras. Think of the MP3 music files that are converted from your collection of CD’s. Do you notice much difference in sound quality when you convert them? The conversion is similar to JPEG conversion. The experts can tell, but us average Joes can’t, nor need to. Again, this is your call.

EXIF (technology) is a pretty recent development in digital technology. It’s explanation is beyond the scope of my review, but suffice to say it’s implementation ensure consistent quality at all stages of digital photography from camera to computer to printer to output. EXIF should be supported by the printer. EXIF in not HP technology, but HP uses it with the 945.

SecureDigital memory is the chip that plugs into the camera to store the files. HP supplies 32MB of memory, but you can purchase larger capacity chips up to 512MB to store more image files. I highly recommend purchasing more memory. 256MB are usually your best bargain. Shop around.

HP Adaptive Lighting Technology: This is another new technology developed for the 945 and new models. This technology will bring out the details that are often hidden in dark shadow areas. If you’ve used ever used a program like Adobe Photoshop, then you know that most information is store in mid-tones. HP technology has intervened what you might ordinarily have to correct in Photoshop or a similar program. And it’s all done automatically for you. I have only kudos for these editing programs, but many of us are on a budget and if the camera’s technology bypasses this need, then we have a feather in our cap.

Final Thoughts


Well, that wraps up what I consider to be some of the more important and exciting features of the Photosmart 945 digital camera. You can download the entire data sheet from HP’s website as well as more in-depth explanation of various technologies. The question to ask now is: Why HP? My answer is: Why not? This camera truly has just about everything the professional needs in a digital camera. It’s backed up by HP’s reliable quality and service. Cutting edge technology is built into every HP digital camera. HP camera’s are simple to use and very compatible. Software is bundled with every camera to enhance creativity. This all adds up to consistent, pleasing photographic prints every time that you will enjoy and share with others. Good luck with your purchase and most of all, have fun taking picture and forging your own frontier in the “digital landscape” of digital photography!

Adobe Photoshop is trademark of Adobe System Inc.