Casio Exilim EX-G1

Shooting Modes (11.50)

Several auto modes are on offer, including a full auto mode where the camera chooses the best settings to use. In addition, there is an Auto Best Shot mode, where the camera chooses one of the scene modes to use, and then makes decisions based on the settings of this scene mode.

Auto Mode Features

Focus – The contrast detection focus system of the EX-G1 was resonably effective: we found that it typically snapped into focus in less than half a second in good light. It is less effective in low light, though: in darkened rooms and at night it often failed to find the right focus point without the assistance of the front lamp to add more light to the scene to boost the contrast. A manual focus mode is also offered, as well as a mode called Pan Focus that sets the camera to close to infinity if you are taking panning shots.

Several options are available for how the camera chooses what to focus on, including an intelligent mode (which picks the focus point automatically from most of the frame), a spot mode and a multi mode that uses 9 focus points and tries to get as many into focus as possible. In addition, a tracking mode is available that focuses on an object in the center of the frame and tries to track and focus on it as it moves.

In macro mode, the EX-G1 can focus down to a distance of about 10cm (approx 3.9 inches) from the front of the lens. That’s a pretty poor macro: you can’t get close to small objects at that distance.

Exposure – If you think that the camera has picked the wrong shutter speed or aperture, you can push the exposure up or down by up to two stops,in one third of a stop steps. There is no option to automatically take a number of shots at a range of exposures, though (called auto exposure bracketing). You do get some limited control over the level of the flash, though; you get 5 flash level settings, from -2 up to +2.

Metering – The usual options for the metering pattern are present: you can use an evaluative pattern, a center weighted one or spot metering, which just measures the light level in a small patch in the center of the frame. Face detection can also be used, and this uses the faces as the critical elements to be correctly exposed for.

White Balance – The EE-G1 offers the usual selection of white balance presets, including those for daylight, shade, fluorescent, tungsten, etc. There is also an option for automatic white balance, and an option called manual which evaluates and sets the white balance. The name of this last one is somewhat confusing: it isn’t a manual setting.

Aperture – The lens built into this camera has a disappointingly small aperture range: f/3.9 to f/5.4. That doesn’t give it much room to gather more light at the wide end or to give a wide depth of field at the smaller apertures.

Shutter Speed – In most modes, the shutter speed of this camera can range from 1/2 of a second down to 1/1250 of a second. This is slightly expanded in the night shooting mode, which can go out to 4 seconds of exposure time.

Self Timer – The usual options of a 10-second and 2-second delay are on offer, as well as an unusual mode called x3 that waits 10 seconds, takes a photo, waits 2 seconds and takes another, then waits 2 seconds and takes a third.

Scene Modes

As usual with Casio cameras, a large number of scene modes are offered: 22 in total, including the usual suspects of portrait, night and Snow. A couple of unusual modes are on offer, though: Interval allows you to take a series of photos at a fixed interval (between 10 seconds and 3 minutes) over a fixed time (between 3 and 30 minutes). When you press the shutter, the camera will then take the images until the time runs out. The multi-motion image is also rather unusual: in this mode, the camera takes several images (9 or 3), isolates the moving object and pastes this over the static background in a single image. The idea is that you can then capture the movement of a footballer or skier in a single image. However, it does not work if the camera moves: it has to be static, and the process fails if there is any change in the background image.

The dynamic photo mode is also rather unusual: this tries to isolate a moving object in a photo and allows you to paste this moving image onto another photo. So, you could take a photo of the tiger enclosure at the zoo and have your kids running around in it without getting arrested for child endangerment. The process is a little fiddly and the results look a little rough, but it is kind of fun. One thing that is missing from this camera is any form of manual control. There is no way to directly set the shutter speed or aperture of the camera.

Picture Effects (2.00)

Should you want to turn your photos into a colorized monstrosity, the EX-G1 includes a number of color filters. We didn’t find the results of these to be appealing, but examples of some are shown below.

Picture Samples
Color filter off Black & white Sepia Red Green Blue More...

Drive/Burst Mode (3.50)

Two burst modes are available: a normal mode that shoots at the full resolution of the camera, and a fast mode that shoots 8 images at a lower resolution (2 megapixels). The normal mode can shoot to the capacity of the memory card: it does not slow down as images are written out.

Shot to Shot (0.34)

We measured the speed of the normal continuous shooting mode at 0.3 frames a second. That’s one frame every three seconds, which is incredibly slow even by the pedestrian standards of most point & shoot cameras. The fast mode is significantly faster, fortunately, taking the 8 frames at a speed of 3 frames per second, albeit at a greatly reduced resolution.