Casio Exilim EX-Z300

Manual Focus (5.50)
Surprisingly for such a generally auto-mode point-and-shoot, the Z300 does offer manual focus. It's adjusted using the left and right buttons on the four-way pad. While focusing, the central area of the screen is enlarged to assist in focusing.

ISO (8.75)
The Z300 has a generous range of ISOs, running from ISO 64 to ISO 3200. These will suit almost any light level, and the competent noise controls means that you won't be to bedeviled by that insidious static.

White Balance (4.50)
White balance controls are usually accessed via the menu system, but can be customized to the quick menu if you need to change them on the fly. There's a pretty good range of choices here: Daylight, Overcast, Shade, DayWhite Fluorescent, Daylight Fluorescent, Tungsten, Auto and Manual. Having multiple variations of fluorescent lighting is useful, as different bulbs can cast different colors of light, though a Flash preset would also have been a nice addition. The Z300 has the unusual feature of a white balance editing mode, where you can go into photos already taken, and adjust the white balance during playback.

Exposure (2.50)
Exposure compensation can be set to the common ±2 EV in 1/3 steps. Auto exposure bracketing would have been a nice inclusion, but at least there's some control.

Metering (6.00)
The metering can be set to multi, center-weighted, or spot, but be careful; this is one of the many settings that gets reset every time the camera is turned off.

Shutter Speed (0.00)
Shutter speed is beyond your control with this camera, relying instead on the auto exposure system. Shutter speeds run the rather restrictive gamut of 1/2 to 1/2000 of a second in normal shooting mode, which is extended up to 4 seconds in night mode. We would have preferred more manual control over this setting, or at least the option of taking one- or two-second exposures while not in night mode, but it was not meant to be.

Aperture (0.00)
Another important setting whose manual controls are sadly lacking on the Z300. At its widest setting the aperture range is f/2.6 to f/7 and zoomed in it alters to f/5.8 to f/15.5. F/2.6 is quite speed for a point and shoot, and lends itself well to low-light and handheld zoom photography.