Fujifilm FinePix F60fd

Auto Mode (4.75)

Movie Mode (5.50)
Movies can be shot at two resolution settings, 640 x 480 or 320 x 240, at 25 frames per second in both cases. Movie size is limited to 2 gigabytes, which means a single 640 x 480 clip could stretch on for an excruciating 35 minutes. The sound is monaural, and sound recording can't be turned off, so be careful what you mumble while shooting family videos. Because of the sound recording, no doubt, changes in zoom are prohibited while shooting video, since the motor sound would be captured.

Drive / Burst Mode (9.00)
There are many options for continuous shooting, some of which even have practical benefits. The most important burst modes, of course, are those that use full camera resolution, which here includes:

- Continuous: Long Period mode (keep shooting till you release the shutter or you run out of memory)
- Continuous: Final 3 (takes up to 40 pictures, but only the last 3 are saved)
- Continuous: Top 3 (take up to 3 pictures while the shutter is pressed. What makes this 'top' 3 is anyone's guess)

For these three modes, Fujifilm claims a frame rate of 'up to 2fps.' We came nowhere near this number in our lab tests in Continuous: Long Period mode, eking out just one photo every three seconds. Still, if you want to be literal about it, that performance does indisputably fit within the 'up to' phrasing. And shooting in Top 3 mode did crank along at nearly 2 frames per second -- just not for very long, and the process of writing the three files to the memory card from the internal memory buffer where they were initially stored was excruciatingly slow.

In addition to these three modes, there are two additional choices at 3-megapixel-or-below resolutions with ISO automatically pegged to ISO 400 or above:

- Continuous: Final 12 (take up to 40 pictures while shutter is depressed, keep only the last 12)
- Continuous: Top 12 (take up to 12 pictures)

Here Fujifilm claims 'up to 5fps' and, much to our surprise, that's almost exactly the result we achieved.

Playback Mode (9.00)
In single-frame playback mode you have three display options from which to choose, cycled by hitting the DISP button: image information displayed, clean full-screen image and a calendar view, which sorts images by date taken. You can browse through dates by pressing up and down on the 4-way controller, and through images taken on a particular date by pressing side to side. We like having calendar view so easily accessible: it's a very useful way of navigating through your images, but for most cameras you have to jump through hoops (like zooming out repeatedly, beyond the smallest thumbnail image display level) to reach it.

Speaking of zooming in and out, the F60fd offers thirteen levels of zoom during full-res image playback (zoom capability varies depending on image size), and while no specific zoom ratio is provided, it delivers a huge blow-up that's more than adequate for a detailed focus check. Zooming out beyond single-frame in the opposite direction yields multi-frame playback, first two images, then nine, then a hundred. The dual-image mode is particularly useful, since it makes side-by-side comparison of related images easy.

The slide show utility offers the option to use the usual straight-ahead jumps or fade-ins between frames, and for photos with faces, employ an automatic zoom into the detected mug shots. It's also possible to display several images at once during the slide show, dividing the screen into quarters, which might be interesting on a big-screen TV display.

The image editing options show a distinct lack of consumer-oriented fun. You can remove red-eye, rortate an image, copy, add a voice memo or crop a section and save it in a separate file. Wheee!

Custom Image Presets (6.25)
There are thirteen scene modes in all, available by setting the Mode dial to SP, then opening up the shooting menu. These include:

- Portrait
- Portrait enhancer (smoother skin, softer focus)
- Landscape
- Sport
- Night
- Fireworks
- Sunset
- Snow
- Beach
- Museum (turns off flash, all lamps and sounds)
- Party
- Flower (macro mode on, flash disabled)
- Text