Nikon Coolpix S230 Digital Camera Review

Nikon Coolpix S230

Digital Camera Review

The Nikon S230 is a small, compact, point-and-shoot camera that features a 3-inch touchscreen display. The rest of the features are pedestrian, with a 3x optical zoom and 10 megapixels onboard. Not surprising given the S320's tiny size, this is definitely a pocketable camera. The Nikon S230 is currently available for $229.95. 
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Modes  
image Design & Layout Page 5 of 8 Controls image

Auto Mode


The Nikon S230's auto mode has several features to help improve your shots. First up is an automatic scene selector, which attempt to tell what kind of scene your capturing and make the necessary adjustments. There's also face detection on board, which can handle up to 12 faces (theoretically). The S230 also tries to compensate for camera shake, although this is electronic rather than built into the lens, which is usually less effective. Motion detection is also built in, which boosts the ISO when fast motion is detected in the scene.Finally you can switch to a smile detection mode, which will try to figure out when your subject smiles and takes a photo at the appropriate time. This is not built into the standard auto mode, however. These technologies are all relatively standard in modern camera, but they do all help to make the automatic mode a bit smarter. This is a good thing since you won't find any advanced manual modes on the S230, although you can make manual adjustments to ISO and exposure compensation.

Flash, timer and focus buttons are found on
the screen in Auto mode.

Movie Mode


The Nikon S230 captures video at a maximum resolution of 640 x 480 at 24 frames per second, relatively typical for a modern camera.

Movie capture comes at a max resolution of 640 x 480.

Drive/Burst Mode


Unfortunately Nikon has not provided any information about the maximum frames per second the S230 can capture. In the menu you can choose from Continuous, Best Shot Selector (which takes up to ten shots and picks the sharpest), Multi-Shot 16, and Interval Timer Shooting.

Playback Mode


To enter playback on the Nikon S230 just press the dedicated playback button at the bottom right of the back. This gives the interface below where you see your latest photo in full screen. You can navigate between photos by pressing the next and previous buttons on-screen, but you can also swipe your finger across the screen.

During playback you can swipe the screen
to move between shots.

Custom Image Presets


The Nikon S230 offers 19 different scene modes, each adjusts your settings for a particular situation. Press the mode button and then the scene mode tab on the display to get the list of all the scene modes and then select the one you want. Unfortunately, the requirement for having rather large icons on the screen so their finger friendly also means you don't have a lot of information on the display about what the scene modes actually do, so we recommend you peruse the manual to figure out what all these icons mean. As you can see below, they range from the mildly arcane to the completely absurd.

The Nikon S230 offers 19 scene modes.

 

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