Nikon Coolpix S630 Digital Camera Review

Nikon Coolpix S630

First Impressions Review

3.9 The Nikon S630 was announced earlier this month, an addition to its Coolpix line featuring a 12-megapixel sensor, 7x optical zoom, as well as VR image stabilization and other features to help you capture the best possible shot. Despite the 7x zoom level, the S630 is still very sleek and pretty darned petite. The S630 retails for $279 and is available in 5 colors. We manhandled the S630 in Royal Purple at PMA in Las Vegas to bring you this first impressions review.
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Coolpix S630 Prices

Controls  
image Modes Page 6 of 8 Conclusion image

Manual Controls


The S630 has, surprisingly, no manual controls whatsoever to adjust exposure or anything else.

Focus


The S630 has a standard auto-focus mode, plus Enhanced Face-Priority AF that focuses on faces faster to ensure you clearly capture the people in your shot. It can detect up to 12 faces at once and the exposure level is automatically adjusted to ensure face brightness is optimal.

ISO


The S630 has a wide range of ISO settings, starting at 64 and going up to 6400 with 6 levels in between. That stunning-sounding 6400 is not available at full resolution, however, and it can only be applied at resolutions of 3 megapixels or less, decreasing its impact somewhat. If the S630 was capable of applying that 6400 ISO at the full 12-megapixel resolution, it would indeed be worthy of much flowery language lauding its capabilities.

White Balance


The S630 has white balance presets to more accurately capture your images based on your lighting conditions. There is a Preset Manual setting plus Daylight, Incandescent, Fluorescent, Cloudy, and Flash presets.

Metering


The S630 has 2 metering modes - matrix and center-weighted.

Shutter Speed


The S630's shutter speed specs are not yet available.

Aperture


The S630 has no manual exposure controls. The aperture is automatically set, anywhere from f3.5 at the widest angle setting to f5.3 at the maximum zoom level.

Image Stabilization


The S630 has an optical image stabilization system that automatically moves the image sensor itself to stabilize the image when the camera is moved during capture, according to the spec sheet. We can't say this is better or worse than a lens-based image stabilization method without testing, but we have high hopes that the S630 performs well in this area.

Picture Quality & Size Options


The S630 offers a number of picture quality and size options to best suit the purpose you have in mind for your pictures, be it framing to hang in a place of honor in your home or sending it in a quick email to a friend. On the S630, you can go anywhere from the full 12-megapixel image with a resolution of 4000 x 3000 pixels down to a 1-megapixel image with a resolution of 1280 x 960, as well as choose from a few different aspect ratios.

Picture Effects


The S630 offers features to both prevent red-eye and fix it in images already captured. Fixing red-eye in a captured picture is as easy as using the edit menu in Playback mode and selecting the Quick Retouch option. During image capture, you can also apply common effects such as sepia and black and white to change the look of your photos.

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