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Nikon S6300 First Impressions Review

$199.95
By TJ Donegan February 11, 2012
7.1
Better than 50% of Reviewed Digital Cameras
http://reviewed-production.s3.amazonaws.com/attachment/44c23c78f6bb4aca5e60003e06883663558c729c/s940x110_Nikon-Coolpix-S6300-940x400.jpg

Handling

Menu

The menu on the S6300 is a straightforward setup of lists of options organized under tabs for playback, system, and shooting settings. The tabs do not have specific pages, so you'll have to know what category the option you want is under and then scroll through the whole list to find it. This is especially frustrating if you want to get at an option that's at the bottom of the menu, because there's no easy way to know it's there without scrolling.

The menu otherwise provides a small measure of control over your shots, with options for drive mode, ISO, white balance, color mode, image size and quality, and other settings right on the first page of shooting settings. Altogether the S6300's menu isn't anything revolutionary or fantastic, but it gets the job done with a minimal of fuss or effort required.

Ease of Use

The Nikon S6300 is very simple to use, with a straightforward, legible menu system that doesn't do much that might confuse novice shooters. The one area that can be a little bit of a pain is the scene mode menu, which merely shows a group of symbols, rather than symbols with accompanying text, in a grid on the screen. This can make finding a particular scene mode (or the most apt scene mode) tough, unless it's something obvious and specific such as fireworks.

If you're looking to take a portrait, the S6300's smart portrait mode helps aid this dramatically. The smart portrait mode is a separate mode form the scene settings and utilizes face detection, blink detection, a skin softening filter, and a smile timer in order to take portraits as simply as possible.

FI Ease Of Use Photo
The smart portrait mode makes taking portraits without people blinking nice and easy.

FI Menu Photo
The menu on the S6300 is nothing spectacular, but it gets the job done and is simply to navigate.

Size & Handling

The S6300 is very compact for a 10x optical zoom camera. It can easily fit into the pocket of a pair of jeans, not to mention a small jacket or purse. The curved nature of the edges fit the contours of the hand more comfortably, though there's no specific inlay for grip, nor is there any kind of rubberized coating on the body to help hold onto the body.

The camera's size and light weight (with battery and card it only weighs a paltry 5.7oz) are great for handling, but beware that with such a long zoom range, there's not much ballast to the camera to help balance against your hand's natural shaking. Despite the camera's built-in vibration reduction, you'll want to steady yourself against something when utilizing the full 10x optical zoom, or utilize the camera's best shot selector burst mode, which will take multiple images and try and record what it thinks the sharpest one is.

FI Handling Photo 1
The camera handles well and is quite stylish, fitting a lot of zoom into a compact form factor.


FI Handling Photo 2
The camera is quite slim, but its long zoom and lack of grip can prove dicey when trying to keep shots stable.

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TJ is the Editor in Chief of DigitalCameraInfo. He is a Massachusetts native and worked as a freelance journalist and photographer prior to joining the Reviewed.com team. He has an unhealthy love of sports, sportswriting, samoyeds, and alliteration.
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