Kodak EasyShare Z700

The Kodak EasyShare Z700 targets a market that Kodak has served for about a century — folks who want to take snapshots without knowing much, or bothering much, about photography. The camera, which is bundled with a printer, is designed to keep nearly everything simple, while offering even the most casual user a range of options.

The EasyShare Z700 is the low end of Kodak’s new "Z" line of consumer-oriented EasyShare digital cameras. It features a 5x optical zoom and 4 MP CCD imaging chip, which are smaller than the 10x lens and 5 MP sensor on the higher-end EasyShare Z740. The fixed LCD screen is also a bit smaller than the Z740’s. There are other differences between the cameras, but they aren’t major. The two cameras are built for the same market and serve the same basic functions with an overwhelming simplicity.

The camera and printer combination is designed to function without the burdensome reliance on a computer. It’s possible to go from scene to print in just two buttons - one to take the picture, and then another to print it out — it’s impressively simple. It seems the intent is to make the entire process as simple as possible, enabling users to do all those things by following very simple directions on the camera’s LCD display, even for the user who does those things so rarely that they forget how between uses.