My husband and I had the chance to review the Nixon Coolpix S800c from Best Buy. I myself have a DSLR camera and I have an earlier version of one of the Nixon Coolpix cameras. For this reason when we received the camera we decided this would be my husbands. This way he can take his own photos when we go on vacation or anywhere where photos would be great to take. I have to say I’m a little jealous. I found that I really love this camera!
The Nixon Coolpix S800c isn’t just a camera it is almost like having an iPod or smart device and camera in one. You can email, check facebook, play games, and of course take photos. I’ve never had a camera with all these features unless you count my iPhone. I highly recommend when you get your camera to spend a little time looking through the manual there is so much information that I think you need to absorb what it does before you jump in. I set up the phone as it was mine so I could get started testing it out. Everything is hooked up through my google account. Once you are hooked up you can download apps, hook up your email and more. So I decided to test it out by taking a photo and posting right to my Google+ account to see if it would work.
It worked like a charm. I then took a photo and emailed it to myself and it came right through and the picture was definitely a useable size. It did not resize it at all. After playing a little I thought maybe I should try taking a phew photos. My husband and previously used the camera at my daughters birthday party. The only issue he had, using the auto feature, was sometimes the flash would go off and other times it would not. When it did go off the photos looked like there was too much light. I think this is just something you would have to play with to get use to the different options on the camera (I almost called it a phone LOL). I took one subject and used the different modes on the camera: easy auto mode and special effects (soft, sepia, High-contrast monochrome, known as black and white, and Hi).
I love the black and white feature and the HI. I think the HI gives the photo a little bit more definition (that is the one in the upper left hand corner). After playing with the photos I thought it might be fun to check out some apps. Since it is a camera I thought it might be fun to look for some camera filters and features. I found some fun ones and I could have played with the camera all night. One of the apps had more filters then I could even sit here and write. So I chose one and like the above test took the same photo with different filters.
To me this is the heart of the camera, the ability to download apps and use them with your photos. Also the ability to email your photos or post online right from your camera. This is great if you are out and want to send a photo to family members instead of waiting until you return home. Usually we take photos with our camera and with our phone, the purpose of the phone is for immediate delivery to friends and family with the Nixon Coolpix S800c you can bypass the phone and simply use the camera.
Many friends that have this camera were having a hard time getting the photos off the camera, without taking out the SD Card and using an SD Reader (or if your computer has one built in). I found I was able to transfer the photos from the camera to the computer using specific steps. The steps are important. You have to plug the USB cord into the computer first. Make sure the camera is unlocked and then I plugged the USB cord into the camera. (It is important to do it this way). Your camera will then say “Turn On USB Storage or Charge Battery”. Chose “Turn On USB Storage ” you should then be able to access the camera in my Finder (or I would guess if you have Windows it would show up as a drive). You can then copy and paste the photos from the camera onto your computer.
This is important to know because I noticed when I was playing with the filter apps the photos were saving to my camera and not my SD Card so you will need to know how to transfer them. Otherwise I highly recommend the Eye-Fi card because it is just plain cool. I did a review on it here : Eye-Fi Card review. The Eye-Fi card can also be found at Best Buy.
Disclaimer: The reviewer has received compensation for this post in the form of the reviewed product or a gift card. . All opinions are my own. You may read more of my disclosure here.
