Casio Exilim EX-300A

Rating: (4.5 / 5)

A few years ago, I bought a Casio Exilim while on vacation - we'd lost the charge cord for the other camera - and I've used and liked it ever since. The old Exilim has taken quite a beating, too - it's been dunked in water, crammed in purses and bags, handled by three kids - and it's still working perfectly. So I was interested to see how the EX-300A compared. All in all, this is a really great camera.

The EX-300A is a bit thicker than my first Exilim, but it’s still compact. I tend to be pretty bad about putting my finger in front of the flash, but that's not an issue with this camera… the flash is placed just left of center. The Exilim has a nice bright 3" view screen and well-placed controls. On top, you have power, shoot, zoom and Make-up Mode (we’ll cover that in a minute). On the back are buttons for record, play mode, photo mode, menu and Best Shot, plus a toggle for navigating that is also a shortcut for your display and flash.

The Exilims have a great setup for pictures; you choose the scenario you're shooting from the Best Shot menu (portrait, kids, closeup, low light, etc), or you can choose Best Shot Auto and the camera will figure out the best settings for what you're doing. One recent example of how useful the Best Shot menu is: I was trying to take a picture of the care tag on a pair of pants, and I just couldn’t seem to get a clear picture of the tiny text…until I tried using the “Business cards and documents” Best Shot setting, and then it was just beautiful and clear.

I like several new Best Shot modes that my old camera didn't have – for starters, the settings for self-portrait for one person, and self-portrait for two people. It works out pretty well, too. One of the best pictures ever taken of me and my wife was using the self-portrait Best Shot.

The Make-up Mode is nice, too…the camera automatically detects faces and maximizes “facial brightness and beauty”. Be aware that this setting seems to sacrifice background a bit to emphasize faces, so it isn’t always the right choice. However, don’t like the auto modes you say? That’s no problem here. Just switch it into manual mode and you can control your photo settings as you like. And with a lot of startup time taken out from my previous version, this new Exilim reduces the likelihood that you’ll miss that important shot. I was consistently able to go from completely off to picture-ready in just 3 seconds.

I like taking videos with the Exilim, and I’ve found them to be perfectly good quality for my home videos, some cooking videos, and my wife’s video weblog. It does seem to make you wait longer than other cameras, once you’ve finished the video, to save it to the card, but it’s rarely excessive. But you can play back with sound, fast forward and rewind, zoom in, and even edit your videos (cut from the beginning, end, or middle) right on the camera. And as long as we’re talking about video, this wouldn’t be a real review without mentioning that this camera has a special YouTube capture mode. Using this feature you can capture video that follows guidelines (size, format, length, etc) for YouTube in the newly popularized HD format. After shooting, you can connect the camera to your PC and the upload software will startup and publish your new video to YouTube. It’s really just that easy. This is the feature I think I like the best because I do a lot of online video stuff and even if I’m not putting it on YouTube, it’s a good format and keeps me from having to produce the videos myself before posting them on my own website.

In playback and review mode, you can use the zoom switch to look at individual movies and pictures, a lineup, or a calendar view (this shows a thumbnail of the first pic or movie on a given day).

One interesting note about this unit, you don't charge the camera itself...you take out the battery and charge it. That doesn't really make much of a difference to me,but I could see how it would be a big advantage; you can keep an extra battery around and charge it while using the camera.

I also subjected the camera to a small battery of endurance trials. I put it in my backpack and carried it around underneath all my stuff for a week, dropped it a few times, gave it to the kids for the day, and put it in my back pocket and sat on it for hours on end. The sturdy camera never skipped a single beat.

The Bottom Line: Overall, I like that this is a compact camera that’s easy to jump right in and use. It has a lot of handy settings…you can tell a lot of thought and input went into the design and menus. It seems to be well-suited for single-handed use and the menus are easy and intuitive. While the Exilim EX-300A has a lot to offer the experienced photographer, it’s also perfect for everyone from salesmen to soccer moms and vacationers.