Location of the Lens (Point & shoot)

[TechieJustin]

I was looking at the Sony T200 and the lens is in the upper right corner.
Is this a bad design?

[kgosden]

I guess it is if you don't like the way it looks. From a technical standpoint the location of the lens has no impact on the camera. The only slight exception to that rule is that the lens and flash should be as far apart as possible to help reduce red eye.

[Beowulff]

Some reviewers have questioned the location of lenses in the upper right-hand corner of ultra-compacts as being a potential problem re inadvertently putting part of a finger or fingertips over the lens without realising. (Due to the fact that most LCD displays only show 95% of the actual field of view.)

I personally don't like this particular lens location, but in lots of cases the internal optical path geometry of folded lens demands this.

You've probably already read Jeff's review HERE (http://www.dcresource.com/reviews/sony/dsc_t200-review/index.shtml) in which he says in part:

The DSC-T200's photo quality was pretty good for an ultra-compact camera. The camera captures sharp photos with pleasing colors, with generally accurate exposure. A few times I did notice that the camera really blew out the highlights, though. Purple fringing was well-controlled, as was noise. There isn't much noise since the camera is applying a fair amount of noise reduction, the results of which are visible even at low ISOs. You'll notice that fine details are smudged, and solid colors (like the sky) appear a bit blotchy. The camera also has minor issues with vignetting, corner blurriness, and barrel distortion, which seem to be "standard features" on ultra-compact cameras. It has big issues with redeye.....

Considering its excellent feature set, I think the T200 would be a great buy, particularly because of its huge LCD and its longer-than-average 5x zoom.

Cheers :)

[cdifoto]

Anything from Sony is a bad design.


*ba dum CHING*


:D

[cdifoto]

OK in seriousness, it's a really GOOD design for flash usage. You can rotate the camera counter-clockwise, putting your hand naturally on top, for portraits and the flash will look better (not great, but better) since the flash is directly above the lens (rather than off to the side) in that position. That helps eliminate/reduce those ugly side-shadows.

Downside is the flash is off to the side in horizontal position so you'll get side-shadows that way.

You can't really have it all when it comes to a pocket-size P&S.

[TechieJustin]

OK in seriousness, it's a really GOOD design for flash usage. You can rotate the camera counter-clockwise, putting your hand naturally on top, for portraits and the flash will look better (not great, but better) since the flash is directly above the lens (rather than off to the side) in that position. That helps eliminate/reduce those ugly side-shadows.

Downside is the flash is off to the side in horizontal position so you'll get side-shadows that way.

You can't really have it all when it comes to a pocket-size P&S.

There is no free lunch.

I'm probably going to go with a Canon A650i. I want some great quality pictures and I have one P&S camera; W70.