Kodak Pixpro FZ53 - Review 2022

If you're a casual snap shooter looking for a quality pocket photographic camera with a small price tag, you have a tough row to hoe. At just $89.99, the Kodak Pixpro FZ53 is appealing on the surface—information technology comes with a familiar brand name, and a sleek, bonny pattern. But while you exercise get a 5x zoom lens, information technology lags behind the latest smartphones in image and video quality, and doesn't include whatever sort of wireless connectivity. Skip information technology and go along snapping shots with your phone, or spend more than on a better camera.

Pattern

The Pixpro FZ53 is very small, measuring just 2.2 past three.6 by 0.9 inches (HWD) and weighing a mere iii.7 ounces. As you'd expect, its trunk is plastic, but it doesn't feel cheaply made. JK Imaging, which manufacturers cameras under the Kodak banner, offers it in black, bluish, and red.

The zoom lens is a 28-140mm f/3.nine-6.iii design, a 5x ratio. Its widest angle of coverage isn't every bit wide as some other low-toll cameras, like the Catechism PowerShot Elph 170 IS, which sports an optically stabilized 25-300mm f/3.six-7 zoom. The Kodak zoom is stabilized digitally, just I ended up with blurry handheld images when zoomed, like the one below that was shot at the maximum zoom setting.

Y'all'll find the ability, record, and shutter buttons on the top. Rear controls are all to the correct of the LCD. There's a zoom control at the peak, with Play, Mode, and Carte buttons below information technology. You as well become a iv-mode control pad with directional controls to adjust display settings, control the flash, delete images, and set the focus style and cocky-timer. The Gear up button, basically an OK push button, is at its heart.

The Menu button launches an on-screen overlay that controls the metering pattern, paradigm resolution, drive fashion, and focus area. No matter what mode y'all're in or what you practice, the FZ53 always defaults to middle-area autofocus when it turns on. If you desire to enable a wider autofocus zone, y'all'll demand to practice so every time yous ability on the camera. It'south abrasive, equally most casual snappers will want the FZ53 to automatically select a focus point.

Most photographers are going to leave the photographic camera set to fully automatic manner. But in that location are some manual controls bachelor. When the camera is set to Manual, you don't take total control like an SLR, but yous can brighten or darken scenes using EV compensation, gear up the ISO sensitivity, and ready the shutter to perform long-exposure photography—settings from 1 2nd to 30 seconds are bachelor. You can't select shorter shutter speeds (helpful to freeze move or compensate for the lack of optical stabilization) or gear up the f-finish.

Other shooting modes include Auto (the default), Anti-shake (which enables digital stabilization), Portrait, Movie, Panorama, and twenty different Scene modes. Some of these are useful for shooting fast action, and others are tuned for fireworks, landscapes, and night landscapes.

Motorcar doesn't go out much leeway for adjustment. You can turn the flash off and toggle macro focusing—when enabled it can lock on to subjects a couple of inches from the lens—only the FZ53 doesn't remember your settings once you plow it off. If y'all want to make certain the camera keeps the flash turned off, it'southward best to get out it in Manual mode.

The 2.7-inch LCD is smaller than you get with most indicate-and-shoots, but that's considering the FZ53 itself is small. I don't mind the size, only the quality is poor. It'south visibly soft, with a mere 230k-dot design, and viewing angles from the top or bottom are poor. Looking at it from the left or right is no trouble, simply it's hard to see if you tilt the photographic camera up or down.

There's no Wi-Fi, a feature you look to see in pretty much every camera nowadays. Images are stored on an SD menu and the FZ53 includes a rechargeable battery. There's a standard micro USB port on the side to charge the battery. You're supposed to be able to snap 200 shots on a total charge according to CIPA standards, but I noticed that the battery life indicator depleted by one-half after just well-nigh lxx snaps.

Functioning and Image Quality

The FZ53 takes a long fourth dimension to first, focus, and fire—most 4.eight seconds. Its autofocus organisation is also boring, requiring about 0.4-second to lock on to our static test target. You lot can enable a 2.6fps continuous shooting mode, but doing so cuts image resolution to but 4MP. If you want to shoot a series of images at the full 16MP size, expect to await most 3.3 seconds betwixt each shot.

Kodak Pixpro FZ53 : Benchmark Tests I used Imatest to cheque the quality of the FZ53'southward lens. At 28mm f/3.nine it shows ane,555 lines per moving picture summit on a centre-weighted sharpness examination. That'southward less than the 1,800 lines we want to see at a minimum, and our field results confirm the lab tests—I wouldn't call the camera's output sharp or crisp. The eye of the frame is the best area, showing well-nigh i,700 lines, merely it drops to 1,500 lines as you motility away, and edges show about 1,300 lines.

When zoomed all the way in, paradigm quality takes a big striking. The boilerplate score drops to 1,213 lines, which nets blurry results fifty-fifty when you get a steady shot. Even the very center of the frame is soft, showing a mere 1,400 lines. To put this in perspective, the iPhone 7 Plus' main 28mm lens resolves 2,454 lines on the aforementioned exam, and its tighter 56mm lens notches ii,154 lines.

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Image noise is also a concern when evaluating photo quality. The FZ53 uses a 16MP CCD paradigm sensor. It keeps racket under one.v percent through ISO 800, which is a fine upshot for a compact, but it takes some serious dissonance reduction to get there. Images at ISO 800 prove significant blur in what fine detail the lens is able to capture. Image quality is best at the lowest ISO 80 setting, and remains decent at ISO 100. Simply you showtime to run into splotchy noise at ISO 200, and ISO 400 results are blurred. Premium smartphones like the Galaxy S7 don't prove an reward in clarity through most ISO 400, only beyond that things even out. Just you have to remember that they typically have wide aperture lenses that capture more than calorie-free than the FZ53—well-nigh 4 times as much at the wide bending. That means an ISO 800 shot from the FZ53 can be captured at ISO 100 with a skilful smartphone.

Video is recorded at 720p quality at 30fps and saved in QuickTime format. Even under our vivid studio lights test footage is noticeably grainy. Y'all can zoom the lens while recording, and the camera does adjust focus equally needed. I ran into a weird event with audio, however, when trying to play back a examination prune using the standard Mac QuickTime actor—the video was silent. I had to open up it in VLC to hear the sound. One time I did, I noticed that the sound of the lens zooming in and out isn't overwhelming on the soundtrack (though you lot can hear it if you listen closely), but the sound of the focus adjusting is quite distracting.

Stabilization is digital only, so wait handheld video to be shaky. Fifty-fifty when shooting from a sitting position, property the camera carefully with two hands, my exam footage was visibly shaky.

Conclusions

The Kodak Pixpro FZ53 is inexpensive and it has a zoom lens. Once you lot move beyond that, though, advantages over a expert smartphone camera are nonexistent. If you want to find a cheap indicate-and-shoot that's worth your money, you'll have to redefine that definition. The Canon PowerShot Elph 170 IS, and its follow-upwardly the 190 IS, both sell for virtually $150. Nosotros liked the 170 when we reviewed it, and accept asked Canon to ship the 190 IS over for evaluation to see if it delivers the same level of quality. The FZ53 may exist one-half the toll, but information technology isn't worth it.