Modern-day analog experience? Casio Z90 review
Remember the pre-smartphone days, when on a family vacation we used to carry around a small digital camera to capture moments and memories? Probably you don't, but I am assuring you that those times existed! One day I had some nostalgic thoughts about what had happened to our old little Casio EX-Z90 and what I could create with it now.
Quick search in a few boxes at my parents' place and found the little guy. Little is probably an overstatement because this thing is REALLY SMALL (that's what she said), easily smaller than any smartphone, and with its 120 grams a lightweight too. The ZX90 was released in 2009, with a CCD sensor, 12 megapixels, and a focal length of 35–105 mm.
The camera doesn't give the user a lot to play around with, only the ISO settings which range from 64 all the way up to 1600, but keep in mind that the camera adjusts the shutter and aperture automatically, so I left the settings on fully auto for once.
So the burning question is, how is it?
Actually, surprisingly good, depending on the conditions. Of course, I didn't expect modern-day DSLR quality in the first place, but in daylight, it produces pretty good results for its age and tiny sensor. With some editing, you can even achieve a nice analog look, which I am a sucker for. And yes, I was too lazy to adjust the time stamp, therefore I am not a time traveler which I do mind honestly.
I made the mistake of trying to underexpose manually an image at night, which resulted in the compensation of a slow shutter speed which made it impossible to get steady results, but honestly? I love the “flawed” and blurry outcome, especially combined with the date/time stamp, which adds another layer to the analog look.
I especially like how it handles the green, blue, and yellow tones, reminds me a bit of the look of a roll of Kodak Gold or Portra.
Even though this just started out as a fun experiment, I seriously consider it to be part of my everyday camera bag from now on. With its compact size, decent picture quality, and the outcome of the edited pictures it serves as a cheaper and much more modern alternative to an analog point and shoot, considering the fact that film prices won’t stop rising. Of course, you can never achieve the 100% film look with digital alternatives and I don't plan to leave my beloved film gear at home, but with its saturation of colors, imperfections due to the small sensor, and softness of the edges, it comes pretty close to that look, in my opinion at least. I wonder when more people will pick up these older compact digitals again, such as these days film has its upswing again. I would highly recommend these to anyone considering picking up photography as a new hobby, just for the fact alone that they are very cheap to buy used, so there won’t be any regret of spending a huge amount on a new DSLR which ends up collecting dust on the shelf.
