Most digital cameras are made by consumer electronics companies, but two of the latest mega-pixel cameras - denoting resolution greater than a million pixels - come from companies with photographic backgrounds.
Kodak's $4,990 DC210 is the latest in a growing line of digital cameras. It has the same resolution of more expensive models, but with a more compact case and a short zoom lens. The $6,990 Camedia C-1400L from Olympus is similar in resolution to Kodak's camera, but offers a few more features.
The DC210 is the first high-resolution Kodak machine that looks and feels like a point-and-shoot film camera. Though smaller than previous models, the DC210 offers a zoom lens, albeit a short one. The magnification at full zoom is only twice the wide angle setting, making it something like a 29mm-58mm zoom on a 35mm film camera.
The 29mm lens is a refreshing change from the less-than-wide angle lenses of most digital still cameras, especially Kodak's. Many people will find the wide angle far more useful than a reasonable telephoto lens when shooting in Hong Kong's confined spaces.
The quality of the DC210 lens is much better than the zooms in Kodak's previous models, which were made by Chinon and suffered from poor glass quality.
The Kodak stores images on a removable card which has a maximum capacity of 60 images on the lowest-quality setting, which is good enough for e-mailing to a friend and then dumping.
On the highest setting, 1052x864 pixels, the images are very good, showing good colour fidelity and only a few artifacts. The images are just shy of film quality, and probably are better than scanning a 3R print.