My new Fujifilm FinePix S4000

Just brought my first bridge camera, the Fujifilm FinePix S4000. I brought it to replace my Canon Ixus 700. I decided to buy the FinePix S4000 as the reviews on Amazon.co.uk were very good, and so was the price! I have never used a camera like this before so I took some pictures in the auto mode, when I got home and uploaded them I was a little dissapointed as the images (when zoomed) appeared to be very soft, kind of like painted! 4 days after buying the camera I read a review on a blog site, they mentioned what I first thought about the softness when zoomed and many comments were saying how bad the images were! I have uploaded a few these were all taken with the auto setting and some of the close up with macro. Are they that bad, should I return the camera?

This my gallery for larger samples http://www.flickr.com/photos/63941886@N03/

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5151/...9463db07_b.jpg
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2771/...fae84f2a_b.jpg
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2519/...a0e859db_b.jpg
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2679/...0001319c_b.jpg

Hi and welcome to the forum.
I came across this link that seem to confirm what you say about the paint effect
.http://www.photographyblog.com/revie...image_quality/ .
From what i saw on your flickr site the deep colours seem respectable, but the lighter colours do seem, as if they were water coloured. I can only think, you are going to get fed up taking water colour effect sky's ect.Hope this helps you... graham

Many thanks for the response. To be honest I think I will stick with it as the pictures are of good enough quality for what I want! and was a very good price for a camera of this spec. Do you think it is a hardware issue or will a firmware update address the problem? The only other camera at this sort of price and spec I could find is the Nikon Coolpix L120, what do you think? worth swapping?

HI .Glad your sorted and keeping the s4000.Don't think it is a software problem could be a firm ware upgrade though. For light photos try your camera on p mode and move your exposure compensation to -3 and see if that helps good luck graham

Typing error i meant -0.3

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Originally Posted by Fujifilm FinePix S4000

Many thanks for the response. To be honest I think I will stick with it as the pictures are of good enough quality for what I want! and was a very good price for a camera of this spec. Do you think it is a hardware issue or will a firmware update address the problem? The only other camera at this sort of price and spec I could find is the Nikon Coolpix L120, what do you think? worth swapping?

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Hi there. From what I see here, your pics are very nice with the sharpness giving no problems at all. As Graham suggests, you can experiment with your exposure settings, or place the camera in Manual mode and set the aperture and speed to give accurate exposure for the scene. I have owned 2 Fujifilm Finepix cameras which still do good stuff and they are 7 years old now. All the best, Mike.

Actually I may be wrong in advising you to set your camera on Manual Mode, after looking at the spec it would seem that it doesn't have one, unless the site I looked at forgot to include that in their spec. Your camera has an amazing zoom lens, and if I were you I would stick with it and learn how to get the best out of it. It should be great for wildlife etc with that amount of zoom. All the best, Mike.

Many thanks for the advice guys, will check some of the manual settings out and let you know how I get on. It is wet and windy here today so I will have to wait before I can take some more pictures!

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Originally Posted by Fujifilm FinePix S4000

Many thanks for the advice guys, will check some of the manual settings out and let you know how I get on. It is wet and windy here today so I will have to wait before I can take some more pictures!

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Oh boy how I would like to live in your location, the scope for photography must be enormous. You must post some images of your beautiful Guernsey whenever you can, including birds and insects as well as landscapes. All success to you.. Mike.

Look for the woman; there's a woman at the bottom of it!----Dumas.