Image Quality and Verdict

Nikon Coolpix S4150 Review – Image Quality

The proof of a pudding is in the eating and here that means the image and video quality. The lens is sharp and able to provide a good range of view options from wider views to good zoom ratios and so can deal well with detail thrown at it.
But I notice images have a lot of noise processing thrown at them which smoothes away a lot of the finer information within shots, making landscapes look as though they’ve been smoothed over.

Lower sensitivity settings, which can climb from ISO 80 to ISO 3200, suffer less but above ISO 800 detail can become much smoothed although of course, noise issues are reduced. Shadow detail is problematic too since any deep shadow is devoid of detail, the camera’s processing seemingly tasked with prioritizing the highlights. That’s fine but if you’re shooting high contrast subjects, the lack of shadow detail can be a problem.

The HD video is good enough, the capture rate at 720P is smoothly rendered and the lens can be zoomed during shooting and the AF is active throughout, if it’s a little slow to react to faster moving scenes or if you pan or move the camera about too quickly.

Nikon Coolpix S4150 Review – Verdict

The Nikon Coolpix S4150 is priced at £129.99 and given its feature set and the attractive styling and build; it’s a relative bargain.

The image quality is on a par with other cameras of this ilk, nothing to shout from the rooftops about but good enough for most tasks. Given the price the touch screen is a real bonus when snapping quickly or for providing improved flexibility over capture options.

It’s an excellent feature if the camera’s mounted on a tripod too, say, shooting macro subjects because you can pick the focus point and take the shot at the relevant point on the screen simply by touching it.

Overall, the Coolpix S4150 represents great value in a stylishly svelte snapper that does plenty in terms of features and just enough in terms image quality.