Sony DSC-S70 Digital Camera

The Interface

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The DSC-S70's menu system is very intuitive and easy to learn. Turning on the camera prompts the user to push the menu button's up button to bring the bottom dwelling menu bar into view. The bar is divided into five different drop-down menus, each separating different selectable features of the camera. The system is very similar to something one may see in a typical desktop operating system, as the S70 even has a "File" drop-down menu that includes features such as "Image Size" and an option to format the memory stick. The "Camera" menu brings up a list of different camera features that apply to each picture taken. The "Effect" menu allows the user to select various picture taking effects. The "Setup" menu allows the user to change some of the S70's OS settings, such as setting when the camera beeps and what language should be used (options are English or Japanese). The final button on the menu bar, which appears as a clock, allows for easy access to the camera's self timer which operates on a 10 second delay. A map of sorts lies beneath the menu bar, informing the user of what each menu button selection will do.

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One of the S70 OS's most useful feature is the ability to easily delete the last picture taken. After taking a picture, all one has to do is hit the left menu button, an action which brings up a review of the last picture taken. In this mode, the picture filename, date and time taken are all displayed, as well as a "Delete" menu option. If one chooses not to delete the picture, hitting the return button returns the user to the record mode.

When in playback mode, the menu bar changes slightly, replacing the self-timer with an "Index" button, the "Effect" button with a "Delete" button, and the "Camera" button with a "Tool" button. Both the "Index" button and the "Delete" button do exactly what one may think, with the "Index" button taking the user into an index view mode of all pictures on the memory stick and the "Delete" button bringing up a dialogue box confirming the delete selection.

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The "File" drop-down menu now includes a list of functions that can be operated upon the taken picture, such as rotating the picture or protecting it. The "Tool" menu offers two options: copy the current picture or resize it. The "Setup" menu remains unchanged.

One of the most useful features of the playback mode on the S70 is its ability to zoom in on a given picture. Limited to the 560x220 LCD screen on the back of the camera, images taken at the S70's full resolution of 2048x1536 are extremely shrunk. If one wants more detail or just wants to see if a specific part of a picture came out, it is possible to zoom in on the already taken image by pressing the telephoto zoom button. By doing so, a zoom in of the displayed picture from 1.1x to 5.0x is shown on the rear LCD screen. The image can be moved around simply by hitting the menu button in the desired direction. This is extremely nice when looking for a specific detail in a previously taken picture.

The S70's menu system was a pleasure to work with, providing easy access to all the camera's features. The only item which plagues the menu's use is the aforementioned menu button. Since using the menu button is the only way to navigate around the camera's menu based OS, we often ended up selecting features we did not intend to, resulting in frustration.