Sony Cybershot

I purchased a Sony Cybershot DSC W200 (12.1 megapixels) camera as my main "point & shoot" camera. I need something small that would easily fit into my back pocket or my purse, and the Cybershot was a great size, for the right price of around $400. All Cybershot cameras come with a trademark Carl Zeiss lens and a Lithium Ion rechargeable battery.

Upon opening the box containing my new camera, I was pleased to find that it was very easy to charge, and then install the battery as well as the camera memory stick. The ease of use of the camera as a whole is wonderful as well. I've never had a problem taking, viewing or printing my pictures.

Taking pictures with this camera is literally a snap! The crispness and clarity of the photos is wonderful for a standard point and shoot. The viewing menu is also nice, not large, but still quite clear. With many other cameras, the view window shows pics as blurry or distorted, and often times what you see on your computer screen or photo paper is quite different than what you see in that tiny box. Not with this point and shoot, the Cybershot really is "a what you see is what you get" kind of camera.

There are a lot of settings for taking pictures, guaranteeing you take perfect shots no matter what the time of day or what the quality of light might be. The auto setting is perfect for everyday, general use but you have the option of shooting in manual as well, altering shutter speed and aperture. The High Sensitivity setting, which is my personal favorite, has been a great one for shooting crisp, clear photos of my running children, and the Twilight setting is also one I find myself using quite often, it's appeal being that it allows me to snap pictures in very low lighting.

As with every other digital camera, the camera card that is included only holds a small number of pictures so purchasing additional memory will be necessary if you want to store more than a few pictures on your camera. There are several options regarding the size of the pictures you take, each taking up different amounts of space on your memory card as well as offering you various options for printing your photos. If you chose to have your photos blown up or printed to standard size, you can easily decide by simply selecting the appropriate option. This particular model allows shooting pictures worthy of printing at a large size of 13x19 or a small as required for email attachments.

There are also many editing options, such as converting your photos to black and white, sepia partial color. Other retouching options are softening the focus, reduction of red-eye as well as resizing the images right within your camera. You will have excellent results, vibrant color and impeccable clarity. The 12.1 megapixels ensure excellent quality, my old camera had 7 megapixels and I cannot believe the difference in sharpness, tone and evenness of my photos.

This camera is an excellent choice for an amateur photographer! I highly recommend it if you want crisp photos without the skill required to use a manual camera.