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According to tradition, the fifth wedding anniversary is the "paper anniversary." Luckily, my wife Eileen knows how I feel about tradition. So after I presented her with a lovely gem-studded anniversary ring (she loves tradition!), she handed me a new Kodak DC25 Digital Camera.
As an increasingly-avid amateur photographer, I've bored Eileen to tears with my ongoing attempts at artiness, capturing the neighborhood playground at dusk or shooting a whole roll of our backyard garden in a vain attempt to give personality to tomato plants. Even dear ole Dad, himself an annoying amateur photographer, has been known to yawn when surveying my photographic handiwork. Heck, I even bore myself sometimes, sweating over film speed, new lenses, and what kind of tissue to clean the lens with.
Enter my new digital camera. You see, with this handy-dandy little sharpshooter, I'm taking snapshots again. And that's really what Kodak's DC25 is all about.
 The first thing I noticed when I pulled it from its cheery orange package was its manageable size. Unlike its bulkier digital cousins of the past several years, the DC25 is the same size as its film-based, fixed lens counterparts. Fits right in the palm of your hand! Not to be mistaken for an SLR either in appearance or performance, the DC25 is the spitting image of the all-automatic, point-and-shoot 35mm cameras that have come to dominate the low end of the camera market. Simply stated, it's a perfect tool for capturing party pictures, basic archival shots (say of your new house under construction or your spouse after a particularly unique haircut), or the obligatory laugh-a-minute snapshots of you and your co-workers in a trade show booth.
 Scott's thoughtful wife Eileen taken with the DC25. Weighing in at a Lilliputian 9.5 oz. (with two 3v lithium batteries), the DC25 is engineered for travel, whether it be in the side pocket of your laptop case or the main compartment of your backpack. The 1.6" color LCD display is relatively small (for an extra hundred dollars or so there are cameras with slightly larger displays), especially when you use it to view up to four shots at once. But heck, to be honest, nobody I've shown the camera to has complained about the size of the display, and when you're trafficking in snapshots, it's hardly an issue. The instant gratification the display affords, coupled with the convenience of the DC25's fixed focus lens and automatic exposure and flash settings, make it a perfect digital companion when you're ignoring your artistic instincts and simply looking to record a moment in time. And make no mistake, the DC25's 24-bit color snapshots (493 x 373 pixels in high resolution mode, 320 x 240 in standard mode) are more than adequate for populating your home page or informal sections of a company website. In fact, my snapshot of Neil Young chatting up Don Johnson at this year's Farm Aid was good enough to run on the front page of JAMtv, not to mention very successful at amusing most of my friends and family when I sent it to them as a .jpg e-mail attachment. The camera comes with serial cables for both Mac or Windows, plus Kodak's own Picture Easy software for transferring your shots from camera to computer. Following my usual "never read the manual" policy, I was able to shoot pictures, transfer them to my computer, and e-mail them to friends and family within minutes of opening the package. And I still can't program my VCR! The package also boasts a "Special Fun Edition" (read "feature poor" version) of Pictureworks Technology's Photoenhancer, a rock-simple program for performing simple image manipulation (blacking in red eyes, correcting for improper lighting conditions, or creating a cartoon or embossed effect on your photos) and an equally basic but entertaining copy of Kai's Power Goo, another idiot-proof program that enables you to create "funhouse mirror" effects and animations with your photos. There are also a few goofy frills thrown in for fans of fluff (digital postcard software, Kodak Inkjet Snapshot Paper, and a ten-second timer that enables participation in your own boudoir shots). A few more rock-solid features for serious-minded users inlude a TWAIN Acquire module for Windows systems, an Adobe Photoshop-compatible plug-in for MacHeads, and provisions for additional storage on a Kodak Picture Card or any ATA-compatible CompactFlash(tm) card. Available in camera and computer stores everywhere, the Kodak DC25 Digital Camera is a highly enjoyable, affordable entree into the world of digital snapshots, not to mention a really swell anniversary gift. - Scott Hess [10/17/97] |
