Casio Exilim EX-G1

Despite its reputation as one of the world's leading manufacturers of waterproof watches, Casio waited a long time before branching out into rugged digital cameras.

It's made the move with this Exilim EX-G1, whose unusual look actually hides a fairly unremarkable camera: it has a 12 Megapixel sensor and a 3x zoom without wide-angle or image stabilisation.  Both of these are features that Olympus has promised for its forthcoming µ Tough 6020, set to be available at around the same price as Casio's camera.

Handling

You certainly can't say that the G1 will go unnoticed.  Its angular shape is reminiscent of a mash-up of the 'edge design' found on the earliest Ford Focus models, a bizarre super-hero and the twisted forms of Casio's G-Shock watches.  Whatever you think about it, it certainly stands out, whether you love it (which I do) or hate it.

We found more plastic than we're used to for a camera that's waterproof to depths of 3 m and shock-resistant for falls from heights of up 2 m, but we were impressed by the flap that covers the USB port and memory card (micro SD, unfortunately), which gives easy access to the inside of the camera while still closing tightly.  The cover for the battery slot, on the other hand, is absolutely dreadful, and you need to slide open a tiny lock before pulling it out with your fingernails.  If you accidentally push the flap, even just a little, the lock closes again, and if you don't have any nails, you'll have to find a friend who does.  It's not really ideal for a camera designed to appeal to climbers and kayakers, two groups that are likely to keep their nails clipped.


Because of the stacked front, the grip is reasonably firm, but nothing better; the vertical zoom control which rests under your thumb doesn't do anything to improve it though.  At least the G1 is very light for this segment.  The arrangement of the buttons can be confusing at first, but you get used to it.

The screen is just 2.5'', and as a result, the resolution is stuck at 230 000 pixels.  On the plus side, it has good viewing angles and Casio's onscreen interface is well-designed.  When you're in playback mode, there's a lot of information available, and you can superimpose the exposure settings and an RGB histogram onto your photos as you look at them.  The fact that it can't automatically rotate photos is still woefully inadequate though.

Responsiveness

The G1 is pretty average in this section.  It isn't the fastest camera to start up, and, at 3.5 s, the wait between two photos is very long.  The autofocus does well, but the intelligent multizone mode didn't strike us as any more intelligent than any other we've seen: we preferred to stick with the central area most of the time--unless, of course, you want to use the manual focus (which is something of a rarity on this type of camera) or set the focus to infinity, which allows you to snap away almost immediately. 

Image Quality

With a relatively modest 3x zoom, no wide-angle mode and a relatively slow lens, we were hoping that the G1 would manage to produce at least some great photos despite its slimline frame and periscopic zoom.  Unfortunately though, we can nip any hope in the bud: it really didn't.

Let's start with the lens: it's accurate enough in the centre, but the result is blurry in the corners, especially at the widest available angle, where barrel distortion is all too visible, with purple fringing also on show in contrasted areas.  The lens is particularly sensitive to flare, bright lines or flashes that appear when a powerful light source is just outside of the frame.


Next up: the electronics.  Even at 64 ISO, noise is visible in dark areas of the frame, and the sensor also struggles with dynamics, meaning light spills over from bright areas into dark.  At 200 ISO, you start to see blocks of colour in darker areas, and at 800 ISO the electronic noise is so visible that it blocks out all of the detail.

The flash is solid, which is good news as without stabilisation, you'll need to use it a lot.  Without it, our portrait test shot was blurry right up to 1/10 s, and even at 3200 ISO and 1/30 s, only about half of our attempts produced useable photos.

Video

The video is in the 16:9 aspect ratio, but not HD; the resolution is just 848 x 480 pixels.  Blurriness is noticeable, and although you can use the optical zoom while filming, you can't adjust the focus.

All that's left to say is that the G1 has a lot of problems with sound too: it crackles, picks up background noise and is so dreadful that we hardly even had time to complain that it was only mono.