Introduction

Ease of Use

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 is a fairly small (109.7×69.6×38.3mm) compact camera featuring a sixteen-megapixel, 1/2.33-type CCD sensor and a stabilised 20x optical zoom lens. Designed to look a lot like a miniature SLR, the Pixpro FZ201 is actually a lightweight shooter that weighs in at a mere 202 grams. Powered off, with its lens retracted for storage, the Kodak FZ201 easily fits into most jacket/coat pockets and belt pouches, making it easy to carry around even on long journeys and tedious hikes. Switch on the camera, and the lens extends in approximately two seconds; a good performance given the massive focal range on offer. The lens goes from 4.5mm to 90mm, which is equivalent to 25-500mm in 35mm terms. It's worth noting that in most interchangeable-lens systems, you would need a minimum of three (usually more) lenses to cover this range. Low-light focusing is aided by an AF assist light located top left of the lens surround (if viewed head on).

Front of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

The camera has a somewhat smallish but decently sculpted, textured hand-grip, which provides a surprisingly secure hold and a good resting place for your fingers. The shutter release is in a natural location for your index finger, with the tactile (if plasticky) zoom lever surrounding it. Right next to the shutter release is a small but clearly marked power button. On the other side of the FZ201's top deck is the shooter's built-in flash, which can be popped up manually using a tiny spring-loaded button on the rear plate of the camera. There's no hot-shoe, so the only way to sync up an external flashgun with the camera is to use an optical slave (of the variety that isn't fooled by the pre-flashes emitted by the built-in unit). Unlike some bigger and more expensive superzooms, the Kodak PixPro FZ201 does not feature an eye-level electronic viewfinder, either.

This means that the pictures can only be composed on the 3” TFT monitor that occupies most of the camera's rear plate. Offering a resolution of 230,000 dots – which is fairly low for a screen of this size – this is a no-frills, fixed display with no touchscreen functionality or any other bells and whistles. The monitor's outdoors visibility is mediocre, and it does not help matters that the camera dims the screen after only a few seconds of idleness, presumably in an effort to conserve battery power.

Rear of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

To the right of the screen is a group of controls including a menu button, a four-way navigation pad with a centred SET button, Playback and Mode buttons. The camera also has a comfortable, textured thumb rest and a conveniently located, dedicated movie shutter release. A handful of functions, including flash mode, display setting and self-timer/macro modes are mapped unto the four-way pad, but that's all as far as hardware controls are concerned. This means there are no direct-access buttons for white balance, ISO speed, metering or drive mode – these, alongside other shooting parameters, can be accessed via the camera's Menu and SET buttons (in selected shooting modes). The Playback button can be configured to act as a secondary power button when all you want to do is review the pictures and videos stored on the memory card or the camera's internal memory.

The available shooting modes – accessible by pressing the Mode button – include Auto, Manual, Portrait, Movie, Panorama and Scene modes. The only difference between the Auto and Manual options – the latter of which is a bit of a misnomer – is that the “Manual” mode gives you access to white balance; colour effects including Normal, Black-and-White, Sepia and Vivid; ISO speed; exposure compensation and slow shutter speeds (which come in handy when shooting at night, for instance). On the other hand, exposure metering, image resolution, optical image stabilisation, continuous auto focus, AF mode and drive mode can be adjusted in Auto mode too. In Portrait mode, the camera optimises focus and exposure for the subject's face, and strives to produce the most realistic skin tones possible.

Top of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

The separate Movie mode might seem redundant given that there is a dedicated movie record button which enables you to start filming at any time, irrespective of what shooting mode you are in; but entering this specific mode gives you more options to fine-tune your video settings. Panorama mode allows you to take 4 consecutive shots that are then automatically stitched in-camera to produce a 180-degree panoramic image. A semi-transparent overlay of the last frame is presented in order to aid you in lining up the next shot. As far as scene modes are concerned, there are 21 on offer, including Landscape, Sport, Beach, Sunset, Fireworks, Night Landscape, Snow, Children, ID, Glass, Photo Frame, Panning Shot, Night Portrait, Fisheye, Party, Indoor, Leaf, Museum, Night Portrait, Sketch and Auto Scene.

Due to the inherent properties of the camera's CCD sensor, the Kodak PixPro FZ201 is limited to recording 720p HD videos, at either 30 or 15fps. A storage-space saving VGA movie mode (640x480 pixels @ 30fps) is also available. Both the optical zoom and the image stabiliser function can be used during movie recording, and the auto focus system will try its best to keep the subject in focus – although its efforts aren't always successful. Sound is recorded via the camera's small monaural microphone, which is located left of the lens surround.

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 In-hand

Among the Pixpro FZ201's drive modes we find a variety of options to capture time-lapse sequences. The camera can be set to take a photo every 30 seconds, every minute, every 5 minutes or every 10 minutes. Do note that each frame in the sequence is saved as a separate image, i.e. the frames are not automatically combined into a time-lapse movie. In continuous shooting mode, the camera can capture photos at a rate of about 3 frames per second.

Once you have taken a photo, the Kodak PixPro FZ201 offers an average set of options to edit it in-camera. Using the Playback menu, you can rotate or crop the image, add a colour effect, perform post-capture red-eye removal, or apply an HDR effect. The latter is akin to Shadow Adjustment on Olympus cameras or post-capture D-lighting on Nikons. The resulting picture, which usually offers improved shadow detail, is saved alongside the original. One downside to spending too much time – read: more than ten seconds – in Playback mode is that the camera will retract the lens completely into its housing, which is frustrating not only because it's a noisy affair, but also because the camera won't remember the last zoom setting, so when you return to Record mode, the lens will be invariably reset to the 25mm equivalent focal length.

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Perhaps the biggest issue we encountered while testing the camera out in the field was centred around the shooter's auto focus performance. With the lens set to the 25mm equivalent zoom position, focus acquisition is quite zippy and positive – but as soon as you zoom in a notch, the AF system slows down markedly, and focus hunting raises its ugly head. At the telephoto end, focus acquisition becomes an entirely hit-and-miss affair even in good light, leading to missed opportunities. Sometimes the subject would go in and out of focus with the FZ201 being unable to lock focus on it. In other cases, the camera would give a false focus confirmation when the subject was in fact way out of focus. While we do understand that the Kodak PixPro FZ201 is a budget-friendly camera that naturally comes with a set of compromises, we believe the AF system of a 2014 model ought to be more reliable than that.

The camera is powered by a removable, 900mAh lithium-ion battery that enables users to shoot approximately 210 photos on a single charge, as per CIPA standards. Once depleted, the battery can be charged in-camera, with the help of a USB cable and included mains adapter. Photos and videos are recorded on SD / SDHC memory cards – and while the FZ201 does not feature on-board Wi-Fi, it does at least support Eye-Fi cards for wireless image transfer.

Image Quality

A camera with a tiny, pixel-packed sensor and a large zoom ratio will always be a set of compromises and the Kodak PixPro FZ201 is no exception. Viewed at 1:1 magnification, the images look over-processed with smeared details, a tell-tale sign of over-zealous noise reduction. Downsize them to typical screen resolutions, though, and they start to look much better – an important consideration given that the camera's target consumer is probably going to view the photos in this manner. As long as you don't intend to make big prints or double-page spreads in a high-quality photo book, photographs shot in the ISO 80-400 range should be OK. Images captured at ISO 800 and 1600, however, tend to suffer from a significant loss of detail and colour saturation, meaning that the Pixpro FZ201 is not very well suited to hand-held shooting in low light. On a more positive note, we did not encounter any red-eye issues in flash shots; and the camera's Slow Shutter option, available in “Manual” mode, makes the FZ201 capable of producing much better night shots than many other compact cameras. Macro performance is good, with a close-focus point of 3cm, although this applies only when the lens is set to the 25mm equivalent focal length. As you would expect from a 20x zoom lens, chromatic aberrations can sometimes be a problem.

Noise

There are 6 ISO settings available on the Kodak PixPro FZ201. Here are some 100% crops which show the noise levels for each ISO setting.

ISO 100 (100% Crop)	ISO 200 (100% Crop)
ISO 400 (100% Crop)	ISO 800 (100% Crop)
ISO 1600 (100% Crop)

File Quality

The Pixpro FZ201 is a JPEG-only camera, with the quality options being Best, Fine and Normal.

Best	Fine
Normal

Focal Range

The 20x zoom lens has an extremely versatile focal range, as demonstrated by the examples below.

25mm	500mm

Sharpening

The out-of-the camera images are soft at the default sharpening setting and benefit from some further sharpening in a program like Adobe Photoshop.

Original (100% Crop)	Sharpened (100% Crop)

Chromatic Aberrations

For an ultra-zoom camera, the level of chromatic aberrations is not exceptionally high, but CAs are still quite easy to spot along contrasty edges.

Chromatic Aberrations 1 (100% Crop)	Chromatic Aberrations 2 (100% Crop)

Macro

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 can focus as close as 3cm from the front lens element, but only with the lens set to the 25mm equivalent focal length. Note that with such a short working distance, properly lighting your subject may prove difficult.

Macro	Macro (100% Crop)

Flash

The flash settings on the Kodak PixPro FZ201 are off, auto, fill, slow-sync, red-eye reduction and slow-sync with red-eye reduction. Do note that shooting with flash introduces a considerable amount of shutter lag. These shots of a white coloured wall were taken at a distance of 1.5m.

Flash Off - Wide Angle (25mm)	Flash On - Wide Angle (25mm)
Flash Off - Telephoto (500mm)	Flash On - Telephoto (500mm)

And here are some flash portraits. As you can see, neither the Flash On or the Red-eye Reduction settings caused a noticeable amount of red-eye.

Forced On	Forced On (100% Crop)
Auto/Red-eye Reduction	Auto/Red-eye Reduction (100% Crop)

Night

In “Manual” mode, the Kodak PixPro FZ201 offers a Slow Shutter option, allowing you to set your shutter speed anywhere between 2 and 30 seconds, which is good news for anyone interested in night photography. The following photograph was taken at a shutter speed of 8 seconds at ISO 80. We have included a 100% crop of the image to show what the quality is like.

Night	Night (100% Crop)

Anti-Shake

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 has optical image stabilisation, which allows you to take reasonably sharp pictures at shutter speeds that would otherwise be critically slow for the focal length used. To test this, we took 2 hand-held shots of the same subject with the same settings (1/40 seconds at a 35mm equivalent focal length of 109mm). The first shot was taken with the Image Stabiliser option turned off, the second with it turned on. Here is a 100% crop of each image to show the results. As you can see, with Image Stabilisation turned on, the images are sharper than when it's turned off. This feature really does seem to make a difference and could mean capturing a successful, sharp shot or missing the opportunity altogether.

On (100% Crop)	Off (100% Crop)

Post-Capture HDR

The camera has a post-capture “HDR” option, which is akin to Shadow Adjustment on Olympus cameras or post-capture D-lighting on Nikons. The resulting picture, which usually offers improved shadow detail, is saved alongside the original. The example below demonstrates the effect.

On (100% Crop)	Off (100% Crop)

Panorama

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 offers a panorama mode, which allows you to take 4 consecutive shots that are then automatically stitched in-camera to produce a 180-degree panoramic image. Note that the resolution of the resulting photo is not particularly high (4928x896 pixels), and image-stitching errors can sometimes occur.

Colour Effects

You can choose from 4 so-called colour effects including Normal, Vivid, Sepia and Black-And-White.

Normal	Vivid
B&W	Sepia

Sample Images

This is a selection of sample images from the Kodak PixPro FZ201 camera, which were all taken using the 16 megapixel Best JPEG setting. The thumbnails below link to the full-sized versions, which have not been altered in any way.

Sample Movie & Video

Product Images

Front of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Front of the Kodak PixPro FZ201 / Lens Extended

Front of the Kodak PixPro FZ201 / Flash Raised

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Rear of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Rear of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Rear of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Rear of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Top of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Bottom of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Side of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Front of the Kodak PixPro FZ201

Memory Card Slot

Battery Compartment

Conclusion

The Kodak PixPro FZ201 is an affordable superzoom camera targeted at beginners and anyone wishing to go beyond what their smartphone can offer. For a camera that houses a 20x optical zoom lens, the FZ201 is actually quite small and lightweight, fitting into most jacket/coat pockets and weighing in at a modest 202 grams. This, combined with a nicely sculpted, textured hand-grip ensures excellent portability and allows for easy one-handed operation. The camera's image quality is decidedly mediocre – if it's large and detail-rich prints you're after, you need to look elsewhere. On the other hand, for the target consumer – who is more likely to view the images on a computer screen or an HDTV set – the camera's IQ is probably going to be adequate, at least in the ISO 80-400 range.

A far greater problem is the camera's focusing system, which seems woefully outdated for a 2014 model. With the lens set to the 25mm equivalent zoom position, focus acquisition is quite fast – but as soon as you zoom in a notch, the AF system slows down markedly, and focus hunting raises its ugly head. At the telephoto end, focus acquisition becomes an entirely hit-and-miss affair even in good light, which can lead to missed shots. Add the low-resolution LCD screen, limited movie recording options, and it all adds up to a mish-mash of a user experience that we're afraid will frustrate a lot of users, both beginners and keen shutterbugs alike.

All of these issues are forgivable, though, if you consider the FZ201's price. As of writing, you can get the Kodak PixPro FZ201 for about $130, which doesn't seem over the top for a highly portable go-anywhere camera with a 25-500mm equivalent lens, 16-megapixel sensor, Eye-Fi memory card compatibility and optical image stabilisation – as long as you can live with its quirks and limitations, that is.

Ratings (out of 5)
Design	4
Features	3.5
Ease-of-use	4.5
Image quality	3
Value for money	4

Main Rivals

Listed below are some of the rivals of the Kodak PixPro FZ201.

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