Nikon Coolpix S01 Review

December 5, 2012 | Gavin Stoker | Rating star Rating star Rating star Half rating star

Introduction

The Nikon Coolpix S01 is a 10 megapixel compact camera with 3x optical zoom, 2.5-inch touchscreen, 7.3GB of internal memory, built-in battery and a body that's smaller than a credit card. Other highlights of the S01 include 720p HD movie recording, an Easy Auto mode with Scene Auto Selector, and Nikon's EXPEED C2 image processing system. The Nikon Coolpix S01 costs $179.95/£149.99 and is available in a variety of colours including red, white, silver and pink.

Ease of Use

Just in the (Saint) nick of time to catch the lucrative Christmas gifting market, the Nikon S01 arrives to a fanfare heralding it as the smallest Coolpix to date. Indeed, with its rounded edges and multiple colour options, including festive red and an even more eye catching mirrored version, it resembles a bauble you might hang on your fir tree. The camera is actually narrower in width and shorter in height than a credit card, and, if you make a fist with your palm, your fingers almost swallow up the S01 entirely. Official dimensions are 77x51.2x17.2mm and it weighs just 96g - meaning you can slip it into a top pocket and almost forget it's there. The above holds relevance, because looks and size appears to be pretty much exclusively what this model is being sold on.

While, when it comes to compact cameras, many may equate smaller with 'better', of course that's not always the case. So we'll be interested to discover which compromises - if any - have been necessary to bring the S01 to market. Is this cool-looking Coolpix truly the marvel of miniaturization that it seems?

Whether a camera the size of a matchbox appeals to you or not, when held in the hand first impressions are favourable. Build quality feels high and not at all plastic-y for a camera with a suggested retail price just under £150, or in reality a street price of around £120 at the time of writing. For that we get a huge (by digital camera standards) 7.3GB internal memory capacity, but, due to the compact dimensions, unfortunately no slot for a removable media card.

Nikon Coolpix S01 Nikon Coolpix S01
Front Rear

The battery is also entombed in the body and so is charged within. You can do this either with the aid of the mains adapter and USB lead supplied, or hook the S01 up to your desktop or laptop and charge it exclusively via any vacant USB port. This provides another option should mains power be unavailable. Battery life is good for an un-showy 190 shots, according to CIPA testing.

Whilst the above makes for a neatly hermetically sealed design, it does mean the camera is completely out of action every time it needs re-charging. In fact the only output port offered here is for USB/audio/video. Given the lack of physical connectivity options, a wireless alternative might have helped to provide another means of transferring/downloading stills and videos, but we don't get that here.

The headline features of the Coolpix S01 are otherwise as modest as the camera's proportions. We get a 10.1 megapixel effective resolution from a 1/2.9-inch CCD sensor, though impressively for a camera this size we do actually get a optical zoom too. However it's just 3x and offers a focal range the equivalent of 29-87mm on a 35mm film camera. In terms of low light performance without flash, a sensitivity range between ISO80 and ISO1600 is offered also - again, no great shakes but adequate under the circumstances. However, there appears to be no way to choose such settings for yourself - the camera chooses for you dependant on the subject it's pointed at.

The 'nuts and bolts' of the S01's operation revolve around a small-ish, 4:3 aspect ratio 2.5-inch touch screen - smaller than those now found on many mobile phones - boasting the 230k-dot resolution common to older or cheaper point and shoots. Such an implementation has allowed attendant physical controls to be kept to a minimum. Just a shutter release button encircled by a zoom lever, tiny lozenge shaped on/off button plus playback button are to be found on the top plate. Apart from the shutter release/zoom, these are set flush with the camera's exterior. With such a simple layout anyone should be able to pick up this Nikon and start snapping straightaway - even if there is not actually that much small screen 'real estate' to prod.

Nikon Coolpix S01 Nikon Coolpix S01
Front Top

A thumbnail press of the power button and the S01 readies itself for the first photo or video in around two seconds, cute if stubby zoom barrel extending from flush to the body to maximum wideangle setting while the back screen bursts in life. Squeeze the shutter release button and there's a wait of a second or so whilst the camera determines focus and exposure - which is obviously slightly tardy by most standards. Squeeze the shutter release fully and a maximum 10 megapixel file is committed to the internal memory in two to three seconds, the screen momentarily freezing whilst this is completed.

The front of the S01 looks very clean and neat, and some would aver, stylish to boot. The lens is retracted within the camera body when it's switched off. Directly above the lens sits a small porthole for the self-timer/AF assist lamp, and alongside this there's a very narrow window housing the integral flash. A tiny pinprick indicates the built-in mono microphone. This is located top left of the lens if you're viewing the camera front-on.

Because the LCD which we have to work with at the back is relatively small - and there are no actual buttons save a touch sensitive 'home' control bottom right - Nikon has gone the other way and made the S01's key operational on-screen icons larger than most. So the four main shooting mode icons shown upon power-up are almost postage stamp sized. This initial operational quartet governs stills shooting (fully automatic only), video shooting mode, playback plus set up - with a tap of each icon placing the camera in that respective operational setting. Here video is the not quite full HD 1280x720 pixels, and with mono sound, and just a digital zoom can be deployed once recording has commenced, rather than being able to make use of the optical variety. The result is rather jerky looking footage. The second alternative video setting here is for 640x480 pixels clips.

To shoot video simply put the camera into video mode and squeeze the shutter release button to begin recording - the view on the LCD narrowing to ape 16:9 widescreen format. There is no separate video record button as we are increasingly used to seeing these days on digital compacts.

Nikon Coolpix S01 Nikon Coolpix S01
Front Top

A vertically ranged sliding bar to the right of the screen indicates there is more to be found below this initial foursome. A flick of a finger accesses further choices including self timer (10 seconds, on/off), flash mode (auto flash, forced flash, off), special effects mode/s (more on which in a minute), exposure compensation (+/- 2EV), image quality mode (10 million, four million or two million pixels) and touch shooting (on/off). The last option of course, when the feature is activated, enables the camera's shutter to be fired merely by tapping a finger on the LCD. The small size - and the fact that merely in the act of gripping the camera the thumb can accidentally brush against the screen, means that it's all too easy to accidentally take a shot. Or start shooting a video of your shoes.

The special effects, or rather on-board digital filters, aren't exactly numerous here, but in the current 'app crazy' universe it's nice to have a little creative control as opposed to nothing at all. We're restricted to sepia, high key (ultra bright), low key (darker), plus our personal favourite of 'high contrast monochrome', which transcends the humble snapshot on which it's capture. All effects are applied at the point of the shot being captured. Because of the small overall camera size and the responsiveness of the screen, we did find operation of the S01 a tad fiddly - the camera rushes past what you actually wanted - and so we longed for a bit more 'meat' on its proverbial bones. The simple layout may suggest ease of use, but in practical terms this is not as much the case as we would have liked.

While the right hand flank of the Coolpix S01 features a lug for attaching the wrist strap provided in the box, the left hand flank is devoid of any features whatsoever. Up-end the camera and neither is there a screw for a tripod at the base. We get two miniature 'feet' for propping the camera upright on the desktop and a ringpull-like 'door' protecting the single port on the camera, but that's it. This is a basic device for someone who really just wants to point and shoot. But does its actual image quality transcend the cute styling and pocket-sized proportions to suggest a bigger beast? Click forward to our next section to find out.

Image Quality

All of the sample images in this review were taken using the 10 megapixel High JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of around 2.5Mb.

As a snapshot camera pure and simple, we're not expecting the Nikon Coolpix S01's image quality to astound in any way, shape or form. But, to be critical for a moment, at maximum wideangle setting we are noticing some loss of focus towards the extreme corners of the frame, whilst pixel fringing is visible in high contrast portions of images. Neither is a surprise. What is however, is that there is a fair level of detail captured too if conditions are right - and some quite pleasant results are possible, as hopefully our sample images here demonstrate.

Colours are also realistically natural without being washed out or faded. Because the flash is so weeny, it works fairly well for indoor shots and portraits in that it's not powerful enough to bleach your subject. In all, the image quality seems marginally better than an average smartphone - but only marginally. That being the case it's hard to guess who would want to carry an S01 alongside the phone incorporating a camera which is probably already in their pocket or handbag.

As it's not possible to manually control the ISO settings it is difficult to get an accurate impression of how the camera copes at each of its incremental settings between ISO 80 and ISO 1600. Our shots taken at dusk however - for which the camera has chosen ISO 400 - do reveal a fair amount of noise in the sky, if not the image as a whole.

Focal Range

The Nikon Coolpix S01's 3x zoom lens offers a focal range of 29-87mm, as demonstrated by the examples below.

29mm

87mm

Sharpening

Here are two 100% crops which have been Saved as Web - Quality 50 in Photoshop. The right-hand image has had some sharpening applied in Photoshop. The out-of-the camera images are sharp enough at the default sharpening setting and don't benefit that much from further sharpening in a program like Adobe Photoshop.

Original (100% Crop)

Sharpened (100% Crop)

   

Chromatic Aberrations

The Nikon Coolpix S01 handled chromatic aberrations fairly well during the review, with some purple fringing present around the edges of objects in certain high-contrast situations, as shown in the examples below.

Chromatic Aberrations 1 (100% Crop)

Chromatic Aberrations 2 (100% Crop)

Macro

The Nikon Coolpix S01 offers a Macro setting that allows you to focus on a subject that is 5cms away from the camera when the lens is set to wide-angle. The first image shows how close you can get to the subject (in this case a compact flash card). The second image is a 100% crop.

Macro

Macro (100% Crop)

Flash

The flash settings on the Nikon Coolpix S01 are Auto, Auto/Red-eye Reduction, Off, On and Slow Sync./Red-eye Reduction. These shots of a white coloured wall were taken at a distance of 1.5m.

Off - Wide Angle (29mm)

On - Wide Angle (29mm)

ISO 64 ISO 64
   

Off - Telephoto (87mm)

On - Telephoto (87mm)

ISO 64 ISO 64

And here are some portrait shots. As you can see, neither the On or the Auto/Red-eye Reduction settings caused any red-eye.

On

On (100% Crop)
   

Auto/Red-eye Reduction

Auto/Red-eye Reduction (100% Crop)

Night

The Nikon Coolpix S9100's maximum shutter speed is 1 second, which is not great news if you're seriously interested in night photography. The shot below was taken using a shutter speed of 1/2 second at ISO 400.

Night

Night (100% Crop)

Sample Images

This is a selection of sample images from the Nikon Coolpix S01 camera, which were all taken using the 10 megapixel High JPEG setting. The thumbnails below link to the full-sized versions, which have not been altered in any way.

Sample Movie & Video

This is a sample movie at the quality setting of 1280x720 at 30 frames per second. Please note that this 45 second movie is 55.4Mb in size.

Product Images

Nikon Coolpix S01

Front of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Isometric View

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Isometric View

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Rear of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Top of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Bottom of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Front of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Front of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Top of the Camera

 

Nikon Coolpix S01

Rear of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Rear of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Front of the Camera

 
Nikon Coolpix S01

Side of the Camera

Conclusion

Nobody is making a claim for the Nikon Coolpix S01 being a serious photographic tool. We're always told a large-ish sensor, large-ish lens and therefore large-ish camera makes for optimum quality images, and none of those are the case here. Nor, despite the glossy metal exterior, would the £120 to £150 price tag indicate that this is much more than a bit of a toy.

Unusually for the normally ultra serious Nikon it seems to be in pursuit of a bit of fun, pure and simple. Perhaps, coming as the S01 does on the back of the Android powered Coolpix S800c, this shouldn't be that big a surprise. But talking of Android, the S01 here doesn't appear to offer much more functionality - save its 3x optical zoom - than your smartphone when it comes to photos and video. In fact in some respects it offers less, as there's no Bluetooth or Wi-Fi built in (and obviously it can't make calls or surf the Internet!). Plus image quality is only slightly better than the average smartphone - at a pinch.

In terms of an expected audience we see the S01's compact curvy-ness most appealing to females due to the purse sized proportions and cute styling, plus the fact that those with larger hands might encounter practical difficulties, as the 'nuts and bolts' of the S01's operation revolves around that small-ish, 4:3 aspect ratio 2.5-inch touch screen. That said, my wife also found it more fiddly to operate the camera than desired. Our shared conclusion was that we wanted to like the S01 more than we did. Perhaps the fun/toy aspect and size will go down better with small children. The three year old loved it.

If it's small you want, then it might also be worth checking out the likes of the Canon IXUS 125HS, offering 16 megapixels and a 5x optical zoom for a street price around £140 at the time of writing. But Nikon will no doubt be hoping that its own tiny camera will appeal to the big hearted this Christmas.

3.5 stars

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

Review Roundup

Reviews of the Nikon Coolpix S01 from around the web.

ephotozine.com »

The Nikon Coolpix S01 is an extremely small camera, as you can see from the picture below next to a can of diet coke. In terms of width and height, it is smaller than a credit card. It is available in red, pink, black, white and silver, with 7.3Gb of internal memory, for £129.95.
Read the full review »

Specifications

*¹ Based on Camera and Imaging Products Association (CIPA) standards for measuring battery life.

*² The maximum size for a single movie is 4 GB, and the maximum recording time for a single movie is 29 minutes, even when there is sufficient free space on the memory card. If the camera becomes hot, movie recording may stop before these limits are reached.

Product name COOLPIX S01
Type Compact digital camera
Number of effective pixels 10.1 million
Image sensor 1/2.9-in. type CCD; total pixels: approx. 10.34 million
Lens 3x optical zoom, NIKKOR lens
Focal length 4.1-12.3 mm (angle of view equivalent to 29-87 mm lens in 35 mm [135] format)
f/-number f/3.3-5.9
Lens construction 6 elements in 5 groups
Digital zoom magnification Up to 4x (angle of view equivalent to approx. 348 mm lens in 35 mm [135] format)
Vibration reduction Electronic VR (movies)
Motion blur detection Motion blur reduction
Autofocus (AF) Contrast-detect AF
Focus range (measured from center of front surface of lens) Approx. 30 cm (11.8 in.) to infinity; approx. 5 cm (2 in.) to infinity (W) or approx. 50 cm (1 ft 8 in.) to infinity (T) in macro close-up mode
Focus-area selection Face priority, center, manual (tap to select)
Monitor 6.2 cm (2.5-in.), approx. 230k-dot touch screen TFT LCD
Frame coverage (shooting) Approx. 96% vertical and horizontal
Frame coverage (playback) Approx. 100% vertical and horizontal
Media Internal memory (approx. 7.3 GB)
File system DCF, Exif 2.3, DPOF-compliant
File formats Still pictures: JPEG, Movies: MOV (H.264/MPEG-4 AVC with LPCM monaural sound)
Image size (pixels) 10 M (3648 x 2736), 4 M (2272 x 1704), 2 M (1600 x 1200)
Movie frame size (pixels) HD 720p (1280 x 720), VGA (640 x 480)
ISO sensitivity (standard output sensitivity) ISO 80-1600
Metering mode 256-segment matrix, center-weighted (at under 2x digital zoom), spot (at 2x digital zoom and up)
Exposure control Programmed auto with exposure compensation (±2 EV in steps of 1/3 EV)
Shutter Mechanical and charge-coupled electronic shutter
Shutter speed 1/2000 - 1 s
Aperture Electronically-selected neutral density (ND) filter (-3 AV)
Aperture range 2 positions (f/3.3 and f/9.3 [W])
Self-timer Approx. 10 seconds
Built-in flash range (approx.; auto ISO) W: 0.5-2.2 m (1 ft 8 in.-7 ft 2 in.), T: 0.5-1.2 m (1 ft 8 in.-3 ft 11 in.)
Flash control TTL auto with monitor preflashes
Interface Hi-Speed USB
Data Transfer Protocol MTP, PTP
Video output NTSC, PAL
I/O terminal Audio video output/digital I/O (USB)
Supported languages Arabic, Bengali, Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (European and Brazilian), Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, Tamil, Thai, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese
Power sources Built-in rechargeable Li-ion battery
Charging time Approx. 2 h 50 min (using Charging AC Adapter EH-69P; battery fully discharged)
Battery life *¹ Still pictures: Approx. 190 shots (with built-in battery), Movies (actual battery life for recording) *²: HD 720p (1280 x 720): Approx. 1 h 40 min; VGA: 3 h (with built-in battery)
Case (optional) CS-CP4-1 (with strap)
Dimensions (W x H x D) Approx. 77.0 x 51.2 x 17.2 mm (3.1 x 2.1 x 0.7 in.), excluding projections
Weight Approx. 96 g (3.4 oz)
Temperature 0 °C-40 °C (32 °F-104 °F)
Humidity 85% or less (no condensation)
Supplied accessories Camera Strap, Charging AC Adapter EH-69P, USB Cable UC-E16
Optional accessories Leather Case CS-CP4-1, Audio Video Cable EG-CP14

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