Sony’s new W120 comes in black, blue, silver or pink and is packed with 7.2 million pixels and a 4x optical zoom — but it is its facial recognition and smile shutter that will make shooting your mates a barrel of fun.

Smile, You’re on Candid Camera

Facial recognition has taken photography to new heights; it makes shooting people so easy. Sony has given you three options so that you can precisely target your audience. The auto option is the simplest, putting little boxes around each head in the scene and altering the exposure so it is perfect for skin tones. Because a lot of us shoot children the W120 has a child priority setting that targets the little heads in your picture, or you can select adult priority to capture the adults in the picture ahead of the tiny tots.
If you want to ensure your subjects are smiling when the shutter fires, just switch the dial to smile shutter — which automatically snaps a shot when your subject smiles. You don’t even have to press the shutter because the camera analyses the faces in the scene and fires the shutter the instant someone grins. The camera also recognises a face in profile — a major advancement in facial recognition — tracking your subjects even when they turn away from the camera.

Zoom, zoom, zoom

Sony’s affiliation with Carl Zeiss means this camera has a lens that is enviably sharp. The Vario Tessar zoom covers a decent 32mm wide angle through 4x to 128mm telephoto. At the wide-angle end of the zoom you’ll get more in the picture with the wider-than-normal 32mm lens, or shoot beautiful portraits at the 128mm telephoto end. Don’t forget the macro mode that will let you shoot as close as 50mm for impressive close-up images.

Flash Gordon

Even in its entry-level camera Sony offers unrivalled flash coverage. The camera isn’t confused when shooting though doorways or when your subject would normally be out of range. If you delve into the scene modes you’ll be amazed at how well this little camera balances available light and flash in the Twilight Portrait mode. As the name suggests, it will work best when there is still some available light in the sky.

Slow to Show

I’m finally getting with the ‘now’ generation, and when it comes to how quickly images are portrayed on the screen this camera is slow. You push the review button and have to wait for the image to be processed before the first picture comes up, then each subsequent image pops onto screen fuzzily before sharpening up. It will hardly depress you to have to wait a few seconds but it is slow to show.

Conclusion

Sony’s compact and cute Cybershot W120 takes sharp images and gives brilliant flash coverage, offering more flash range than any other camera in its price bracket. The facial recognition works almost faultlessly, but I did notice it slows down in lower light conditions and it sometimes fails to lock on to heads if they are small in the scene. You’ll find the 4x optical zoom very useful since it starts at 32mm and reaches to 128mm telephoto, making it ideal for travel or just shooting family and friends.

Specs

• Manufacturer: Sony

• Model: Cybershot DSC-W120

• Price: $399

• Effective Pixels: 7.2 million

• Lens: Carl Zeiss Vario Tessar 
 5.35-21.4mm (32-128mm 35mm 
 equivalent)

• Viewfinder: Optical

• Monitor: 2.5-inch TFT LCD 
 (115,200 pixels)

• Shutter: One to 1/1600 sec

• Aperture: f2.8 – f5.8

• ISO: Auto, 100, 200, 400, 800, 
 1600, 3200

• Shooting Modes: Easy, Auto, 
 Program, Scene – Twilight, 
 Beach, Snow, Fireworks, Twilight 
 Portrait, Landscape, Soft Snap, 
 Smile Shutter, High Sensitivity

• Exposure Metering: Multi 
 Pattern, Centre Weighted, Spot

• Focus Modes: Multi-point TTL 
 auto-focus

• Media: Memory Stick Duo/Pro 
 Duo, 15MB onboard

• File format: JPEG, MPEG-1

• Flash: Auto, On, Off, Slow Sync

• Interface: USB2

• Batteries: Lithium-ion 
 rechargeable

• Dimensions: 88.2 x 57.2 x 22.9mm

• Weight: 156g

Contact

www.sony.co.nz

Pros

• Facial recognition

• 4x optical zoom

• Fantastic flash coverage

Cons

• Slow to review images

• Fine movies can only be recorded 
 to a card

Design                  18
Performance         17
Features               18
Image Quality       18
Value for money   17

TOTAL     88/100

This review is from D-Photo issue #024.

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