Olympus MJU 1000 Review

The Olympus MJU 1000 is likely to appeal to people for two main reasons. First this camera offers protection from rain and bad weather in general. The second reason is that the camera has ten megapixels. In my view the importance of a great number of megapixels is overstressed, but I know that many people will like the idea of owning a camera with a very high number of pixels.

In terms of features the MJU 1000 is a standard point and shoot camera. It has the additional attraction of being just about small enough to slip into a pocket.

I know more or less exactly what to expect from the Olympus MJU range now. In terms of brightness and in most cases colour too the MJU 1000 does a good job. It does have a tendency to turn blue lines into purple and to struggle with focusing when the light starts to get low.

Outdoors in bright light the camera is able to focus well. In fact I would describe focusing as above average when compared to other similar digital cameras. Working with the first outdoor shot there are a number of key pointers for picture sharpness. These include the bricks on the building and the names on the boats. Both of these have a good level of sharpness. With the names on the boats being sharp this also means that the MJU 1000 is able to hold the level of focusing as you move away from the centre of the photo.

This picture also highlights a couple of weaknesses with the camera too. The lines on the boats show up as purple when they are in fact blue. Where the sun catches the edge of some of the bright coloured objects a thin purple line is often added as well. There is also a greater loss of detail in the photo than normal where the camera finds it difficult to cope with the glare of the sun.

When the zoom lens is not being used as in the second outdoor shot focusing is softer, especially towards the edges of the shot. This is a common problem with consumer level digital cameras. A plus point is the fact that whereas many digital cameras lose a lot of light towards the corners of this shot the MJU 1000 handles this well.

The third outdoor shot once again highlights the issues of blues showing as purple and also the problem of purple fringing.

The outdoor portrait works well. I like the balance of colours and the photo is sharp too. Skin tones look natural and the camera handles the light as it falls on the face without overexposing sections of the shot.

Using the MJU 1000 indoors in lower light the results are not as impressive. The indoor portrait is poorly focused. It is possible that by moving the camera around you will be able to find places where the camera can focus, but the camera is likely to prove unreliable in lowlight. The indoor shot of beer bottles underlines this point. I had to try the camera in different positions before I was able to produce an acceptable photo.

For close up photos the MJU 1000 produced a shot I would describe as about average. There is nothing that stands out as being wrong with the photo and it is bright and clear without being one of the best I have taken. It should be noted that the camera cannot focus any closer than 10cm away from the subject. This means that my test photo required a fair degree of cropping to make it appear a true close up.

You can take photos all the way up to an ISO rating of 6400. At that level picture quality is very poor as I would expect it to be. At a more standard ISO 400 there is a loss of quality, but I would say the quality of the photos you can take on this setting are usable.

Shutter lag is the time it takes to take each picture. With digital cameras there can be a delay between clicking the shutter button and the photo being captured. This can lead to missing the picture you wanted. Shutter lag is a major problem if you are taking shots of moving subjects such as animals, sports scenes and children.

I was able to take a single photo in 0.45 seconds and five photos in 14.25 seconds. These are times are on the slow side of average.

You can compare this camera to other models by taking a look at the Shutter Lag Comparison Table.

The 3x optical zoom lens has a focal length equivalent to 35 - 105mm in 35mm format. The maximum aperture of the lens is 2.8 (wide) / 4.7 (tele). 5x digital zoom is also available. For close up shots the camera can focus from 10cm away from the subject.

For composing images and accessing the menu system there is a good sized LCD screen (2.5"). The screen is made up of around 230,000 pixels. I found the screen worked well in lowlight. There is no viewfinder.

The flash unit has a maximum range of 5.2m. This falls to around 3.2m when the zoom lens is in use. Flash modes are: automatic, red eye reduction, always off and always on.

Olympus have incorporated a wide range of predefined scene modes into the MJU 1000. When you select a scene mode the camera will use what it considers to be the best settings for the shot. The scene modes are Portrait, Landscape, Landscape with Portrait, Night scene, Night scene with portrait, Sports, Indoor, Candle, Self portrait, Available Light Portrait, Sunset, Fireworks, Museum, Cuisine, Behind Glass, Documents, Auction, Shoot & Select 1, Shoot & Select 2 and Beach and Snow. There is also a panoramic setting.

If you would like to appear in the picture a self timer with a delay time of around 10 seconds is available. You also have access to a histogram to help check exposure levels.

After a photo has been taken there are a number of features you can use. These include changing the colour to black and white or sepia, plus trimming and cropping the photo. You can also attempt to improve the quality of a photo with red eye reduction, blur reduction, brightness correction and saturation correction.

Among the more advanced features are metering (ESP and Spot), exposure compensation (+/-2 EV in 1/3 EV steps), ISO sensitivity (64, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, 6400) and white balance (Sunlight, Tungsten, Overcast, Flourescent 1, Flourescent 2, Flourescent 3).

A burst mode is also available. This lets you take up to 12 frames at a top speed of 3.6 frames per second. Shutter speeds are controlled automatically by the camera. These work in the range 1/2 second - 1/1000 seconds.

TV quality movies can be recorded. These have a maximum resolution of 640 x 480 pixels and a top speed of 30 frames per second. Sound can be recorded and digital zoom is available when shooting is in progress.

Olympus supplies all the necessary cables and software to connect the MJU 1000 to a computer, television and PictBridge compatible printer.

The MJU 1000 is relatively easy to use. There are more straightforward cameras on the market, but this one should not take too long to get to grips with. One useful feature is the in camera guide. This gives you some tips on how to improve your photos.

You can pick up a Olympus MJU 1000 for around £215. This compares to around £250 for a Sony DSC N2, £185 for a Casio Exilim EX-Z1000 and £270 for a Canon IXUS 900 Ti.

If Olympus could sort out the lowlight focusing issues and the problems with changing blue lines to purple and purple fringing this camera would be a bargain. As it stands it is difficult to suggest buying it.

Olympus have made the MJU range slimmer and the MJU 1000 should just about squeeze into a fairly small pocket. It has a stainless steel body and is available in silver. The design includes some curves to help make the camera look a little less like other models. It has dimensions of 97 mm x 56.2 mm x 22.7 mm and weighs 140g.

Power is supplied to the camera by a rechargeable Lithium-ion battery (Li-12B). Both a battery and charger are supplied with the camera as standard.

There are 28.5mb of memory built into the camera. This means that Olympus do not provide a memory card as standard. To boost the memory capacity you need to buy xD picture cards. I was able to take 13 photos before the memory was full.

Click here to save money on xD cards.

Weatherproof
User guide
LCD screen performance in Lowlight
Style and design

Indoors in Lowlight
Purple tinge to blue areas of photos

Oh Olympus! I have reviewed so many of the MJU range now and I nearly always reach the same conclusions. A weatherproof camera is a great idea, but surely better lowlight focusing and the ability to avoid the tendency towards turning blue lines to purple could be overcome. As much as I would like to be able to recommend the MJU 1000 when it comes to picture quality there are many better cameras around.

Front View

Back View

Top View

Sample Menus

Although every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of the information on this site, please make sure you double check the feature set and specification at the point of purchase.

Olympus MJU 1000