The Sony DSC H3 is an 8 megapixel digital camera with a 10x optical zoom lens. The focal length of the lens is equivalent to 38 - 380mm in 35mm format. Up to 51x smart zoom is available when shooting at lower resolutions. 20x digital zoom is also available.
For close up shots the DSC H3 can focus from 2cm away from the subject. There is also a face detection setting for sharper portrait shots.
The 2.5 inch LCD screen is made up of approximately 115.000 pixels.
The built in flash has the following modes: Auto, Forced Flash, Slow Syncro, No Flash. Pre Flash, Red eye reduction and Auto Daylight Synchronized Flash can all be turned on through the menu system.
The maximum flash range is 7m (wide) and 5.6m (tele). The intensity of the flash can be adjusted.
There is a small selection of scene modes. These are Twilight, Twilight portrait, Soft snap, Landscape, Beach, Snow, Fireworks, High Sensitivity, Advanved Sports shooting.
Retouching Options
After a photo has been taken you can soften the focus, select an area of the photo to be in colour and make the rest black and white, add a fisheye lens effect, add a starburst effect, crop the photo and correct red eye.
The maximum resolution for a movie is 640 x 480 pixels. The top speed is 30 frames per second. Sound can be recorded, but zoom can only be applied before you start shooting the movie.
In manual exposure mode the aperture can be set in the range f/3.5 - f8 (wide) - f/4.4 - f10 (tele) and the shutter speed can be set between 30 seconds and 1/2000 seconds
Other advanced features include sensitivity (Auto, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200), white balance (Auto, Daylight, Cloudy, Fluorescent1, Fluorescent2, Fluorescent3, Incandescent, Flash), exposure compensation (+/- 2.0EV, 1/ 3 EV step), bracketing (+/- 1.0EV, 1/ 3 EV step) and metering (multi, centre and spot).
A burst mode allows you to fire off up to 100 shots at a top speed on 2 photos every second.
All the necessary cables and software are supplied to attach the Sony DSC H3 to a computer, television set and compatible printer.
Sony DSC H3
| Description: | 8 megapixels and a 10x optical zoom lens |
| Ease of Use: | 8 |
| Features: | 8 |
| Colour: | 8 |
| Macro: | 8 |
| Indoors: | 9 |
| Value for Money: | 9 |
| Style: | 9 |
| Movie Mode: | 8 |
| Image Quality: | 9 |
| Build Quality: | 9 |
| Total: | 85 |
| Verdict: | "Picture quality, build quality and shutter delay times are all very impressive. I really enjoyed testing this camera and would be happy to own one. It is smaller than most super zoom models and sells for a reasonable price. Recommended" |
| Review Date: | December 2007 |
| Related Pages: | Sony DSC H3 Specification Sony DSC H3 Sample Images Sony DSC H3 Features |
| Camera | Rating |
| Fuji Finepix F70EXR | 85 |
| Canon Powershot SX120 IS | 85 |
| Panasonic DMC TZ7 | 85 |
| Canon Powershot SX200 IS | 85 |
| Samsung WB500 | 84 |
| Sony DSC H20 | 81 |
| Fuji Finepix S1500 | 81 |
| Olympus MJU 9000 | 79 |
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.
Sony DSC H3
