Casio has been a comparative latecomer to the digital camera market but its EXILIM range caused quite a stir and the company has been steadily building on this collection of solidly made, versatile machines ever since.

The 12.1-megapixel EXILIM EX-H10 is the first such compact to classify as a ‘Superzoom' since it comes with a 10x optical zoom (plus a further 4x digital zoom) allied with a 24mm wide angle lens which means you can make the most of both landscape and close-up photography. Arriving in three attractive shades of cool silver, smart black and girly pink, the camera feels firm in the hand without being unduly weighty.

As with some of the lower spec Zoom series, the EX-H10 comes with two specialist buttons on the top left for instantly switching to Landscape mode (which reduces cloud and mist) and Make-up mode (to smooth over those facial wrinkles).

There are some issues with the other controls, however, as Casio has sculpted the buttons for Menu and Playback in a curved design to fit around the main circular control dial on the back, which makes it more likely you'll press adjacent commands at the same time. Also, the standard instant record button for video filming still doesn't have a preview function, which would have been a useful addition.

But these are relatively minor irritations on a camera that packs a lot into a small body, including nearly 40 scene modes, a Dynamic Photo function (pasting a subject from one image onto a different photographic background), a large and bright 3-inch LCD monitor and HD video recording in 16:9 wide-screen format with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. It's worth noting, though, that you can only capture a maximum of 10 minutes of video footage at a time and there isn't an HDMI output to play your HD quality movies back on your TV screen.

What have come to be default features like Face Recognition and Anti-Shake technology are all included, plus a major improvement in battery life that Casio claims will let you take 1,000 snaps before needing a recharge. You'll also be impressed by the quality of the images, especially by their sharpness and the vividness of the colours, even at the far end of the zoom.

Finally, just a note on the price. Although Casio has quoted a retail price of £280 for the EXILIM EX-H10, which is more expensive than most of its comparable rivals, we have seen figures well below £200 online and for that sort of outlay it's hard to find as good a bargain for all these features.

Verdict
The Casio EXILIM EX-H10 has retained all of the feature heavy capabilities of its 3x zoom brothers and added a whopping 10x optical zoom and an extra long-life battery. It still produces high quality crisp images.

Company: Casio

Contact: 020 8450 9131

Tags: casio casio exilim digital camera hdmi high-definition video tft lcd zoom lens liquid crystal display