The first thing that struck me about the Camedia C-990 Zoom was that it looks and feels like a camera.

Olympus first introduced SLR (single lens reflex) to digital cameras in early 1998 in the form of the Camedia C-1400L.

The Olympus Camedia C-740 is a 3.2-megapixel camera offering images at 2,048 x 1,536, with a maximum 10x optical zoom. Offering USB connectivity, miniature xD-Picture card support and video output that allows pictures to be viewed on TV as well

The Camedia C-5050 is a 5.3-megapixel camera offering a good balance of automatic and manual settings, catering for users who like a professional look and feel. It also offers USB connectivity, separate status LCD, optical resolution of 2,560 x 1,920, support for RAW output format and video-out.

In appearance the Olympus Camedia is rather ordinary, mirroring closely what is standard fare in the conventional SLR field, and perhaps even a little dated. This however belies the superior performance that the Olympus put in this month, which impressed the Labs team enough to award it with the Labs Award for Quality.

Digital photography has made enormous strides in recent years, and as a result, the technology is being incorporated into affordable consumer products.

If you had asked me a few weeks ago what the advantages of eight megapixels (MP) were over five, I would have said very few. However, that was before I discovered the fun factor in being able to play with an image that is up to 115cm by just over 86cm (72dpi).

Two-megapixel digital camera

Underneath the behemoths rough exterior is a friendlier beast. Along the front of the machine is a series of large buttons and dials, with each function clearly labelled.

If were to believe the hyperbole, this technology will do for digital technology what the invention of the parachute did for skydiving.

Undoubtedly the key feature of the Olympus C-750 is the huge 10x optical zoom lens. This is ideal for sports photography or getting close to camera-shy subjects. We’d expect a lens of this size to introduce severe chromatic aberrations, but Olympus has used extra-dispersion lenses, which make sure light is evenly distributed across the CCD.

It used to be a case of whoever had the largest CCD was going to sell the most cameras.

It used to be a case of whoever had the largest CCD was going to sell the most cameras.This may have held true when there was only a handful of digital still cameras on the market, but today it is a different story.

Olympus’ Four Thirds imaging system comes of age in a classy compact SLR that makes the rest look ordinary

As digital cameras have improved, people have found that they can be used to produce more than just web quality images and, consequently, there is a growing demand for photo printers. While traditiona