Sony innovation brings a smile to the face

Sony's latest innovation makes me smile

Images provided by Camera-Warehouse.com.au
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I was truly impressed recently with a friend's purchase of a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-H50 digital camera. He was raving about the features on the camera and how easy it was to use, but it wasn't until he demonstrated perhaps the most innovative of the bunch that I could share his enthusiasm.

I have to say, I'm not a big fan of the Sony 'megabrand', so I took some convincing, but even I can appreciate how good their new smile detection (officially know as "smile shutter") technology is. Face detection is now commonplace on most compact digital cameras and means that the camera will adjust focussing and exposure based on what it determines (normally very accurately) are the faces in the frame.

Sony takes this a step further. So good is there face detection that the camera can even tell whether it's a smiling face or not! In fact, with smile detection activated, it won't take a photograph until the subject is smiling, and an automatic mode will snap the picture the moment it detects a smile, but not before.

The smile shutter isn't a new feature and has been available since the launch of the Cyber-shot T200 in August last year, but this was the first time I'd seen it in action and I was very impressed. In an increasingly uniform marketplace it's the small features that make a difference and this is certainly a crowd pleaser, well, it made me smile.

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