Goodmans GDC 1308 Review

Overall Rating

Clear screen, EV Compensation and White balance settings to personalise your shots (and get the best from the camera!)

TV-out isn't really worth being there... very odd image comes through on my set.. falls down on close shots.

I bought the Goodmans GDC 1308 digital camera and at first was slightly disappointed as some of my pictures (mostly close-ups) were not much of an improvement on my old Kodak 640x480 digicam. Then I read all these reviews on this site and was very close to just returning it. However, I took it out on a few walks and became more familiar with the controls (especially EV compensate), and the camera has definitely improved as I've learned what it can and can't take. For the price, I'm now confident in saying that this really is a great camera. I also had the Windows XP problem, I called Goodmans and they were quick to send out some instructions, but they were actually useless as I fixed the problem myself before they arrived. To simply get your pics off the compact flash card, all you need to do in XP is plug the camera in. The camera registers as a harddrive on which is your folder of images :) I have no intention of using the camera as a webcam, so no drivers required... (the only reason it took me too long to figure this out was that I didn't have the camera itself in PC mode - I am a non-instructions-reader lol).

Two accessories I've bought - one absolutely essential, one more of a luxury. You MUST buy a battery charger and high quality NiMH batteries for this camera, as it literally kills regular alkaline ones. I took one image with alkaline batteries, and the battery meter went down a notch. With NiMH, I got through a whole day without the meter moving. Secondly, I just ordered a 128MB compact flash card. The 16MB card provided is ideal for getting a number of test shots (or a low-quality 200 shot session) in, in addition to the fact that your alkaline batteries will last until the card is filled ;) but to get the most out of the camera, you want to be able to shoot freely at the high resolution, and I'd recommend allowing for £40-50 for an extra card (or, if you buy it at Argos as I did, consider buying it with the camera as you'll get it half-price... I wish I had). Once you've added those two things, your camera is costing £200-ish. Is it worth it, you ask? I'm certainly not displeased :) I've included a link to my personal site somewhere on this review (wherever it's going to say "recommended site"). In the next week or so the design will change and there will be a Photos section.. all of those pictures will be taken with the Goodmans GDC 1388 so you can see for yourself once I get round to uploading all that.

Members' Comments onMark.'s Review

• P Shires. on 24th Apr 2002

  Well said my friend, but could you tell me what the best settings are for the white balance and ev compensate as i have tried different ones with no success, alot of the shots indoors tend to come out very bright white especially on the faces, at at distance they are fine but once i get to about 1.5 metres from the subject i get poor results.
  
  i hope you can help me here

• Mark. on 26th Apr 2002

  I wouldn't say there were any "best" settings... just play around with it as you would with any camera, till you get the best result. One of the wonders of digital cameras is that you can take plenty more then 24 or 36 pictures in one session, and you can have instant review and the option delete your shots. There are some items about EV compensation out there on the net, but they haven't been of much use to me as the figures don't match the way Goodmans have dealt with it in this camera. However, indoors, one thing I have found is that if I do *anything* with the white balance or EV, it's best to leave the flash turned off. Not sure if this'll help, but just go and play with it :)

• colin. on 5th May 2002

  I appreciate your constructive comments, but how do you increase from 16mb to 128mb, I am quite new to digital photography, after a trial run with a fuji finepix which was swiftly returned, I am delighted with this model and am looking forward to putting it to the test.

• Colin. on 15th May 2002

  whoops, re last comment. I've just realised that the camera is a 1308 and not 1388, sorry about that.

• roger. on 26th Jul 2003

  i just bought the 1308 and am fairly pleased but evertime i unplug it from the pc a window comes up and says its unsafe to unplug and says i should use the hotplug icon in the status bar, well where is the staus bar icon