Casio Exilim PRO EX-P505

While there are plenty of digital still cameras that capture digital video and digital video cameras that capture stills, no one has yet produced an imaging device that handles both with equal dexterity. The new Casio Exilim PRO EX-P505, which features five-megapixel resolution for stills and high-quality digital video recording capabilities, comes the closest yet. If you can't decide whether to take a camera or camcorder to your kid's soccer game or on your next vacation, the EX-P505 will fill both bills nicely.

On the digital still side, the P505 comes equipped with a 5-MP CCD sensor that can capture images of more than 2MB in size, which means you can easily print up to 8.5 x 11 inches. The quality of the photos produced by the P505 won't blow you away -we found the colors in some shots to be a little dull-but they're certainly good enough to frame.

Despite its compact size, the P505 features a generous 5X optical zoom with a pretty good macro mode that can shoot down to one centimeter. In a nod to the more advanced shooter, the camera offers aperture priority, shutter priority, and manual exposure settings to allow for more creativity. If you'd rather have your camera do the tweaking for you, try Casio's Best Shot function, which offers 22 different settings, including Portrait, Fireworks, and a sepia-toned retro look.

Continuing Casio's improvements with its start-up time, the P505 is ready to go just 0.8 seconds after powering up. Even better, shutter lag is inconsequential when the flash is turned off, clocking in at just 0.01 seconds. Playback of pictures is also fast, with shots going by at approximately 0.1-second intervals. Some of that speed can be attributed to Casio's Exilim engine processor, which is also designed to bring out more detail in images.

Battery life on the P505, as with many Casio products, is excellent. Expect approximately 220 images or 550 images of continuous shooting per battery charge.

For digital video, the P505 shoots in the MPEG-4 format. The quality of the videos is quite good for a digital camera, recording a TV-like 30 frames per second at 640 x 480-resolution in the HQ mode. For the amateur shooter, there are five Best Shot video scene modes, including Portrait, Scenery, Night Scene, Fireworks, and B&W Silent for an old-fashioned look. The Past Movie function is really cool. It enables the P505 to start recording footage five seconds before the shutter is pressed, so you don't miss any candid action.

If you've ever wanted to get usable frame grabs from a video, the Motion Print function lets you convert a nine-frame sequence into one print or one frame into one still photo. For short, quick video clips, the Short Movie function enables up to eight seconds of a movie to be taken during a single shutter. Three kinds of movie editing-before, during, and after-can also be done in-camera to allow you to delete unwanted scenes even before they're transferred to your computer.

To view all these stills and videos, the P505 sports a rotating two-inch TFT LCD panel that allows you to shoot from a variety of angles. You'll be more impressed when you take your SD card out and pop it into your notebook; the videos we recorded in HQ mode took up the majority of our laptop's screen and looked great, although some of the yellows seemed a bit oversaturated.

Keep in mind that you'll have to supply your own memory card. The 7.5MB of built-in memory is enough to store only three pictures taken at the highest resolution and just 14 seconds of the best-quality video.

Although the Casio Exilim PRO EX-P505 doesn't quite match other digital cameras in its price range in terms of still picture quality, no other imaging device multi-tasks like this one. This digicam delivers great-looking video and good pictures in a design that's easy to carry.