Coolpix L15 Digital Camera (Silver), 8.0 Megapixels, 3x Optical Zoom, 2.8" LCD Display, VR Optical Image Stabilization, Nikon In-Camera Innovations, One-touch Portrait, Powered by AA Batteries

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59 year old. I'm careful with my things. If the #%@^# camera breaks in my pocket, imagine how long it will last for your average teenager. The L11 and L15 are lemons.

Coolpix L15 Digital Camera (Silver), 8.0 Megapixels, 3x Optical Zoom, 2.8" LCD Display, VR Optical Image Stabilization, Nikon In-Camera Innovations, One-touch Portrait, Powered by AA Batteries

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that this one suffers from.

Verbose Version:

My Background: First of all, I'm relatively tech savvy. I'm a bit of a gadget and electronics geek and do a fair amount of reading on a range of related topics. When I get a technology item that does not live up to my expectations, I search the web, review the manual, and look for firmware updates when and where such a search is applicable. I have also done extensive work in the digital realm, including design and product photography. I mention this simply to help people avoid the mistake I made of assuming many issues detailed with this camera are user-error. Frankly - much of the time poor reviews are written by people that either have unrealistic expectations or do not understand how to use the product. That is not the case for this review.

My Expectations: A dependable point and shoot camera that simply works well. Exposures should be passable, focus should be relatively fast and accurate, shot to shot time should be within the realm of reason. I own and use a DSLR, so I'm not looking for a camera that I can use for my professional work, nor do I expect it to perform like a such a camera.

My Experience: With the exception of the first item in that list and one or two other things, my experience with the L15 has been extremely poor. Here's how it lays out:

The (relatively) good first:

Image Stabilization: The L15 has optical image stabilization and it actually works well. Yea.

Startup Time: Quite good actually. I pick it up, turn it on, and it's ready to shoot without waiting too long. My last Nikon (Coolpix 4600 as I recall) was much worse in this regard and there is nothing worse than a camera that you carry for those spur-of-the-moment shots that takes so long to start up that the moment has passed. At least this is not true of the L15.

Exposures: Average. Handles white balance and exposure about as well as any other camera in its class.

LCD: Nice 2.5 inch display, though it washes out pretty badly in sunlight. Most do though, so that's common. I'd rate this one worse than average in sunlight.

Stop-Action Movies: Very neat stop-action movie mode to make animated film. Takes patience, but it's fun. Unfortunately you can't delete an individual frame so if you make an error your whole film is shot. (Caveat: this wasn't a huge deal for me, so I might be mistaken about the ability to delete a frame - I was unable to figure it out or find it in the manual and decided to return the camera before investing any time in searching the web for a work-around). Downside here is the awful focus system that detracts from the fun of filming (see below).

Other: It's small enough to carry easily, and uses AA batteries. A requirement for me in a point and shoot.

Now the bad:

Shot to shot time: this has been written about repeatedly. The amount of time this camera takes to write photos to the card is ridiculous. It can range from 3 or 4 seconds to over 5. This is WITHOUT the flash. Using the flash, it can climb to over 10. Absurd. And the annoying hourglass on the display just rubs it in. It can take so much time to write shots to a card that it's just pointless to even consider taking a series. Since there's no optical viewfinder you can't even set up your next shot while you wait. Completely unacceptable. Now, you might think it doesn't sound so bad, but believe me: the first time you are waiting around like a dope holding a brick while your shot disappears you'll think differently.

Auto Focus: Slowwwwww. Can take a ridiculously long time to find focus, and often just can't at all. Grinds away, creeping towards focus, then can't lock. No real rhyme or reason to why it's good or bad in any situation: the lighting can be great or it be low enough to require the focus assist, it still just WON'T focus sometimes. And I'm not talking about focusing on something with no contrast or no image information like a flat wall. I'm talking about a photo of people sitting at a table, taken from a reasonable distance, and it just can't focus. No manual focus ability means you are just hosed: you have to move around, try different zoom depths and angles until it can find focus. Seriously the worst auto focus system I have personally used in any digital camera, and I've been shooting digital since 1997 and have owned well over a dozen cams.

Flash: Double flashes every time, in any flash mode. Really weird.... This isn't when it's set to red-eye reduction - it's ALL the time. Pre-flash followed by flash. So people look away or blink just in time for the actual photo. Others have posted on this.

Synopsis: The bad far outweighs the good on this camera. All the things that really matter in a point and shoot fail miserably with the exception of startup time and image stabilization. Using this camera in real life situations is an exercise in frustration to say the least, and I can't imagine having to keep using it without at some point hurling it into a wall in frustration.

I'm returning it and getting the Canon PowerShot A570IS 7.1MP Digital Camera with 4x Optical Image Stabilized Zoom for the same price (as of this writing, $140). The focus is faster and more accurate, shot to shot is faster, it has image stabilization, and my experience with Canon Powershots has been good thus far. I'm hopeful I'll have a better experience. In the same price range I was also considering the Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ7S 7.2MP Digital Camera with 6x Image Stabilized Zoom (Silver) which has a wonderful 6x optical zoom, but decided on the Canon for reasons I'll outline in another review.

If you are dead-set on this cam, I urge you to try it out at a local store before buying it. If you can't I'd advise looking elsewhere unless you love to be frustrated.

Another really well done and documented review is here:

http://www.cameras.co.uk/reviews/nikon-coolpix-l15.cfm

Coolpix L15 Digital Camera (Silver), 8.0 Megapixels, 3x Optical Zoom, 2.8" LCD Display, VR Optical Image Stabilization, Nikon In-Camera Innovations, One-touch Portrait, Powered by AA Batteries

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are not complex (that's good) but extra button pushes are required that should not be needed. On Canons, pressing the shutter immediately kicks out of any menu and shoots. Nikon requires you to get out of the menu first.
Changing a setting like flash, requires you to go to the selection and then hit ENTER. The ENTER is an extra unneeded button push.
The flash always seems to do the red eye "double flash" no matter what the setting.
Wider angle (like 28mm) wide setting would be nice.

Summary: This is a pretty good camera but with compromises. Given the limited choices for this type of camera, I'd buy it again, but if Canon made an SD870is that ran from 2 AAs, I'd have bought that. Unfortunately, they don't. Now that that hybrid NiMH batteries don't self-discharge, these are great cheap batteries for digital cameras. I really hope to see some high quality 2 AA compacts soon, but this will tide me over for now.