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Review: Sony’s Cybershot DSC-HX9V

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Sony's DSC HX9v

Within 20 mins of using this camera I knew I wanted one. (This is a review camera on loan from Sony).

I took around 20-30 photos of my kids and in that time frame not one of them was a bad shot. A week or so later I still have not read the manual but finding it easy to navigate through all the options and scene selections etc. My favorite setting on this camera is the background defocus which allows you to blur out the background and I found this one especially good for close ups of the kids.

What I also liked was the super zoom. It is a pocket camera, yet, it has one of the highest zooms available in the market. 16 times optical zoom! Made for great photographs where the kids were not aware that we were taking their photos (so they could not do silly poses).

Sony Camera example image

There is one big negative though. The charger port is underneath the camera which means I have to either lay it down on it’s lens side or the LCD screen side to charge. You would need to make sure you have a soft clean space for charging this camera. Consider that a valuable lesson that was learnt the hard way (Screen is now scratched, Sorry Sony!).

In a nutshell:

This is a super zoom Sony Camera with a 16.2 megapixels resolution and 16 times optical zoom. It has GPS functionality so you can easily tag and remember where you took your photographs. There are some other cool features like (Backlight correction, 3D images, full HD recording), but if even if you just want an easy to use pocket camera with photographs that look like they were taken with high end SLR model then go for it!

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Comments

  1. I agree this is currently the best in class, I can’t put mine down. I bought a wall charger on amazon for $10 and now I don’t have to deal with the in camera charging anymore!

Have you read?

A Whimsical Sock Pattern to Blow Your Mind

You probably know by now if you’re a regular reader (and if you’re not, welcome!) that I love a knitting pattern that’s a little silly or a little different from the usual. Classic patterns are great, too, but sometimes you just want to make something with a bit of whimsy. And when it’s super functional, too, that’s even better.

That’s the case with the Bananen-Socken pattern from Susanne Shahin. These banana socks are one of those patterns no one seems to be totally sure where it came from, and this free pattern on Ravelry explains how she makes them based on how she learned it.

It’s a sock that’s curved and when not on a foot it looks rather like a banana. There’s no heel, and you can use whatever number of stitches you need to make it fit your foot. If you’ve knit enough socks to know how many stitches you like you can just use that number, or the pattern notes include sizing charts to help. (It needs to be multiples of 2 for the ribbing.)

After working a traditional cuff, the body is made with ribbing on the back and welts (or what the pattern calls horizontal ribbing) on the front, which is what gives it the curved shape. There’s no heel, but there is toe shaping, but for the leg and the foot you just keep working the same pattern as long as you like.

I’m a little skeptical about how these socks will feel with ribbing on the bottom of the foot, but I’m definitely intrigued and will probably give them a try. 

The pattern notes are available on Ravelry in English, German, French, Italian and Spanish. If you head to the pattern page you can see a photo of what it looks like on a foot, and it just looks like a normal sock.

Have you ever knit banana socks or do you want to now? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

[Photo: Susanne Shahin]