Pentax Optio W60

The basics

Enjoy taking pictures underwater with the Pentax Optio W60. It is a lightweight and waterproof digital camera that provides users with 10 megapixels shots with 5x zoom lens plus 28 mm wide-angle capability. Due to its waterproof feature, it is able to operate up to approximately 3.96 metres underwater for up to two hours in temperatures below freezing point.

The good

Waterproof to four metres (13ft), cold-proof to sub-zero temperatures and 100 per cent proof if you drop it in a bucket of Absynth. We shot far off sea horses with the 5x internal optical zoom, while close-up frogspawn was glorious in all its detail thanks to the wide-angle lens and top macro-shooting talents. Even the built-in face detection helped us focus on our mates’ gurning grins. All these user-friendly functions are great, but the proof is in the image pudding. Luckily the images are mostly delicious.

The bad

Indoor shots taken with and without the flash, however, were a little noisy and grainy, but given the W60's focus on outdoor and underwater abilities we can forgive that. Also, while you can shoot HD movie footage in the 720p format, it's only at 15fps, and the results aren't particularly eye-popping.

The bottom line

Pentax has come up with the ideal companion for festival goers, travellers and water fetishists.