Pentax Optio WG-1 GPS Digital Camera - Grey (14MP, 10m Water Proof, 1.5m Shock Proof, 5 x Wide Angle Optical Zoom and GPS Function) 2.7 inch LCD

Bought this camera for a family holiday in Corfu, rather than take my expensive Nikons. I did expect some quality trade-off, but was pleasantly surprised at just how well the Pentax performed. This camera does everything it says on the box, and has been heavily used in both the sea and the swimming pool with no ill effects. It even has an underwater shooting mode to counter the filtering of the red end of the spectrum. Shoots great video too, and with an 16Gb SD card, has all the space I needed, rendering my video camera largely redundant. The WG-1 has a tough, armoured casing that looks tough enough to batter an elephant unconscious with.

One minor gripe; leaving the GPS on will hammer the battery, so use that feature sparingly as the GPS still works even when the camera is switched off. If you do want to use this feature constantly, make sure you have a spare battery or two.

If you want a take-anywhere, ruggedised camera that you can use underwater with confidence, then this could be for you. A winner.

Like the previous reviewer, I bought this camera to take to the Maldives. As the other reviews all say the camera takes great pictures, it has lots of options to play with and is easy to get to grips with. GPS does drain the battery but anyone who's used this before will know it, anyone who hasn't will find out very quickly.

One of the things I love about this camera is the speed at which it operates, I've used the Olympus Tough before and if it's gone into power save mode, or you've just taken 1 photo it's ages before you can take another and whoops the shark/fish/rays don't want to wait. Not with the Pentax, it's much quicker in comparison and I only missed 2 shots that I was trying to get.

The reason I haven't given it a 5 stars is because the camera didn't make it to 10m. I was only snorkelling, albiet to about 5m but water got into the camera. Not much, in fact so little it was not enough to cause a problem for the electronics BUT when I was standing in the sun the heat would cause the camera to warm up and the water inside created steam on the inside of the lens. Really really annoying. Had to leave it for about half an hour somewhere cool for the steam to disapear so I could use it again.

Fortunately I was able to swap the camera without an issue. I haven't had the same problem yet I had in the Maldives but I haven't been diving with the new camera yet.

I Bought this camera for our holiday in mexico, with a case and 16gig sd card and spare battery cost me about £325 as i bought them all seperately,and when the camera was a new release. I could not find the right deal at the time to buy the particular items i wanted together. Bought the GPS version and also wanted the green colour which i think looks great. A 16 gig card will hold thousands of photographs at maximum resolution or a couple of hours of video at 1280x720, do not buy cheap sd cards as they will take a long time to store a 14mpixel photo, and will not work well with HD video. At 14mpixel the photos are usually between 3.5 and 4.5 megabytes each photo. The Transcend 16gig class10 work well, but if you can afford it, get the Sandisk 16GB Extreme class10 SD.
Picture quality is good but i found that green colours tend to look a little brighter in the photograph than they were in real life, which is not such a bad thing as they can make outdoor photos a bit more vibrant.
I did use the camera down an underground cenote (sinkhole in limestone rock) swimming in fresh water, also used it to take photographs on a sea bed walk while wearing a diving helmet, at about 12 to 15 feet deep, and while underwater changed camera function to underwater video and got some good footage of the tropical fish and the stingrays upclose. Camera worked fine through the whole trip except for the GPS, which did not want to find a lock in mexico, although it worked well in England.
GPS flattens the battery quickly, especially the tracking function, but with GPS function turned off, the battery lasted four to five days and about 75 photographs or more. Zoom quality is good and with resting my arms on a rail, managed to take a shot at maximum zoom without shake on the picture. I did find the face detection a litle annoying at times, as i had to cycle through this setting to either make it see faces, or turn it off because it focused on the wrong place.
Overall the camera is easy to use, has a lot of functions, including sound record on HD video, and will stand up to the general punishment that an outdoor adventurer will put it through, and image quality is a big improvement on the cheaper 14mpixel camera you can buy at the local supermarket because of the quality lenses and sensor fitted to this camera.
Would i recommend the Pentax Optio WG-1 GPS?, of course i would, but the cheaper model without the GPS is probably the one to go for, although it does look good in green.