Pentax Debuts Optio Z10, S10 Cameras

Pentax has announced two new Optio cameras, the 8 megapixel Z10 with a 7x zoom, and the DivX-certified, 10 megapixel S10.

It was just last month when Pentax unveiled a pair of new Optio cameras, but this month the company is at it again, taking the wraps off their new Optio Z10 and Optio S10 compact point-and-shoot cameras.

The Optio Z10 will offer an 8 megapixel resolution and a 7× optical zoom, which Pentax likes to point out cranks all the way to 35.7× combined with digital zoom. The Z10 also features sensitive down to ISO 3200 for low-light shots, digital image stabilization, and high-speed face recognition to assist in making snapshots of friends and family recognizable. Pentax isn’t saying how much built-in memory the Z10 will come with, but it stores images to SD/SDHC media, offers a 2.5-inch LCD viewfinder, and offers PictBridge printing capabilities,

Meanwhile, the Optio S10 offers a similar feature set to the Z10 (albeit with a 3× optical zoom) pushes the resolution to 10 megapixels—and Pentax actually says the S10 features 22 MB of internal memory, along with it being one of the smallest and lightest 10 megapixel cameras on the planet. The S10 is also DiVX certified, enabling users to capture movies in DivX format. This is Pentax’s seventh DivX camera, and the digital shake reduction apparently makes capturing DivX-format video more appealing—DixV video can also be played back in a variety of consumer DVD players.

Both the Optio Z10 and Optio S10 will be available in September with suggested prices of $249.95; in the United States, the S10 will be exclusive to Wal-Mart.