Ricoh WG-30w Review

Performance Evaluation

Here you will find our evaluation of the Ricoh WG-30w's build quality, handling, image quality, and interface.

Construction

The WG-30w has a solid metal strap lug on the right hand side and a bit of finely machined decorative trim on the front.  The remainder of the camera is made of thick, resilient plastic, and when holding it, you can feel that it's built like a tank.  Thanks to this, the camera is not only waterproof to 40 feet (12m), but also shockproof, crushproof, and coldproof. 

Six white LED lights surround the camera's lens.  These can be turned on via the menu, and come on automatically when selecting the Digital Microscope shooting mode.  This feature is unique to the WG cameras, and it comes in handy underwater or when shooting extreme close-ups.

There are two access doors that can be opened by the user.  The first, underneath the camera, houses the battery and SD card.  The other, on the left side, houses the USB and micro HDMI ports.  Both doors are lined with a rubber waterproof seals, and it is a good idea keep these seals free of dust and dirt in order to minimize the chance of leaks.  The HDMI port allows you project the camera's video feed, while the USB port is used not only for data transfer, but also to charge the camera.

On the front of the camera, you'll also find the flash, the AF assist light, the speaker, the microphone, and an infrared remote control port.  A second IR port is also located on the back of the camera for comfortable remote shutter release regardless of where you're standing.  Compatible remotes include the Pentax Remote Control F, Pentax Remote Control O-RC1, as well as generic third party units.

A small protective pin can be found in each corner of the camera's LCD.  These pins protect the screen and reduce the likelihood of scratches when dropped or placed on a rough surface.

Overall, the WG-30w delivers what you'd expect from a rugged waterproof camera.  We are happy with how it's built, but on the other hand, it's nothing spectacular in this day and age.  Just about every other manufacturer with a waterproof camera delivers something comparable, including Panasonic, Nikon, Canon, and Sony.

Handling

The WG-30w's ergonomics are actually quite good (though the WG-3/WG-4 is even better), and the camera lends itself well to being used while wearing gloves.

All of the camera's controls are located on the right hand side.  The shutter release button can be a little hard to press at times, and this can result in added blur in your pictures when shooting in low light.  Apart from this, we had no issues pressing the buttons, even while wearing gloves.  Like the WG-4, and unlike the WG-2, the WG-30w has a dedicated "red button" that allows you to instantly start video recordings.  On the WG-2, the same button was instead used to change the autofocus mode, something that most users will never change away from the default setting.

A standard tripod mount made of plastic is located underneath the camera, also on the right hand side.  The location of this mount makes it hard to keep the camera mounted securely on smaller tripods, but it is fully compatible with the WG mounting accessories launched earlier this year.  Because the base of the camera is not perfectly flat, smaller tripod mounts may not be perfectly level, even when tightened.

The USB/HDMI access door can be a challenge to open, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.  Ricoh's current flagship WG compact, the WG-4, houses both ports beside the battery and SD card slot, thus eliminating the second door.

This camera uses a rather small battery, so the battery life is limited.  Expect around 200 photos per charge; results will vary based on wireless usage and shooting conditions.

General Speed and Autofocus

Most users will be happy with the WG-30w's overall speed and autofocus performance.  The camera takes about a second to start up and has almost no shutter lag.  The autofocus is very quick for everyday shooting, but does slow down considerably in low light or when shooting macros.

The one area in which this camera struggles a bit more is card writing speed.  If you take a photo at 16 megapixels (the maximum resolution) and immediately press the playback button, you will be greeted by the infamous "data being recorded" message, and an additional second will pass before the camera displays your photo.  This message is also shown for about two seconds after recording a video.  When shooting in continuous mode, the camera may lock up for an extended period of time while saving files. 

We aren't surprised at all by these findings, as compact cameras such as this one have very limited processing power.  The WG-30w does a good job overall given what it has to work with.

Lens and Stabilization

The WG-30w is equipped with a 5x zoom lens that would correspond rougly to a 28-140mm F3.5-5.5 lens on a 35mm SLR camera.  The angle of view and zoom range offered is good for everyday photos, but some might prefer to have a wider and brigther lens.  This is offered by the Pentax WG-3/Ricoh WG-4, which has a 25-100mm F2.0-4.9 equivalent lens.

Stabilization in this camera is limited to Digital SR, which is nowhere near as effective as the sensor-shift or optical stabilization found in other cameras.  We therefore recommend flash use and/or a tripod in low light conditions.

Image Quality

Before we start our discussion of the WG-30w's image quality, we would like to advise you that while this camera has a 16 megapixel sensor, it defaults to taking 12 megapixel photos with a 16:9 (widescreen) aspect ratio.  If you indend  to use the sensor's full resolution and native 4:3 aspect ratio, the appropriate setting must be changed in the first tab of the menu.  As the camera's LCD screen has an aspect ratio of 16:9, black bars will appear on the sides when shooting at full resolution.

One area in which the WG-30w shines is hand-held close-up photography.  Its lens can focus as close as 1 centimeter for extreme macro photos with larger than life-size magnification, and it can also focus within a typical 1:1 or 1:2 macro range when the subject is a few centimeters away.

The photo below was shot hand-held with the macro focus mode enabled.  Click on it for the full image.

WG-30w - Ice Cystals

You can also expect accurate exposure and fairly decent colors from this camera.  Again, click on the thumbnail below for the full-size image.

WG-30w - Sample Landscape

In certain scenarios the out-of-camera contrast is a bit lacking, but this can be corrected in post or boosted via a menu setting.

The WG-30w really starts to struggle when lots of details are present in the distance, though.  Let's take the photo below as an example; click on it for the full-size image:

WG-30w - Canyon

A 100% crop of the image, such as the one below, resembles a watercolor painting more than anything else.  Even when it's bright outside, the camera applies excessive noise reduction, which results in smudging and fuzzy details as in the image below.  Things only get worse indoors or in low light, when the camera tries to shoot at higher sensitivity settings.

100% crop of the photo above

The ensure optimal image quality, we recommend that you manually set the camera to ISO 125 (the base ISO) and disabled the "IQ Enhancer" feature in the menu.

Refer to the samples on the next page to get a better sense of what to expect from the WG-30w.  Overall, with the exception of the macro mode, we remain unimpressed with the quality of the photos from this camera.  A smartphone such as a Samsung Galaxy or Apple iPhone is capable of better landscapes.

Shooting Videos

The WG-30w supports full-HD video recording at 30FPS, or 720p and 60FPS/30FPS with mono audio.  While not cutting-edge, the video mode is suitable for everyday filming. 

Video stabilization is electronic, which can introduce a jello effect in your footage.  Also, only digital zoom is available during recording, which can severely impact image quality for distant objects.  The continuous video autofocus gets the job done.

User Interface

The WG-30w has a simple menu system with only 3 tabs: image capture settings, video capture settings, and system settings.  While it lacks context-sensitive tooltips for the menu settings, the interface so simple that it becomes self-explanatory, and it is thus beginner-friendly.  The shooting modes and flash can be controlled directly via the 4-way controller rather than the menu itself.

In playback mode, we were surprised to see two advanced features: a histogram and shadow/highlight alert.  These features enable users to more easily evaluate the accuracy of the exposure; they are accessed by pressing the "OK" button.  The camera also provides basic retouching features, such as cropping, resizing, and red-eye reduction, among others.

By now you have most likely realized that while the WG-30w is not a high-end camera, it's durable and can get the job done in many different outdoor scenarios.  But it has one issue that we simply can't forgive: a severely outdated, substandard LCD screen.  Rather than reusing the 3.0", 460k-dot LCD from the Pentax Optio WG-2, Ricoh has instead fitted the WG-30w with a 2.7" LCD with half the resolution (230k dots).  The result: a shooting experience that is nothing short of abysmal.  Since the display has a widescreen aspect ratio, the entire display isn't even used when capturing 16 megapixel photos, which further lowers the number of pixels used to display images.

The slider below compares the screen size of the WG-30w to the WG-2:

The screen resolution is so low that it can be hard to recognize faces, let alone small objects, without zooming in (in both live view and playback).  To illustrate, here is a screenshot of the camera in playback mode:

Below is the photo being displayed, scaled to roughly the same size:

This screen resolution takes us back to technology used nearly a decade ago.  We might have looked the other way if the WG-30w were marketed as a cheap beginner model, but it isn't: the WG-10 and WG-20 fill that gap at about a third of the price.  Fitting an otherwise-decent camera with a screen this bad is simply a mistake, no matter how we look at it.  Nobody will want to use this camera during an era in which smartphone screens out-resolve many televisions.  The story may have been different three years ago.