Top of camera controls

Top of the camera is (left to right) self-timer button, macro / landscape button, LCD display, flash mode button, zoom control and shutter release.

This fairly minimal controls approach works pretty well and everything you tend to need is accessable without turning on the LCD (except for exposure compensation which would have been a nice option on the top controls - perhaps a shift button held down combined with the w/t zoom control to adjust exposure compensation).

Rear of camera controls

Rear of camera is the LCD surrounded by control buttons. Top right is the power switch (one of these flick on, flick off types). Bottom right is the main mode dial for switching between Capture, Review, Connect and Camera Setup modes. All controls described below.

	Menu button : Enters / exits menus in Capture and Review modes, used to "back up" from sub-menus.
	LCD on/off (display) / CONFIRM button: This button toggles the display on and off and is used in menus to confirm selection.
	Up/down arrows : Used to navigate menus.
	Left/right arrows : Used to jog between images in Review mode and select sub-menu options.
	Mode dial: The main mode dial controls the cameras current mode, either Capture (take photos), Review (playback and review images), Connect (enable external connectivity - serial / USB), Camera Setup (change various camera settings).

Capture mode

In Capture mode with the LCD turned on you see a live preview of the image you'll be taking, no other information is overlayed on this image.

Pressing the menu button displays the capture menu, scroll up and down and select a menu option.	After selecting an option the right hand pane allows you to modify that options settings (in this case JPEG quality).

Overall the menu system on the DC280 is a vast improvement over that found on many other digicams, it's bright, colourful and simple to navigate, the menubar scrolls smoothly (nice touch) and menu response is good. I would like to have been able to scroll off the top option straight to the bottom option (wrap-around).

Review mode

Switching to Review mode instantly reviews the last shot taken, you then have various options as described below. When scrolling between images the DC280 uses the same technique as found on the Nikon 950 which is to display a "rough" blown-up thumbnail first and refine it with the more detailed image if you don't move to the next image.

The immediate review of last image taken, use the left and right arrow keys to move between images.	Pressing the menu button "slides" the thumbnail view (bottom) and menu bar (left), use left and right to move between images and up and down to choose menu options.
Here is an example of selecting a menu option, the thumbnail of the image is still displayed, in this case we've requested picture info which displays date, time, image quality and exposure information

Camera Setup mode

Entering Camera Setup mode displays the above menu system.	Selecting a sub-menu option displays the sub-menu on the right-hand side.
This is the camera information (note the firmware version: pre-release camera).