The Kodak EasyShare P880 is a very interesting camera. Now out of production, there are still a few floating around in the back of some camera stores, as a refurbished camera from Kodak, or on Ebay.

This camera is capable of making very high quality images. Combine this with an excellent 24mm-equivalent lens and it's quite a combination.

Here are a few things that I did to squeeze the most from the P880.

First set the ISO to 100 and leave it there. Anything higher starts producing noisy images. The set the mode dial to "A," the aperture-preferred mode, and set the aperture to F/4. The automatic modes seem to favor very high shutter speeds over reasonable apertures.

There's a button on the top left side of the camera that lets you pick different focusing modes. I leave it on "Normal AF" most of the time, but you can set it to "Infinity," very handy for photographing distant scenes. The "Macro AF" selection is what I used instead of the macro setting on the mode dial.

Since the P880 does its best at low ISO settings, and since it lacks an image stabilization system, you've got to find ways to hold the camera steady. Here's one trick I found that worked very well. First, adjust the camera's strap to be as short as possible. Set the EVF/LCD to use the camera's rear LCD screen. Now loop the strap over your head and pull the camera away from you until strap pulls against the back of your neck. In this position, you're using your body to steady the camera. I've been able to take pictures down to 1/4 second using this method. It just takes a little practice.