Rapid evolution in technology garners tense competition, and as the explosive growth of the digital camera market is still very much in effect, genetic oddities such as the new Xacti VPC-C4 are only to be expected now.

This pocket-sized camera is positioned in a market saturated with various filming alternatives as a dual-purpose device – a digital movie camera and a still-image camera – and this is reflected in the unusual shape. With its silvery pistol-grip design, it’s like some futuristic version of the Super-8. In fact, that’s almost exactly what it is: a home video camera for the digital age. The bonus is, it takes respectable stills.

The unique design of the C4 makes for simple single-handed operation. The controls are all located on the backside of the unit, with shutter controls, zoom and the interface-navigating joystick – all within easy reach of the thumb, and a rubber strip along the leading edge provides a nice grip. The 1.8in TFT screen folds away flush to the body of the camera, and when it’s all buttoned up, this dinky little unit is surprisingly robust.

The camera takes 4MP images at a resolution of 3,264x2,448, which makes it a relatively high-quality snapper, and there’s just enough optical zoom leeway to focus in on distant targets. The resulting images are noise-free and impressive, with excellent colour balance.

Turn the flash off and tinker with the ISO levels, and you can squeeze some very atmospheric evening shots out of the C4. The video quality is a pretty good too, with MPEG-4 movies maxing out at 640x480 and 30fps, making it ideal for brief spurts of holiday fun-catching, and good for webcam work.

The 128MB of onboard memory doesn’t go too far, so we would recommend throwing an extra £35 at the e-tailer of your choice and picking up a 1GB SD card to improve the camera’s storage. The battery life is usable, with up to 130 still shots or an hour of video on a single charge. You’ll also find useful a remote control and a USB cable.

Overall, it’s a neat, well-designed and capable product. Not one for the professional photographer perhaps, and it’s a bit pricey, but the C4 is a high-quality snapper that you’ll havea lot of fun with.