Canon Powershot SD450 / IXUS 55 Digital Camera - Not Much of Improvement Over SD400
Written: Oct 15 '05 (Updated Apr 07 '06)
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Pros: Huge screen, compact size, weight, looks nice, fast, pleasing photos
Cons: Red eye, not much manual control, low LCD resolution, no substantial improvement over SD400
The Bottom Line: I see not much difference between the SD450 and SD400, aside from the LCD screen size. Even the image quality was very similar. I recommend...
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| dkozin's Full Review: Canon Powershot SD450 / IXUS 55 Digital Camera |
After Canon released the 5-Megapixel Canon PowerShot SD450, I decided to find out how much different it is from the Canon SD400. On the surface, it seemed that the only difference would be the larger LCD screen (2.5-inch vs. 2-inch on SD400).
I have bought the Canon SD450 for $330, which is about $60 more than I bought my Canon PowerShot SD400 Digital Elph for. But I was lucky to get the SD400 so cheaply as it was advertised in an Office Depot catalog for a price that was probably a mistake. Currently, the SD450 sells for about $30 more than the SD400. Should you spend $30 extra for the SD450 or get the SD400? Let's find out
Pictures
The pictures of the Canon PowerShot SD450 and the sample photos taken with it are available at the address below:
http://www.review-shop.com/Canon_SD450/Canon_SD450_Samples_1.html
You can copy and paste the above address into your browser's address area.
What Is Canon PowerShot SD450?
The Canon PowerShot SD450 Digital ELPH is a 5-Megapixel super-compact stylish digital camera with metal case, 3x optical zoom (35-105 mm equivalent), huge 2.5-inch LCD screen, zooming optical viewfinder, acclaimed fast Canon DiG!C II (DIGIC 2) Image Processor and 9-area smart AiAF auto focus, powered by a compact rechargeable battery. The camera can also record videos.
The SD450 stores pictures and videos on SD (Secure Digital) or MultiMedia memory cards (16 MB SD supplied) and features fast USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to PC and Mac computers. It also supports direct printing (without computer) with PictBridge compatible printers. The cables, software and rechargeable battery with charger are included.
Two Reviews
I will provide two reviews below. The first one (short version) will be targeted to people who don't want to read through multiple pages of text to figure out if the camera has what they want and if it performs well. It is targeted to a casual user rather than somebody who cares about the small details.
The second version will contain the description of the more advanced aspects for those who are interested in them. By separating this information, I hope to avoid boring casual shooters to death with information about things they might not need.
Short Review
Once the camera arrived, I opened the package eager to see how much different the SD450 is from the SD400 that I had a while back. The first thing you notice is how much larger the LCD screen is and how the controls and the viewfinder are trying to stay on the rear of the camera, pushed aside by the grown LCD screen. The camera looks extremely cool. It is very miniature, looks stylish, feels sturdy and heavy in your hand with its metal case and buttons.
The camera looks and feels durable as well. The SD450 has a retractable lens that extends and has a lens cover that opens when the camera is powered on. When the camera is powered off, the lens retracts and the lens cover closes.
The SD450 features an on/off button on the top deck as well as a zoom rocker and a large shutter release button. The bottom of the camera has a metal threaded tripod mount and a battery and SD card compartment lid. The lid is made of plastic but the outer surface is metal. The rear houses a huge 2.5-inch LCD screen, an optical zooming viewfinder, control buttons and menu controls with a select button in the middle of it.
There back of the camera also has a sliding switch between review, movie and still picture taking modes. This sliding switch has well-calibrated effort - not too flimsy yet not too stiff. The side has a small cover, underneath which you can find a USB jack, A/V jack and a DC power input jack. There is a belt loop next to the lid.
The camera is very easy to use. Comparing to the SD400, the menus and icons got slightly more descriptive due to more available space on the screen. For example, the pictogram that shows mountains now says Infinity underneath to tell you that in this mode the focus is fixed on infinity.
I have not read the manual (I have not even opened it), but was able to use the camera and all its features in no time. The SD450 can be used by any member of the family and by photographers of all levels of expertise from novices to advanced ones (albeit it will not give you much control over the shutter speed or aperture).
The camera comes pre-set to Auto mode, in which you have no need or way to adjust settings. You do not have to do anything other than point and shoot - the camera takes care of the rest. The camera uses 9-area intelligent autofocus. You press the shutter release button halfway to make camera focus and the camera shows you (on the LCD screen) where it focused by displaying one or more green rectangles. Then you take the picture by pressing the shutter release button all the way.
In case you want more control, you can select Manual mode, which is not a real manual mode where you would be able to select the shutter speed and aperture, but rather a mode in which you get access to selection of several parameters. In Manual mode, you can set the ISO (50-400), white balance (several presets and custom), use exposure compensation to make pictures darker or brighter, use picture effects, color replacement effects, etc.
Be advised that the camera uses a dedicated button (arrow up) to change ISO, unlike the SD400 where you had to push FUNC and use the function menu.
In addition to fast ISO selection, the SD450 gives you instant access to the flash mode selection (flash off, red-eye reduction, night portrait, auto flash), macro or infinity mode as well as drive mode (single frame, timer or burst/continuous shooting) at a push of a button.
The camera uses the latest version of Canon DiG!C processor - DIGIC II. It is the same processor used in larger Canon digital SLR cameras and it gives this Digital Elph amazing speed. The camera takes less than a second to power itself on in review mode and only about a second to power on and extend its lens in shooting mode. It feels instantaneous.
The camera can capture images at about two per second in burst mode (I used Kingston Elite Pro SD memory card). In single-frame mode, the camera could snap pictures as fast as I could push the shutter release button. The focusing takes less than a second, even in dim lighting, at both wide angle or telephoto.
The shutter lag, when pre-focused, is almost unnoticeable. The zooming from wide angle to telephoto (or back) takes less than two seconds and is responsive, but has less steps than I would like. I find the 3x optical zoom the camera has sufficient for most situations.
I have not fully tested the battery consumptions, but took more than 80 pictures and the low battery warning has not appeared yet. Canon claims you can take about 150 photos on one battery charge with the LCD on.
The LCD is large, bright, gains-up in the dark (increases brightness) and is fluid. But the resolution of the screen stayed virtually the same (actually decreased slightly) comparing to the SD400. Still, it works well.
The camera's flash is quite bright for its size. It has a red-eye reduction mode and is sufficient at up to 10-12 feet away. It has a recycle time of about 7-10 seconds. I discovered that due to its close proximity to the camera lens, pictures of people indoors in dim light had persistent red-eye problems, which I had to fix in Adobe Photoshop later on. I had no red-eye problems using flash outdoors.
The camera produces excellent photo with well-exposed, sharp, contrasty and richly-colored images (see the samples). The sample photo can be seen at
http://www.review-shop.com/Canon_SD450/Canon_SD450_Sample_1_1.html
(you can copy and paste the above address into your browser's address area)
Overall, for its size, the camera produces pictures that are the best in class.
The skin colors are true to life and pleasing. One issue I have with image quality is that the corners of the frame are not as sharp as the center at some focal lengths. This will be mostly unnoticeable in printed pictures since corners normally don't make it to the print due to the aspect ratio difference and other factors.
Aside from slightly blurry corners, the photos came out sharp with very pleasing colors.
The image noise is present at ISO 50 in shadows, grows (slightly) at the ISO 100, gets more pronounced at ISO 200 and gets worse at ISO 400. Still, if you are printing 6x4 or 5x7 pictures, the noise should not be visible at all. But I do not recommend printing anything larger than 7x5 at ISO 400. At ISO 50-100, you can print your photos at up to 11x14 inches with good detail.
Recommendation: I see not much difference between the SD450 and SD400, aside from the LCD screen size. Even the image quality was very similar. I recommend Canon SD450 if you want a miniature, cool yet capable camera with 5-megapixels that produces excellent photos with print sizes of up 11x14 inches and has a large 2.5-inch screen. If you don't need the 2.5-inch screen, you can save $30-50 by getting the SD400. Both cameras are capable performers, and look cool too!
If you want more control and features, you might want to check out the larger Canon PowerShot A610.
Full Review
More on Features and Controls
The Canon SD450 is a camera very similar to the popular SD400, but has a larger 2.5-inch LCD screen. The camera uses a very compact rechargeable battery that looks like a cell phone battery. The camera has a bright low-light focus assist illuminator that helps it focus in low light.
The camera features selectable Evaluative, Center-Weighted and Spot metering modes. The camera has a built-in flash that is quite powerful or its size and has a red-eye reduction function. It features a shutter speed range of 15-1/1,500 sec and selectable ISO of 50-400 as well as Auto ISO.
The SD450 also has a Macro mode where it can focus as close as 1.2 inches (3 cm) at wide angle or 1 ft (30 cm) at telephoto. The available movie mode records movies with sound (the camera has a microphone and a speaker) at 640x480, 320x240 or 160x120 with movie clip lengths of up to 3 minutes.
The camera has an aperture range of f/2.8-5.6 at wide angle, f/4.9-10 at telephoto. It seems that the aperture is a two-step type with no fine control over aperture. The camera doesn't let you control the aperture or the shutter speed directly, but even if you select Infinity mode (the icon looks like mountains) or try shooting in different lighting conditions, you will soon discover that your resultant photos have only one of two aperture values at any given focal length. For example, I only get f/2.8 or f/5.6 at wide angle.
This might explain the fact that there is not indication of the aperture (or shutter speed) on the screen during the shooting or even in review. The camera only shows you a red icon, which serves as a warning that the shutter speed might be too slow and you should use a tripod or place the camera on a stable surface.
Still, it would be rather useful to know the shutter speed when shooting handheld or while shooting fast-moving objects. And it is good to know the aperture while shooting at telephoto to figure out if the background will be blurry.
There are a bunch of scene modes as well, which help the camera tweak the focusing and exposure settings according to the type of scene.
You can use the exposure compensation in the manual mode and it comes in handy in the morning or sunset hours as the camera overexposes the picture trying to preserve the shadow detail. I had to use about -2/3 EV exposure compensation with outdoor photos in the morning.
More on Image Quality
The camera produces contrasty photos that have a pleasing "Canon" color with slight oversaturation and nice blue skies - the kind of color consumers like. The dynamic range of the photos seems to be good. The histogram of my sample photos (viewed in Photoshop) had no clipping in either shadow or highlight areas. But in harsh lighting conditions, the highlights can be blown out.
I was able to find only small amounts of chromatic aberration (purple fringing) in the areas of high contrast. The camera has typical noise characteristics. And it was no surprise that the noise at ISO 400 makes the ISO 400 barely unusable at any size over 5x7 inches, whereas the ISO 50-100 photos are usable up to 11x14.
Image Quality Settings
The camera lets you select between Super Fine, Fine and Normal compression levels (regardless of resolution). You can detect occasional JPEG artifacts in the mode of highest compression and some fine detail may be lost. But the two lower-compression modes (Fine and Superfine) are rather good.
Color and Picture Effects
You can adjust color saturation by selecting Vivid or Neutral color in addition to the standard setting. In Vivid mode, the saturation is increased and I find that it provides too much saturation. I don't use this mode. In the Neutral mode, the saturation is decreased. I find it useful mainly in the low light conditions to reduce noise and make images more true-to-life.
Also available Black and White, Sepia and Low Sharpening effects. The former two are nothing to write home about - just regular modes that are quite useful if you want to give your photos an old look. The Low Sharpening effect reduces in-camera sharpening and lets you sharpen your photos later, in software (e.g. Photoshop). This gives you more control over sharpening.
Additionally, the camera has modes called Vivid Green, Vivid Red and Vivid Blue. They do exactly that - make the stated color vivid. And the camera has funky color effects. You can replace some colors with others - a feature I don't particularly care for.
White Balance
The SD450's automatic white balance is usually quite accurate with the exception of the incandescent lighting, where you are better off either selecting Incandescent white balance setting or using the available manual white balance.
Focusing
You let camera focus using its AiAF 9-area focusing system and the camera will show you green rectangles over the areas where it focused so that you can confirm the focus areas. There is no manual focusing provision.
There are also two special focusing modes, accessible at a push of a button: Macro mode and Infinity (Infinity available in Manual mode).
Camera Sounds
The camera is rather quiet in operation aside from the scraping/scratching sounds when focusing, especially as you reach the telephoto end of the zoom. I heard the same sounds while using the Canon PowerShot A520 and A510, so this is no anomaly. My Panasonic FZ5 makes similar sounds, but they are quieter.
Tripod Mount
The camera has a metal tripod mount. It is useful if you want to take macro pictures or pictures with long exposures (e.g. nighttime). The camera has a timer (2-second or 10-second), which you should use to avoid blurry images when the camera is on the tripod.
The SD450 has noise reduction that is activated with exposures longer than 1.3 seconds and takes a picture with the shutter closed and then subtracts it from the original picture, thereby eliminating so-called "hot pixels" and reducing noise in long exposures.
Build Quality and Ergonomics
The camera has a solid feel and excellent build quality. The camera a bit too small but for its size, but it is convenient to hold and its compact size lets you put it in a jacket pocket or a purse easily. In fact, it is so small, you can put it in a shirt pocket. The major controls are within easy reach and the tactile response is good. But the zoom control is awkwardly located and could have been better implemented.
Menu System
I have not read the manual, yet was able to use the camera in all modes. I used not to be a fan of Canon menus, recent cameras from Canon are very easy to use. Not only I find the menus intuitive, they also appear very fast, unlike the menus on cameras with first version of DIGIC processor, e.g. Canon A520 and A510.
The camera is extremely fast and responsive. The large bright LCD screen shows pictograms of selected modes (e.g. Macro, Flash mode, etc.) appear large and legible on the screen (sometimes with subtitles) and then move to the side of the screen. A very cool and useful feature, especially for people with impaired vision.
LCD and Viewfinder
The camera has a 2.5-inch non-articulated (fixed) LCD screen and an optical zooming viewfinder. The LCD coverage as about 100% - you can see exactly what will be recorded. The viewfinder, however, cover only about 80% of what will be recorded. The LCD is bright, fluid, has good visibility in sunlight or darkness. But it does not have very high resolution at only 115,000 pixels. The smaller 2-inch screen of the SD400 has higher resolution of 118,000 pixels! Still, the SD450 has a legible screen that works well.
Computer Connectivity
The camera uses USB 2.0 Hi-Speed connection to transfer pictures to a computer. You can also remove the SD memory card and use a memory card reader (if you have one), but I used the camera with the USB cable supplied. The file transfer is very fast at about 2,500 KB/s. The annoying part is that you have to install a driver to be able to use the camera with your computer (I never had to install a driver for Panasonic or Olympus cameras I used). And I do not use the software that was provided with the camera since I have Adobe Photoshop CS2.
Histogram
The camera can display a histogram in the review mode to show you if you have overexposed the highlights or underexposed the shadows. I useful feature when you don't trust the LCD. But there is no histogram in shooting mode.
Bottom Line
I see not much difference between the SD450 and SD400, aside from the LCD screen size. Even the image quality was very similar. I recommend Canon SD450 if you want a miniature, cool yet capable camera with 5-megapixels that produces excellent photos with print sizes of up 11x14 inches and has a large 2.5-inch screen. If you don't need the 2.5-inch screen, you can save $30-50 by getting the SD400. Both cameras are capable performers, produces best-in-class photos (for their size). And they both look cool too!
If you want more control and features, you might want to check out the larger Canon PowerShot A610.
My Reviews of Other Similar Digital Cameras
Canon:
Canon PowerShot SD450 5-Megapixel Digital Camera Review
Canon PowerShot SD500 7.1-Megapixel Digital Camera Review
Canon PowerShot SD550 7.1-Megapixel Digital Camera Review
Canon PowerShot SD600 6-Megapixel Digital Camera Review
Panasonic:
Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ3 5-Megapixel Digital Camera with 6x Optical Stabilized Zoom Review
Panasonic Lumix DMC-LZ5 6-Megapixel Digital Camera with 6x Optical Stabilized Zoom Review
Olympus:
Olympus Stylus 600 Digital Camera Review
Olympus Stylus 800 Digital Camera Review
Sony:
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-P200 Digital Camera Review
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-T5 Digital Camera Review
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-T7 Digital Camera Review
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-W5 Digital Camera Review
Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-W7 Digital Camera Review
Fuji:
Fuji FinePix E550 Digital Camera Review
Fuji FinePix E900 Digital Camera Review
Fuji FinePix F10 Digital Camera Review
Kodak:
Kodak EasyShare V550 Digital Camera Review
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 330
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Easy Enough for Anyone to Use
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Epinions.com ID:
dkozin
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Location: California
Reviews written: 814
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About Me:
I love to push buttons on electronic (audio and video) equipment. It makes me happy.
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