A gem of a digicam: pro features in a point-n-shoot body!
Written: Jun 29 '03
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Pros: Superb image quality, good focusing system, versatile manual controls, small size, quality construction.
Cons: No battery strength indicator, quirky menu controller, fussy macro function, delicate LCD surface.
The Bottom Line: This is an excellent choice if you want portability, wonderful image quality, solid construction, and operating flexibility. I am delighted with my S50!
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| rebbi's Full Review: Canon PowerShot S50 Digital Camera |
I will first invite you to read my review of the Olympus C-5050Z at http://www.epinions.com/content_102471470724. Doing so will give you a better idea of where my preferences and biases are so you can better judge whether this review will prove useful to you. (My S50 is a replacement for the 5050.) I'll begin by reiterating what I said in the other review: "There is no such thing as 'the best digital camera.' There is only 'the digital camera that most suits what you want to do with a camera,' and that requires knowing what you want and need the camera for."
I'll take the positives first:
Portability: no, the S50 isn't the smallest digicam out there (not as small as Canon's own Elph series) but it is still a very small camera. Yet the nearly all-metal construction gives the camera a quality feel and a "heft" that make it a pleasure to hold. It will not fit easily into, say, the front pocket of a pair of snug-fitting blue jeans, but if you're wearing baggy "vacation" shorts, for example, it will fit in your pocket with room to spare. Or, buy a tiny case and wear it with a shoulder strap or belt loop, and you'll forget it's there until you need it. I can't overemphasize how much I love having a camera this small. No camera, no matter how wonderful it is, can take a shot that you missed because you didn't feel like lugging the camera with you. The S50 is small enough to "wear as a fashion accessory." ;-) As a result, I'm constantly taking photos these days.
Good paper manual: the S50 has enough layers of complexity that you'll be grateful a for a manual that you can study at your leisure, rather than staring at a PDF in Acrobat on your computer monitor for hours on end. ;-)
Image quality: prepare to be blown away. The amount of detail that you will see in your best photos from the S50 is truly remarkable -- couple this camera with a good photo printer (like Canon's own i850 or i 950) and you will produce prints that are most often indistinguishable from chemical prints. (I took one photo of a neighborhood cat at close range and you feel as if you can see every individual hair on the cat's body... remarkable, especially with such a tiny lens!) Colors are true to life and well (but not over-) saturated, and skin tones look especially good. And under most circumstances, the Auto white balance works very well. Finally, at ISO 50 (which, by all accounts, is the equivalent of other digicams' ISO 100) the S50 captures images with virtually a complete absence of digital "noise," even in shadows. Coming from the noise problems of the 5050, this is wonderful.
LCD: it is bright and sharp, and the display, magnification, and scrolling around within photos in display mode is remarkably fast, perhaps as a result of the specialized "digic" processor in this series of cameras. I particularly love the conveniently placed slider switch which toggles the camera between photo display and picture taking mode. You can view photos with this switch without turning the camera on (i.e., without sliding the lens cover aside) and you can view photos without leaving picture taking mode, and return with a half-press of the shutter button. Neat!
Focusing: in some shooting modes, the LCD display will (with a shutter half-press) show you one or more of 9 green focusing squares, letting you know what the lens is focusing on. I love this feature. It has surely saved me many out-of-focus shots, and I never get the kind of pictures I used to often get with the C5050, in which the camera chose to focus on a background element while the subject was blurry. As for the optical viewfinder, it's slightly better and no worse than most of the compact digicam viewfinders I've tried. But if you're like me, you'll use the LCD most of the time to compose your photos because you'll get so much more information when you do, and because you'll see more of what you're about to capture.
Flexibility: I haven't even begun to fully explore the various creative program modes and manual options of this camera. One magazine reviewer dubbed the S50 a camera that will grow with you as your photographic skills increase, and I think that nails it. What I find so great about the S50 is that while all of the creative and pre-programmed modes are there for you, it performs nearly flawlessly as a "point 'n shoot" camera, too. And that is what allows it to "grow with you."
Movie mode: while no still digicam is going to replace a dedicated video camera, the ability of the S50 to capture small film clips with sound up to 3 minutes in length can come in handy when a priceless moment arises.
Storage: compact flash still rocks. ;-) It's cheap and plentiful and you can get cards large enough for storing an entire weekend's road trip's worth of high resolution photos without breaking the bank.
CONS: Now for the "nothing in this life is perfect" department...
That much-maligned function switch -- it's oddly shaped, and sometimes makes negotiating the menus a little harder than it ought to be. Specifically, while up, down, left and right are fine, pressing the center of the button to "Set" a selection can be tricky. My nearly fool-proof method is to navigate the menus with my thumb, but to shift to my index finger when I need that dead-center "Set" function. Hard to visualize but it solves the problem quite well.
No progressive battery level indicator: battery life in the S50, subjectively, at least, is very good, even using the LCD display pretty constantly. Still, it would be nice to have some battery-level feedback besides a sudden, flashing red indicator when the battery is nearly completely depleted!
LCD delicacy: the surface of the LCD is vulnerable to scratching out of the box, but there is a solution for this, too. See below?
Red eye? Others have reported this to be a particularly severe problem with S50 flash pictures, but I haven't found this to be the case -- besides which, red-eye, when it does occur, is easily eliminated in most image processing programs.
RECOMMENDED ACCESSORIES:
Spare batteries: the fact that the S50 doesn't warn you very well when your batteries are running low means that you want some spares on hand. While the Canon branded Li-Ion batteries are quite pricey, I and others have found generic replacement to work just fine. Look on eBay for auctions of these batteries by places like eForcity... I picked up two generics for $22.
LCD protector: head over to http://www.daproducts.com. For only $8 with shipping, their "mini protector," a stick-on acrylic rectangle, will protect your LCD from scratches without diminishing image clarity.
"Glub-glub:" Canon makes a cool, but not cheap, waterproof case for the S50/45/30 series. It adds some bulk to the camera, but protects it from sand, sunscreen, snow and water down to a depth of 100 feet. Good peace of mind.
Carrying case: there are lots of choices here. I chose the Lowepro Z10, which fits the camera well, has a pocket for flash cards or a spare battery, and adds very little volume to the camera itself. Less than $10 at Best Buy.
Add on lenses and filters?? Even though the S50 has no threading for lenses or filters, enterprising 3rd-party firms have filled the gap. Have a look at http://www.ckcpower.com for their adaptor which lets the S50 accept 37mm lenses and filters. I recently purchased one of these adaptors, along with a Tiffen Mega Plus 2X telephoto convertor. When I've had time to play with it, I'll add to this review.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 519
This Camera is a Good Choice if You Want Something... Flexible Enough for Enthusiasts
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Epinions.com ID:
rebbi
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Reviews written: 10
Trusted by: 1 member
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