I'm a hobbyist who long ago owned a Konica SLR and shot lots of slides. In the digital age, I've only owned point-and-shoot cameras and have become frustrated by their lack of flexibility and quality. I looked long and hard at SLRs but don't yet feel I can spring for the price. I also wanted something more easily portable. But I wanted complete control over shutter speed and aperture, and I wanted to be able to shoot in RAW for more post-processing flexibility. I decided to spring for the G10.
Since purchasing this camera about a week ago, I've taken about 2,000 shots. (I went a little nuts!) Here's what I've learned so far:
-- Although the auto settings produced very good pictures, this camera really comes into its own when you shoot in Manual mode. I was able to routinely get some vivid fall sunset scenes on a lake with beautifully saturated color and contrast by tweaking shutter speed and aperture settings separately.
-- I'd say that the noise at 400+ without post-tweaking is considerable, though nowhere near what I used to see on 400 ISO film back in the day. It was easily reduced post-processing using a noise-reduction program that works within Photoshop, and I ended up with some beautiful indoor shots with minimal effort. I even took some night landscape pictures with a bright moon at 1600, and was pleasantly surprised at the results after tweaking them afterward.
-- I was able to get extremely sharp photos in macro mode (closeups of bees in flowers, that kind of thing), again without a tripod. I'm still getting the hang of focusing on the exact part of the flower that I want; I find it more cumbersome to do it with this camera than I did with my old SLR (where you just turned the lens with your hand).
-- The camera did a good job out of the box at face recognition. The built-in flash on auto settings was just OK; it didn't hideously over-expose the faces, but it didn't look entirely natural either. Again, moving away from the auto settings and using fill flash judiciously helped me create some much more natural and attractive portraits. I would imagine adding a separate flash attachment would help even more. I found my favorite portraits were taken with no flash at all and some light tweaking with contrast in Photoshop.
-- The optical zoom met my needs well. I loved having the wide-angle capability for landscape shots, and I got some gorgeous, very clear pictures of a bald eagle at the top of a tree with the telephoto zoom. The camera clearly showed me when I was moving beyond the optical zoom into digital zoom, and my pictures of the eagle deteriorated accordingly. I will probably turn off the digital zoom.
-- The camera comes with all kinds of built-in scene settings (snow, night snapshots, sunsets, underwater, etc.), most of which I haven't yet found that helpful. I did get a couple of fun foliage shots using the sunset and foliage settings, but in both cases I could've gotten the same results simply tweaking in Photoshop afterward. If you don't want to mess with post-processing programs or playing with the camera's controls, I could see how these scene settings could be useful.
-- Photoshop CS3 can't open the RAW files from this camera yet. This is a big drawback for my purposes. I have opened the RAW files in the Canon software that comes with the camera, but it's not nearly as powerful or intuitive as Photoshop. So for now, I'm exporting the RAW files to Photoshop as TIFFs, and they're enormous -- 85 MG. The quality is marvelous, however, and I'm hoping that Adobe will quickly add support for the G10.
I'll try to add some photo examples to this review. I noticed they get a little washed out when saved for the web; the originals are much more vivid.
As point-and-shoots go, this is about as good as it gets for my purposes. I gave it five stars, though I'd like to give it a half-star demerit for the lack of RAW support in Photoshop (a problem I hope will soon be corrected). If you're not quite ready for the leap to an SLR but you want more control and quality than the common point-and-shoot camera, this is an outstanding choice. Canon Powershot G10 14.7MP Digital Camera with 5x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom
I am what one may call a "serious amateur" photographer. My first serious camera was a WWII-vintage 35mm Leica rangefinder that my dad, while in the U.S. Army, got from a captured German Oberleutnant (he said he won it from him playing cards!). I still have that camera, though it needs work. My first "modern" SLR was a Canon F-1 I got back in the early 1980's. Wife Number One got that - along with all the lenses and accessories - in the divorce. <Sniff!> <Sob!>
At this stage in my life, I still care about the quality of pictures I take, but I no longer have the money or the desire to carry around a bulky DSLR body with a satchel full of lenses, flashes, filters, etc. Forgive me, O gods that guard the purity of the photographic arts - I want a point-and-shoot! But I don't want a toy, either.
My first choices would have been something like a Leica DLUX 4 10.1-megapixel Digital Still Camera or a maybe a Sigma DP1 14MP Digital Camera. Both - sorry to say - are a little too rich for my blood right now. That left me with plan B - either the Panasonic DMC-LX3K 10.1MP Digital Camera with 2.5x Wide Angle MEGA Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Black) or the Canon Powershot G10 14.7MP Digital Camera with 5x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom.
As much as I have liked Canon products in the past (I have owned Canon scanners and printers as well as cameras over the years and have always liked their products), I was highly suspicious of the Canon G10 on the grounds of its 14.7 Megapixel resolution. How much digital noise would I have to endure so Canon could claim victory in the latest skirmish of the megapixel wars? I was also very intrigued by the Panasonic for its lens - extremely fast for a point-and-shoot at f2.0 and its unusually wide angle of 24mm (35mm equivalent).
In the end I got the Canon G10 for the following reasons:
1. Most of my shooting is either portrait or outdoor scenery shots, where short to long telephoto (60mm-200mm equivalent) is most appropriate, so the extreme wide angle of the Panasonic was less useful to me. If you are someone who takes lots of family group shots in close quarters, you may feel differently, however.
2. The Canon, though with a slower lens than the Panasonic, was nevertheless able to pass my "art museum test." In other words, I could take excellent hand-held shots indoors of art objects in available light at fairly low ISOs of well under 400, sometimes at nearly 200; shots clear enough to show the depth and detail of every brush stroke. I found that to be good enough for me. But if you are someone who likes to do available-light shots in candle light or outdoors around camp fires, the extra speed of the Panasonic's lens may then become crucial.
3. The Panasonic, though admittedly an excellent camera of its type, was awkward to use, at least for me. It was a tad too small for comfort (I am a big guy, 6'4", 280 pounds, with hands like catcher's mitts). The camera always felt on the verge of slipping out of my hands, especially when holding it in my left hand while messing with the controls with my right. And mess around I did, since the controls were not particularly intuitive in their operation. I'm sure one could get used to just about anything, especially if one reads the manual and practices with it long enough. But I am of the school that believes that good interface design means NOT having to read the manual!
4. The Canon G10, in my opinion, just fits. Big enough and properly shaped for my hands to feel comfortable gripping, but just small enough for carrying in a coat or jacket pocket (though admittedly too big and heavy for a shirt pocket). What's more, every major control is plainly marked and positioned right where God intended for it to be. I found that the Canon passed my "users manual test" as well. Only with the most obscure and least-often-used functions did I have to break out the damned book to figure out how they worked. The camera feels satisfyingly solid, with very good build quality; it just feels good in the hands. I found I felt comfortable with the camera very quickly, could take pictures right away, without hassling with learning the manufacturer's perverse sense of control interface logic.
5. I found the image quality to be generally excellent, with great detail present and surprisingly low noise at ISOs below 400. Left to the camera's automatic white balance sensors, I found the color balance just a tad bit cool for my taste, but what do I know... I'm an old Kodachrome guy. In any case, it is easy to set your own custom settings for color temperature to suit your preference. Even if forced to take shots at ISO 400 and above, all is not lost. For Photoshop users, I recommend PictureCode's Noise Ninja (http://www.picturecode.com/) plug-in. For users of The GIMP (excellent open source free photoshop alternative), try GREYCstoration (http://cimg.sourceforge.net/greycstoration/). Both of these software plug-ins do an excellent job of cleaning up noise without obvious objectionable artifacts. These tools enable shots at high ISO to be much more usable, unless you insist on those poster-sized blow-ups.
In sum, the Canon's worst shortcoming, noise at high ISO (a problem with ANY digital point-and-shoot that sells for less than a grand), is more than outweighed by its sheer usability, its excellent feel, solid build quality and intuitive interface, as well as image quality good enough to satisfy just about anybody. I will step out here and say that on prints 11x13 and smaller, it would take a keen eye indeed to tell the difference between most images from a G10 and those from a DSLR selling for more than twice the price.
What's more, the Canon G10 offers, for those who want to explore the deeper capabilities of the camera, a wide array of automatic shooting modes as well as excellent creative control options, including RAW image support (although Canon's implementation is STILL proprietary and not yet natively supported in Photoshop), shutter or aperture priority, full manual exposure mode, and precise control not only of depth of field, but independent focus and exposure locks, too. This is an easy camera for a novice to just pick up and use, but is sufficiently advanced for the serious amateur or pro when he or she needs high quality with low bulk, and for that novice who wants to grow into his or her new hobby.
For a novice, this camera may seem a touch pricey, but at less than $500 is truly a steal compared to the prices of other high-end point-and-shoots to which the Canon G series is often compared.'
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