Canon PowerShot S95 is a popular camera with some drawbacks, including poor flash design, lack of capture, narrow maximum aperture in the tele-telephoto range, short battery life, low performance and relative high cost. In the S100 model, Canon tried to eliminate some of them by introducing a wider angle of 24 mm focal length, manual control and zoom during movie shooting, geotagging.
Photo quality rating
Despite a slight increase in resolution, the Canon PowerShot S100 maintains excellent photo quality, which contributed to the popularity of the S95. Shutter speed and exposure, color accuracy and tonal range are good, the lens is relatively clear. There are some distortions, but they are smaller than you would expect with such a focal length equivalent to 24 mm. Considering the size and relatively small sensor, the camera provides excellent JPEG quality up to 200 ISO units, and the photos remain quite good up to ISO 800. When shooting in RAW, you can even get a quite suitable result for ISO 1600, which is rare for cameras of this size. In addition, there is a color halo of high-contrast edges. The camera can fix it in JPEG format, but when shooting in uncompressed format, you will need to work hard to fix it.
High sensitivity is especially important for the S100, since the aperture, while limited to a 5x range, narrows so quickly that there is not enough light. Shooting in the afternoon in November is likely to disappoint. Any zoom with the maximum aperture requires increasing the sensitivity setting.
Enhanced Video Recording
The Canon PowerShot S100 Silver is capable of shooting video while using the zoom quietly and imperceptibly. This feature has become one of the improvements to the S95. The video is clear, somewhat oversaturated (this can be fixed by choosing neutral settings), the sound quality is good. There is a slow motion mode when recording is performed at normal speed, and playback at 240 or 120 fps with recording in MP4 format. This method is good in that it does not limit the shooting time, but it is produced with a resolution of only 320 x 240 or 640 x 480 pixels, depending on the frame rate.
Too slow for kids
Unfortunately, Canon has not improved the performance of the S100 compared to the S95. It is still insufficient and does not keep up with the leaders of the XZ-1 or LX5. The camera turns on, focuses and takes a picture in 1.6 s, which is acceptable. The speed of single photos is about the same as that of competitors: 0.4 s for focusing and shooting in good light and 0.6 s for dim. But, like the S95, the camera slows down in two consecutive shots up to 2.4 s for JPEG, 2.6 s for RAW and 2.8 s for flash. RAW + JPEG does not differ in speed, but here the camera is especially sluggish.
Serial shooting in JPEG is performed at a speed of 2.4 fps, but the model cannot be used to photograph fast-moving objects, including children and pets. In addition, battery life is the shortest in this class. This is something to sacrifice for size: the small Canon PowerShot S100 also has a small battery. The LCD is the same as the S95 - bright, saturated, allows you to work in direct sunlight.
Error handling
Canon PowerShot S100 developers fixed some design flaws of the S95. There was a tiny holder in front and a rubber stop for the thumb at the back, which greatly facilitated the shooting process. The control ring around the lens has been preserved, which distinguishes the camera from its competitors, except for the XZ-1, which repeats this design. The ring can be set to set shutter speed, ISO sensitivity, exposure compensation, manual focus, white balance, zoom, frame size, or custom function. The settings are independent of the shooting mode. For example, you can control focus in manual mode or shutter speed in aperture priority mode. Step zoom can be surprisingly useful, as it sets the popular focal lengths (24, 28, 35, 50, 85, 120 mm), which is very convenient if you need to repeat the picture. Quick access to ring settings is made using a special button on the back of the camera. If frequent changes to functions are not planned, then you can reconfigure this button to perform many other tasks, including metering, disabling RAW + JPEG, or using the built-in neutral filter.
View from above
The shutter button and the mode dial, such as PASM, auto, video and plot, as well as a slot for user settings and special effects, appear on top. Custom settings include manual focus and / or zoom and My Menu Items in addition to the corresponding shooting options.
Back view
The rear panel of the Canon PowerShot S100 contains a typical set of controls, including focus mode, flash and exposure compensation plus a quick access button for functions and a dedicated video recording button. Although the menu items are distributed between three seemingly small screens, the user nevertheless has enough means to control and configure the camera and options. For example, at first glance it seems that there are only the most necessary flash options, including correction and synchronization for the first or second curtain. But, having delved into the menu, you can find a manual adjustment of its intensity level. Nevertheless, it would be nice if the flash behaved a little smarter in the "auto" mode.
Quality compact
The Canon PowerShot S100 is still the smallest camera you can purchase, providing good quality photos with a full range of manual settings and a wide aperture lens. This is a great camera, well thought out and comfortable, albeit with some drawbacks. The lens, although it sets a wide aperture, when it is zoomed in, it sharply narrows. The camera is not very fast, which is probably good for street shooting, but it does not have time for unpredictable children or animals.
In the next model, Canon PowerShot S110, these shortcomings will not be fixed. Wi-Fi support will be added, and the screen will become touch. The rest - optics, a sensor, an image processor - the Canon PowerShot S110 will remain the same.
Location function
The most notable new addition is the GPS receiver for geotagging photos. Management is quite simple - you can turn it on or off. There is also a function of continuous recording of the location between images so that you can make a complete route of your trip. Use the supplied software to access this information. The GPS recorder works when the camera is turned off, which reduces battery power, especially when there are problems with signal reception.
There are some less interesting innovations. Movie Digest mode automatically captures a few seconds of video before taking a picture. It sounds good, but at the same time, video is recorded only with a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels. HQ high-speed burst shooting allows you to take 8 photos at 9.6 fps — less than a full second capture with fully automatic settings. Then you need to wait about 4 seconds while recording. Allows you to shoot at full resolution. In addition, there are additional plots and filters for special effects.
Canon PowerShot S100: professional reviews
In general, the model is very similar to its popular predecessor, but a completely new sensor, processor and lens together make up a more versatile, faster and more productive handheld camera, which can become the perfect everyday camera for DSLR and CSC owners.
Among the main disadvantages of the Canon PowerShot S100, reviews by professional photographers call a significant increase in price, inadequate flash control and a small battery capacity. This somewhat reduces the positive impression of the camera.
Users are strongly advised to upgrade the firmware of the Canon PowerShot S100 to version 1.0.2.0, which fixes a problem with the focal length of the control ring and interrupts wireless communication when using the camera as an access point for iOS devices.
Users agree that the S100 resolved many of its predecessor’s problems, including poor video and lack of a holder, improving performance, features and image quality.
The ISO range is from 80-1600 and the maximum aperture is F / 2.0, which, however, is possible only in the wide-angle position of the lens, allows you to shoot in low light conditions and with hands. A positive assessment was made of the ability to achieve blurriness of the background and clarity of the subject, which most owners of other compacts can only dream of. 5x zoom provides greater coverage than the S95, albeit with the inevitable increase in maximum aperture to F / 5.9 by 120 mm. Full HD-1080p video with continuous auto focus, stereo sound and full use of zoom professionals pleased.
Is the price justified?
One gets the impression that all new hardware, in particular GPS, has led to an increase in price to a fabulous $ 429.99. Many will doubt the fairness of such a price for a simple compact camera, but others will consider it economically and logically justified: it is the smallest device with wide functionality of digital SLR cameras and excellent image quality, completed by an elegant user interface.