Canon PowerShot SD970 IS

I was on the market for a while looking for a replacement to my four years old Canon SD320 Digital Elph, which after many years of solid performance just started to show it was way behind on all the… advances on sensors and overall improvements coming from the booming of the digital camera market over these years. The SD320 was my first digital camera after playing around for years with a Canon Rebel EOS SLR film camera which took amazing pictures but not only it wasn't digital but it was not also that practical to carry around My initial feeling was to go back to the SLR days thinking the advances on digital cameras would allow me to find a great but not that bulky or heavy camera -at least not heavy for my standards- that I could carry around without much trouble. I didn't want to carry a big lens so my first consideration was a Canon G-10 or G-11, which I considered a nice mid-range SLR, not too big, not a victim of the known limitations of the point and shoot cameras. I was lucky to being able to use a G-10 a very good friend that uses it as his `pocket camera' (you have to see the lenses he has on his other SLRs) lent me for a few weeks. Even if I was very impressed with the capabilities of the G-10 and the amazing pictures I got from it, I realized I wasn't ready to carry a camera this big around and wasn't really into the aperture/shooter speed/etc ordeal I once enjoyed with my old SLR. Even by giving away all that flexibility and realizing I probably wouldn't be able to take professional-like pictures, I decided I wasn't ready for something bigger than a point-and shoot. I also wanted a camera I can hand to my wife in auto mode and still take great pictures Being a long time Canon user, I started with a Canon but didn't neglect other brands. After doing plenty of research and looking at the advantages and disadvantages of its competitors from Fuji, Sony, etc, I decided Canon was still good enough even if it was behind brands like Fuji on sensor capabilities according to many credible sources. I gave Canon the benefit of the doubt and decided I was going to stick with a brand of camera I knew, with the menu I knew and with the defects I knew how to tweak to reduce its impact on the pictures. There are no perfect Cameras and Canon cameras maybe far from perfect according to many, but for me they are like that old car at the right price that if you know where to kick-it you can make it overcome its drawbacks. So I stick to what I knew, I didn't want to go through the learning curve of a new brand I was among this SD970 IS and the newest Canon models of point and shoot, the SD980 IS and the SD940 IS. Honoring the motto of optical zoom is king I quickly discarded the SD940, even if the wider angle lens would have give me more flexibility in what basically a point and shoot is used for: take picture of people. But during the years I learned than a good optical zoom is one the things needed to close the picture quality gap between a point and shoot and an SLR camera. As my friend likes to say, more glass, more quality. It was not that easy between the SD980 and the SD970 though, being the former an advanced model of the later. The SD980 has a wider lens range with the same optical zoom as the SD970 (5x) and just because it's newer it should have a better sensor and a better lens, but this isn't always the case. The SD980 was also slimier and sexier and that touch screen was really something I wanted to try, but at the end I played it safe as at the time I bought this camera the SD980 had been on the market for just a few days, and I went for proven vs. hopeful, even if the SD980 looked impressive and at a better price. So I bought my little SD970 and took it on its maiden trip to the United Kingdom and Spain. One word: Astounding little camera. Just to set the framework of the review, I didn't use the auto-setting but only the program mode, so I cannot say how the auto mode works but as they are using the same lens and sensor I would be surprised if results are much different. The first thing you will notice is the superior dynamic range this camera has for being a compact camera. It can capture way many if not all variations of colors and shadows and moves easily across the color pallet with ease. The second thing you will notice is how easy is to play with the different possibilities within the program mode and amazing results you will get form all the combinations. You really have to be a professional to realize the picture you've got are not made with an SLR camera, picture quality looks as good or very close as much more expensive camera with bigger sensors, which leads me to the third point: the sensor does a great job even if small being a compact camera sensor. One of the things that worried me of this camera was the high mega pixel-small sensor combination which is a recipe for picture noise. I'm not sure what's the obsession of camera makers on increasing the pixels while equipping their cameras with substandard sensors (maybe is the belief that more MP = better pictures). In my opinion, anything over 10 MP for a compact camera is risky considering the size of the sensor it can carry, but 12 MP is the top, I wouldn't buy a compact camera with more than 12 MP, is a marketing myth that not necessarily means better pictures. Being the SD970IS at the top of the range for its sensor, in none of the pictures I took there is noticeable noise even at low light conditions. I was greatly surprised by this. I was even able to take great pictures of close subjects using the macro (macro mode, not digital macro) with a background blur typical of bigger SLR cameras, and as expected pictures of landscapes and fields were among the best I've obtained, even when compared with my old SLR. The 5X optical zoom delivers as expected, and the digital zoom is not that bad. Even if you get some image distortion -as expected- using a digital zoom (or digital macro for that case), it's not noticeable at first glance and much scrutiny is needed to realize a particular picture has been taken with digital zoom or digital macro I didn't use all the modes but I realized that the vivid color mode and the one that increased the green were the best to take pictures of people and landscape respectively on true colors. The various ISO also worked great although the auto-ISO mode worked pretty well too. One mode I found useful particularly on taking pictures under backlight overcast conditions, very common in UK at this time of the year and that easily overexpose pictures, was the bright light mode that made the sensor compensate for the backlight with superior results. This reminds me of one defect of the camera: It has a tendency to overexpose pictures on open, bright conditions and you will find yourself more often than not manually playing with the ISO settings or sticking to the bright sun mode. But see, as I said is a defect you can overcome if you know the camera well and play with it a bit. Another amazing thing is the display screen, very bright with great definition where you can see the pictures very close to the way they'll look once printed or displayed on a bigger screen, and it doesn't scratches easily. Canon really put a very good quality screen on this camera, cannot say the same of my old SD320 In addition to the tendency to overexposure, I found the flash takes way too long to recharge and the battery life is not great particularly if you are like me and look plenty into the screen to see how the picture you just took looks like. Carrying an extra battery is a must, a thing that can be a turndown for some. Also, if it says that the battery is "slightly depleted" showing two bars which according to the manual means that you can take many more pictures, get ready to change the battery soon, it's not true. But again, this is one of those defects you can overcome if you're aware and ready If you like to take movies you will find that HD movies are real and look gorgeously wide on your HD TV, crisp and clear, but the sound wouldn't be that great. Well, that's because the microphone is positioned on top of the camera and sound waves naturally pass over it with less intensity that if it was positioned in front of the camera. Also, the microphone DOES capture the sound of the digital zoom as many said here so my recommendation is to don't use the zoom while filming and go the way of the steady cam and walk in an out or follow subjects closely. It's great for family movies but I wouldn't see as a great way to film distant objects or situations needed to zoom in and out. But hey, go the Tarantino way an abuse the steady cam. If it works great for him it will do for you! Also, be careful not to cover the mic with your finger -thing easy to do because or where the mic is- or you will have a Chaplin movie then! Movies are also saved as .mov format which gives you grater flexibility for watching them on or exporting them to different media players In summary, one of the best point and shoots around for the price now that it's well below the price it was when launched. At that price I agree with many that claimed it was overpriced. Oh, one last thing: don't buy it for the "shake or tilt" feature of the display to move along the pictures taken (don't tell Canon, but it isn't that good)

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