This Post is Canon PowerShot S90 Review – Click below If you’re looking for:

My Overall Rating : ★★★★½

Canon PowerShot S90 10MP Digital Camera with 3.8x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3-inch LCD Review

The Canon PowerShot S90 is designed for photography enthusiasts and it carries a hefty price tag to prove it. It also has some of the best controls you’ll find on a compact camera for manual and semimanual shooting modes.

Its lens and photo quality are top notch, too. Actually, about the only thing that’s unimpressive with the S90 is its performance; those searching for digital SLR speed in a pocket camera probably won’t be happy. But, aside from a few other minor criticisms, the S90 is a first-rate compact camera for advanced amateurs.

The S90 looks fairly innocuous; it’s a textbook Canon box-and-circle design. The body is completely flat for a minimalist appearance, but it gives you nothing to grip. The black metal casing doesn’t make it any easier to hold onto either. The S90’s finer design points revolve around the excellent wide-angle f2-4.9 lens and its manual and semimanual shooting controls.

Around the lens is a new Control Ring that can be assigned to handle changes to aperture, shutter speed, focus, zoom, white balance, exposure compensation, or ISO. (A button on top lets you speedily change what it controls.) The ring rotates with firm, pleasing clicks so it’s easy to select settings accurately and it makes using the camera quite fun. The opposite can be said about the Control Dial around the directional pad on back. This dial works in tandem with the Control Ring to change settings quickly.

For most of the shooting modes, it defaults to exposure compensation; however, in Scene mode, it changes the scene type you’re using. However, it moves much too freely and can result in accidental changes. Otherwise, the combination of the two rings is great and makes for swifter changes than you’ll get on other compact cameras.

On top of the body is a small flash that automatically pops up and retracts when turned on and off. The S90 is also compatible with Canon’s add-on HF-DC1 flash unit. There are mini-HDMI and USB/AV outputs under covers on the right camera’s right side. And, well, the rest of the design is similar to the majority of Canon’s PowerShot lineup. The buttons are nearly flush with the body and everything’s packed close together, which might upset some users.

There are no less than 25 shooting modes available on the S90. The bulk of these are specialty scene modes; 17 in all and none of them are out of the ordinary for PowerShot models. There is also an Auto mode that is pretty much Canon’s reliable scene-recognizing Smart Auto feature. There is a Low Light mode that drops the resolution to 1,824×1,368 pixels (2.5 megapixels), but allows for a sensitivity of ISO 12,800. A VGA-quality movie mode is on the dial as well, so HD fans are out of luck. Plus, you can’t use the optical zoom while recording, not that there’s a lot there to use.

The remaining shooting modes put more and more settings under your control: Program AE, Shutter priority, Aperture priority, Manual, and Custom. The last mode lets you assign a frequently used set of shooting options and settings to the C position on the mode dial. To go with it, you can register up to five commonly used menu items to a My Menu tab in the main-menu system.

Other advanced options include exposure bracketing and focus bracketing that will take one photo at a manual focus position and then one each at preset positions nearer and farther; manual white balance correction; and raw or raw plus JPEG capture. There are 45 shutter speeds from 15 seconds to 1/1,600 of a second and 14 aperture values–f2 through f8. You also get a selectable range of 17 ISOs between ISO 80 and ISO 3,200. The amount of tweaking available is great for a compact camera and the control layout makes it reasonably fast and painless.

Let’s take a look at all of the Canon PowerShot S90 features/specification:

  • New 10-megapixel High Sensitivity System; DIGIC 4 Image Processor
  • Improved low-light image performance, plus a Low Light scene mode for ISO settings up to 12,800
  • Customizable control ring for easy access and operation of manual or other creative shooting settings
  • Wide-angle 3.8x optical zoom with Canon’s Optical Image Stabilizer; bright f/2.0 lens
  • RAW + JPEG shooting and recording modes; capture images to SD/SDHC memory cards (not included)

If you want to buy Canon PowerShot S90, you can get it cheap online through Amazon.com here. They offer special discount price and reliable shipping service.

Let me show you what current owners have to say about it:

“…I have owned one since October 2009…my first digital camera. It goes everywhere with me. Sometimes I use the settings, but often leave it on auto as the camera’s programming is superb. I set the flash not to fire, and changed the MyColors setting to Vivid. The colors are glorious! This camera performs so well in low light that the flash is seldom needed. I have hundreds of great photos of all kinds of things. I’m so happy with the S90. I do plan to buy a custom grip for it because it’s not fun having to dangle it from the wrist strap (the camera is a slippery little thing). I have never dropped it, but only because I am SO careful. Like a freshly caught fish, it tries to slip out of your hands.

People marvel at my photos, and they never did before! The bright, clear LCD screen and the instant playback are so helpful. This camera was a high-class way to enter the digital photography world.

A longer zoom would be nice, but not at the price of losing the low-light capability. The photos are so clear that one can always crop in to simulate a longer lens…”

If you want more info on this Canon PowerShot S90, I suggest you take a look at the Canon PowerShot S90 reviews on Amazon here. A lot of consumer positive response to this Canon PowerShot S90 here.

Here is why Canon PowerShot S90 is worth buying:

Canon PowerShot S90 : Pro

  • Exceptionally small and lightweight (100 x 58 x 31 mm and 175 g)
  • Increased sensor size for a portable with a lower megapixel count (Sony’s new ICX685CQZ sensor, 9.31mm diagonal)
  • Reasonably large zoom factor (28-105mm, approximately 3.8X zoom)
  • Wide end is very wide for landscape shots, vistas, group photos (28mm)
  • Fast f/2 lens permits high levels of light passage in low light situations
  • f/2 lens makes shallow depth of field shots incredibly effective – this camera is a macro shooter’s delight
  • Two types of highly effective shake reduction technologies
  • Design makes lens cap unnecessary
  • Extremely high image quality for a pocket sized camera
  • HUGE 3 inch LCD screen with 461,000 pixel resolution and 100% coverage of the shot you wish to take
  • RAW mode allows for highest image quality and post processing
  • Virtually every camera setting is user adjustable (ISO, shutter speed, aperture, EV, white balance, etc.)
  • Ring-based control implementation one of the best on ANY current camera
  • Reasonable cost for a camera of this ability (but watch the prices climb as the camera stays in and out of stock)
  • Metadata being properly written to the file so they can be read by photo editing software (a problem with earlier Canons and some other brands)
  • SDHC flash card is highly standardized, and is coming in larger and faster formats (necessary if you are taking many RAW shots)
  • Extremely attractive physical design
  • High quality construction apparent on first use
  • Reasonably good battery life – most people are reporting about 300 shots (without flash) between charges

Canon PowerShot S90 : Con

  • Zoom ends at 108mm (3.8X zoom), which may be a deal breaker for some
  • Does not take HD videos (but does shoot 640 x 480 at full 30fps)
  • LCD screen not at the highest current resolution as seen in some DSLR’s (but is great, anyway)
  • Proprietary battery is an expensive proposition, as two or three are needed for daylong trips
  • Camera case not included, and is expensive to purchase afterword
  • No prices below retail due to the high demand of the device
  • May be difficult to initially acquire due to high demand
  • Still no “universal standard” RAW mode file format – the camera manufacturers need to address this soon!
  • Mechanical noise when setting focus and moving between bright and dimply lit areas – this is the aperture being adjusted, but it can be annoying

Conclusion

As long as you’re not expecting dSLR speed in a tiny body, the Canon PowerShot S90 is an excellent compact camera for advanced amateurs.

This Canon PowerShot S90 can be ordered directly from Amazon.com today. CLICK HERE for the best price and get your Canon PowerShot S90 today! They are 100% secure site so you can be rest assured that your details are protected when ordering.

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