The Canon PowerShot SD1000, the Best of its Class

I have been a great lover of cameras and the sport of taking pictures since I was a kid. I have always loved going outside just to find those perfect pictures and still do. Though, in my search for those perfect pictures sometimes the perfect picture doesn't come out so perfect. I have been the proud owner of many Canon cameras and others including Sony, but the PowerShot SD1000 is the one with which I am most happy. It really does capture all the precious moments and scenes in stunning quality, making priceless memories jump out at you! The PowerShot SD1000 goes pretty close to capturing those perfect pictures that I look for.

Basics

The Canon PowerShot SD1000 Digital ELPH is a 7.1-Megapixel ultra-compact digital camera with 3x optical zoom (35-105 mm) and a big 2.5 in. LCD screen. It comes with a built-in flash that has a maximum range of about 15 ft. It features the fast Canon Digic III processor used mostly in the more expensive EOS (SLR) series and a 9-area smart AiAF auto focus. It uses a small and light Li-ion rechargeable battery and a convenient SD card to store photos on (32 MB SD card included). A fast USB 2.0 connection is supplied to transfer pictures to a computer or video cables can be connected to a TV to view the pictures in a slide show (A/V cable supplied). It also features PictBridge which allows direct printing of your pictures to a printer that is PictBridge compatible.

On the top panel of the camera is located the on/off button, the shutter button, and the zoom rocker designed around the shutter button. Zoom is achieved by slightly moving the rocker back and forth.

On the right side of the camera (holding it so the LCD screen faces you) you will find where the wrist strap attachment is and a compartment for the USB and A/V cable connections, to either connect it to a computer or television.

The back panel of the camera includes the 2.5 in. LCD screen, viewfinder, a sliding button to switch the mode of the camera (picture, movie, and review for taken pictures), a PictBridge button which also works to transfer pictures to the computer when pressed (a blue light will turn on when connected properly), and some control/menu buttons with a FUNC./SET button in the middle all used to access and change options.

Build Quality and Style

The first time I held the camera out of the box I was surprised to note how durable it was. It was kind of deceiving at first with how light it is, but you could probably drop it and it wouldn’t do anything to it. It doesn’t look as durable as the SD600 Digital ELPH (the previous model) and it still has a few cheap compartment doors and controls, but it’s pretty tough. It’s very sleek and stylish, a great design in my opinion. It just makes you want to cuddle with it, especially noting how happy you are after seeing its picture quality. It fits the hand like a glove and the buttons are located in very comfortable positions. This thing can be taken anywhere in a pocket because of its size. With my older cameras I would always miss photo opportunities because I couldn’t carry mine with me. Now, I don’t miss a single one.

Usage

This camera I have found is very easy to use, just like its predecessors. It turns on quickly and has very user-friendly menus and icons to help you know what you are doing. It even displays the name of every mode you go into along with a picture so you always know where you are. It will display the picture and name pretty big so you can read it just for a few seconds and then it moves off to the side. It’s great tool for those of us who like to get lost. It also displays the shutter and aperture speed information right before taking the picture, achieved by holding the shutter button half of the way which also focuses the picture.

The camera is pre-set to function in Auto mode. You don’t really have anything to do here but just point and shoot. You can change features such as the flash and put it into Macro mode (used for close-up shots) while in Auto, but most of the options can’t be changed unless in Manual mode. The 9-area auto AiAF smart focus will do the job just fine. By pressing the shutter button half of the way it will automatically focus on whatever it thinks is the main object in view. Then, pressing the button the rest of the way will take the picture. The button is pretty sensitive, so you don’t need too much pressure for it to go half the way. The camera also uses a focus assist light that is used for distance measuring and works great for close-up shots.

The Macro and Infinity modes are accessible by pressing the left button on the round dial. The Macro mode is both available in Auto and Manual. It allows the camera to focus on things too close for Auto to handle. It can focus on things as close as 1.2 in. from the lens, which produces great pictures of flowers and foliage (my favorites). It also works when filming movies, to produce close-up videos in good quality up to 640x480 at 30 fps with sound. The Infinity mode is only available in Manual. I don’t know exactly what it’s used for, but I use it for long distance shots when Auto won’t focus on what I want it to in the distance.

Using the Manual mode is quite easy and very helpful I have found to add a little bit of a “home” touch. Just like a woman’s touch in a home, it can be very useful sometimes. You can’t change the shutter or aperture speeds, but there are some things that come in handy. You can change the exposure of a picture making it either brighter or darker, use white balance for different lighting situations, set picture effects (like color), color replacement, and set the ISO (for dark settings). One of my favorites is the Intense setting in Manual to change color. It makes all the colors in the picture more vivid and alive, which makes it stand out better.

The ISO and flash settings can be changed very easily by pressing the labeled buttons on the back panel. The ISO in Auto mode can be changed between Auto HI and Auto (HI being used for very dark settings). In Manual we have a bit more liberty to choose between ISO settings as there are ISOs of 80, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, and of course the Auto and Auto HI. The ISO 1600 is a new feature of the SD1000, which would be used for the darker pictures. There is a setback to the ISO though. The higher you put the ISO to the more noise you get in the resulting picture. At about 400 the noise is ok, but at 1600 you will notice that the picture isn’t desirable. It just won’t be blurry. The flash settings can be changed in any mode. There are settings for On, Off, Auto, Auto with Red-eye Reduction, and Slow Synchro (useful for nighttime pictures).

Features

A new feature that I absolutely enjoy on this camera is its capability to accept the new SD cards. They are called SDHC cards (the HC standing for High Capacity) and will include the 4 G and the 8 G cards (the 8 G to come out shortly). The older models in the Digital ELPH series can’t take these types of cards. It’s very nice to have more space while taking pictures. I think a mistake was not giving this camera internal memory though. It helps when you want to do card-to-card transfers of pictures. But, overall I love the fact that this camera can support SDHC cards.

There are many different scene modes. A few examples are Beach, Night Snapshot, Kids&Pets, Digital Macro, and Portrait. They are selectable on the same row as Auto and Manual by pressing the FUNC./SET button. To see them all you just go all the way to the left in the row and press the menu button. They basically explain themselves as to what they do. Though, the Digital Macro allows the camera to focus on something close and then zoom in even closer with the digital zoom. It gives pretty amazing results.

Another new feature that I have fun with is the face detection. I was always looking for something like this. On my SD600 when taking a picture with flash of people their faces would turn out too white and ghost-like. With this new feature though, I can see an amazing difference in pictures like this. People look normal now and I’m not afraid to turn on the flash. I find it a very useful option on the SD1000. Even if you get red-eye in the picture with Red-eye Reduction on in the flash, you can use the Red-eye Correction tool while reviewing photos on the camera. This is also a new and useful tool made for the SD1000 which works well.

Something that I love to play with is the timer settings. There are 3 timer settings on the SD1000. You can set it to take a picture after 2 sec., 10 sec., or set a custom time. This is not all. The custom setting also comes with a feature that asks you how many pictures you want it to take after the set time limit. I usually have that at 15 sec. taking 2 or 3 pictures. It takes the pictures in about 1 sec. intervals.

LCD Screen

The LCD screen is a major plus to all camera fans like us. It has 2.5 in. and amazing viewing quality in light or dark. The settings of its brightness can also be changed according to need. The SD1000 has an amazing resolution (about 230,000 pixels in just 2.5 in.) and even beats its “better” model the SD750 in the quality of the screen, just because the screen on the SD750 is 3.0 in. but has the same amount of pixels as the SD1000. The LCD screen shows everything that will be in the picture, whereas the viewfinder will only show about 75% of what’s in the picture.

The camera can be turned sideways to allow a full view of pictures. If you take a picture with the camera standing up and view it holding the camera normal it will have 2 black bars on the side. But, if you turn the camera to a standing position it will automatically turn the picture to be viewed the way it was taken.


Movies

The movies have pretty good quality for a digital camera. The highest setting it can go to is 640x480 at 30 fps. The movies appear sharp and clear with good sound. It doesn’t compare with a camcorder though. There are 6 settings for recording movies. It utilizes Standard, Fast Frame Rate (for fast objects, 60 fps at 320x240), Compact (uses less space with 15 fps), 2 color modifying settings and my favorite, the new Time-Lapse setting.

The Time-Lapse setting is used for making movies of slow moving things. It would be useful in making those fast cloud movies that meteorologists use to show us the weather sometimes. It would be advisable to use a tripod for this setting as it needs to stay still for 2 hrs. In that period of 2 hours it takes pictures in intervals and then in the end compiles it into a movie. That’s how we can see the movement of the clouds faster than normal. It actually looks pretty cool.

Image Quality

This particular camera allows users to change the image quality right on the camera. With the press of a button you can choose between Normal, Fine, and the Superfine settings of image quality. There is not much difference between Fine and Superfine just looking at the pictures, but using Normal causes a little decrease in image quality. There is also a choice in the size of the image. The range includes many sizes from small to large. A very useful feature if you don’t want images that are too big, but still have amazing quality. I like setting mine to Superfine at about a medium size, so as to have the file size be around 2 MB and still be able to be the background on a computer if desired. The pictures would be around 4 MB if you put the settings to maximum. The images are saved as JPEG files.

I am impressed with the capabilities of the SD1000; by far it is one-of-a-kind in its class. Just comparing my SD600 with the SD1000 I noticed a difference in the quality of the pictures that each one took. My pictures from the SD600 look incredible, but the ones that I took from the SD1000 look like they could jump up with life. Outside and inside, with and without the flash, I noticed a difference in the sharpness and color of each picture. With Canon’s ingenuity and industriousness it brings this camera into a new dimension of photo quality. Every color at any focal length is as vivid as ever and the pictures are crystal clear. I am definitely satisfied with the Image Quality of this camera.

There is a way to correct image quality in darker situations with the ISO turned up to high settings. The noise isn’t very desirable even if it gets rid of blurriness. The camera comes with a tripod mount on the bottom. If you hook it up to a tripod and then change how long the shutter stays open in a picture. To do this, simply go to the exposure setting and press the menu button in Manual mode. This is how more light comes into the lens and allows the image to be clearer and brighter without the need of flash and without noise and blurriness. The timer can also be set to increase the stability of the picture.

Battery Life

About 210 pictures can be taken with one battery according to Canon. I have found that the battery life has increased quite a bit since the SD600. It is attributed to the new Digic III processor that uses less energy to take pictures. I went to Rome a little while ago when I had my SD600, and I was able to take about 130 pictures turning on and off the camera with one battery. My SD1000 has been able to take 150 pictures so far without the battery low-level warning coming on. I like being able to take pictures without a huge fear of having to save the battery for later.

Performance

A huge factor into how this camera performs so well is its Digic III processor. The most advanced Canon technology in cameras. It greatly enhances the speed of the camera. It powers up in about 1 sec. or less, and takes amazingly fast pictures. The camera can take up to 2 pictures per sec. in burst mode and then take pictures as fast as you can press the button in single frame mode. There is almost no shutter lag, which really can’t be noticed anyway. That helps with keeping the picture less blurry when we can’t keep a steady hand. Another feature that would have greatly increased the performance of the camera is Image Stabilization. I am sad to say that Canon has not incorporated this into this camera. It’s a great feature that would have given photos in dim light less blurriness and a decreased need to use ISO.

A theory that I had was that the faster the processor was the better the picture quality was, leaving less time for it to process the picture it had just taken. I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know that Canon’s Digic III processor makes the SD1000 Digital ELPH one of the fastest of its kind.

Dreams or Wishes

Internal memory and Image Stabilization would have been great additions to the camera.