|
|
|
Features and functionality in a compact well-built body
 Build 9/10
Ease of use 8.5/10
Image quality 8/10
Value for money 8.5/10
For a compact, Canon's elegant PowerShot S80 provides lots of user adjustable controls. Although not strictly shirt-pocketable, the S80 is slim enough to slip into a jacket pocket or purse and its retracting 3.6x zoom lens is well protected behind the sliding lens cover/on-off switch. Its sturdy metal body contains an 8-megapixel CCD sensor plus Canon's DiG!C II image processor, and excellent ergonomics make the S80 a satisfying camera to use.
The many functions available would make the S80 a great second camera for a DSLR enthusiast, although the lack of a RAW capture option could deter many serious photographers. However, the quality of the JPEG files are good enough for printing to A3 size, especially when shots are taken in low contrast lighting.
Video capture is a strong feature of the S80, which offers a high-resolution XGA (1024 x 768 pixel) movie settings as well as the standard VGA, QVGA and QQVGA modes. However, XGA clips are recorded at 15 frames/second, with 30 frames/second only available in VGA and QVGA modes. The S80 also supports time-lapse photography, with an intervalometer that can be set to record up to 100 shots at intervals between one and 60 seconds.
We measured an average capture log of 0.8 seconds, which reduced to 0.1 with pre-focusing. It took less than half a second to process each shot, regardless of image size, and shot-to-shot times averaged just under 2 seconds, which is acceptable. The burst mode recorded images at 0.6 second intervals to the capacity of the memory card, and files are processed as they are shot.
Features and functionality in a compact, well built, high-resolution camera, although a few enthusiast functions are limited or absent.
Related Links
|
|
