PowerShot S100 12.1 MP Digital Camera with 5x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Black)

This camera is PHENOMENAL ... but if you want it to work right, you need to put in the time to understand how it works and to test all of the many shooting options that are offered. Perhaps, if you are looking for the best pocket camera which takes awesome photos by just turning it on, pointing and shooting, this may not be the best choice (I suspect the canon 300 HS would be one of the best for this). But if you are looking for a camera capable of taking superb pictures with excellent picture quality that require just a little understanding of how to utilize the settings, or if you want a fantastic pocket camera which allows you to manipulate all the basic controls of an old, standard film-35mm, it is hard to imagine you could find better (though if you have the money and pocketability is not of supreme importance, the Fuji Film Fine Pix x100 would be my pick ... at $1200). I spent easily over 1 month doing research on all all sorts of cameras (various models of Lumix, Nikon, Sony, Olympus, other Canons, a couple of others and the FujiFilm) before i bought this. While in the end i am very happy with my selection, it took way too long for me to sort through all the customer reviews here, the professional reviews on CNET, DPReviews, Youtube, etc. The many reviews here on Amazon helped immensely in trying to make my choice, but I have to say I was a bit confused at first and then concerned by the extremes of comments (lots of 5 stars and a good bit of 1 star reviews). I am writing this for other Amazon users in order to help make sense of this situation. (just for reference, i am a visual artist and have a good amount of experience with photography and cameras.) 1. the negative reviews are mostly because of a lens error problem which affected a good number of units of this model. fear not about this ... canon seems to have taken responsibility for this if you get one of these lemons (and in my experience with canon, they are very good with making good on their mistakes). most of the units with this problem were corrected (the S100's with a serial number beginning with numbers 29 through 41 are the ones seemingly affected by the error and most of these have been sold or recalled or fixed). 2. most of the negative reviews regarding picture quality are absurd. if you just put the thing on "auto" and press the button and hope every picture is going to be great, you will likely be disappointed. this camera takes a little more getting to know than the typical pocket camera because it is more complex, but this allows you to be able to do things that most other cameras of this sort cannot do. you just have to invest a little time. PEOPLE SAYING THAT THE IMAGE QUALITY IS CRAP ARE ALL JUST WRONG - they just have not put the time into learning how to use this camera and use it properly. i was going from an old Powershot s500 that i LOVED. this was only 5 m-pixels, but it was easy to use and took really nice, balanced photos with great ease. when i first fired up the s100, i was a bit afraid that some of what was said about the picture quality was true, but after taking 20 or sometimes 30 pictures of the same thing in the same light, i was able to really understand the differences in what the settings and modes do and was able to get a feel for using the auto-modes as well as manipulating the ISO, aperture, and shutterspeed ... and i get not just great but SUPERB photos. now, after a couple of weeks, i sometimes still need to snap 3 or 4 pictures until i get one i like, but that photo is an excellent image ... one so much better than almost every compact camera i have ever seen (and with my research, i looked at buckets of sample photos from all sorts of cameras. pros: image quality - i looked at probably about 20+ compact cameras, their sample pictures and sample shots of all of them at different ISO's: this canon had the best image quality of all of them bar the pricey fujifilm x100 (which was gorgeous but this is also not really a compact camera). at ISO 800, the s100 retains more definition and colour saturation than all of the others (i think there was an olympus that came in close ). low-light shots - MOST PEOPLE THINK THE MEGA-PIXELS ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE CAMERA ... NOT SO. while the s100 has ample m-pixels, it is all about the size of the sensor and the aperture range. this camera has one of the biggest sensors (7.44 x 5.58 ... and a good quality CMOS) and the low end the aperture goes down to 2.0, so you have the ability to take really nice low-light shots. also has a good (digic 5) processor. controlability - this camera allows you to control everything important in your photo; f-stop 2.0 - 5.9 has a great range for a camera this size, ISO 80 - 6400, and 1/2000 sec. - 15 sec. shutter speed. there really aren't other cameras that can give you this. macro capability - i have never seen a camera that can take pictures at 3 cm like this, maybe a couple of full size SLRs fitted with macro lenses, but he s100 goes beyond what i imagined even possible on a camera like this data readout - has great data information for each shot, as you line up the picture and after you have taken the shot tons of options - too many for me actually, which i also think is a bit of a con; but you can always just not use the ones you do not like lens ring - gives using the camera a nice sense of control that hearkens back to the old SLRs RAW - i am not a professional and RAW has little appeal to me other than post-production manipulation, but if you want, this shoots in RAW ... personally, i find that JPEGs frequently do better in avoiding colour moire in fine resolution video quality - not even interested in video, but great quality cons: new added finger grip on front - for me it does nothing and just jets a little in the way no decent digital filtres - with all the stuff they stuck in this camera, you think they could have included some digital filtres ... i mean how often are you going to want to use the fish-eye or miniature landscape feature? cute, but i'd rather have some simple digi filtres. too may options - for some could be a plus, but for me there are too many things and features i would never use and some which are so complex i would not be able to remember how to access them lens ring sticking out - while i love the idea of the lens ring, its protruberance makes the camera just a bit more difficult to stuff in the pocket flash - before digital, i had 2 canon elph film cameras. one had a pop-up flash like this one; it broke. i almost did not buy this camera because of the pop-up flash. while this one seems so much better (it has a little motor that seems very tight and strong), i still fear i could break it. in the end, though, i am glad i got the camera because it is otherwise so great. if you still have any doubts, this is a great camera.

I suppose that I am "late to the party" regarding the Canon PS S100. The S110 is already out as its replacement, and it is, of course, a fine camera. The time finally came to replace my venerable Digital Elph S50, and I did an enormous amount of research trying to decide what to replace it with for my "pocketable" walk-around camera. I tend to prefer Nikon for SLRs and Canon for small cameras (both are excellent), and my research continued to support the notion that Canon is right at the forefront for small cameras. Many recent reviewers have concentrated their reviews on comparing the S110 and the S100. I mostly will not. Since I have been absent from the small camera market scene for seven years, this review will instead mostly dwell on the improvements of the S100 over the earlier models, which observations I hope that someone will find useful. Very briefly, with respect to the excellent S110, for me the deciding factor in favor of the S100 are the analog controls and the non-presence of a touchscreen. Ergonomically I like the big shutter button and the all-analog controls of the S100. I tend to find touchscreen control of a camera non-intuitive; perhaps I am just a product of the baby-boomer generation. To further date myself, I miss the optical viewfinder that used to be standard on cameras of this class. Like almost all of its competition, the S100 uses the rear LCD as an electronic viewfinder. This is the wave of the future and the S100 is no exception. I am adapting. Examining the S100 I can see that Canon has improved much over the earlier generation of cameras. The first thing I am going to comment upon is the image quality -- it is very, very good. Almost astounding, in fact for a camera of this size. Digital SLRs of a decade ago would be hard-pressed to take on the S100. Somehow Canon has squeezed a lot of performance out of the relatively small lens on the S100; partly due to its excellent sensor. This camera will effortlessly produce excellent images even under difficult light conditions. The image stabilization ("IS") feature (together with this camera's excellent high ISO performance) made it possible for me to take reasonably sharp photos of nighttime Christmas lights, which is something my older pocket cameras could never accomplish to my satisfaction. The next improvement that I found pleasing on the S100 is the user interface. It is very intuitive. Canon has knocked most or all of the rough edges off of its interface. I found it very easy to quickly adapt to it, which was not true of my earlier Canon circa 2002. The AUTO function allows the user to be taking pictures right out of the box in a matter of minutes. The "P" (Program) mode has many more features but nevertheless is easy to figure out and master. To my surprise both aperture and speed priority settings are right there on the top control dial, so users who wish to really control their photos, e.g. depth of field or action blurring shots, will be at home with this camera. My final main observation concerning the S100 is its amazing feature set. As noted above, it features both Program, Aperture, and Focus-priority settings. Like a full-blown SLR it allows center-weighted metering, "evaluative" metering, and spot metering. It has a variety of different focusing modes. It also has scene settings mode and a "filter effects" mode which allows a number of interesting effects such as B&W, sepia, vivid colors, and other effects. This camera allows the photographer to approach his or her shooting in a variety of different ways, and you really have to work at it to produce poor pictures with this camera. The AUTO or Scene settings will allow the shooter to let the camera make most of the decisions or, alternatively, the camera allows about as much flexibility as an SLR camera. Using a 32GB SD card the S100 will take approximately 10,000 photos, depending upon whether the shooter elects to shoot RAW, JPEG, or RAW+JPEG. Pretty amazing considering that only a decade or so ago we were all shooting 36 images on film and then paying ten dollars to get it developed so that we could see how our pictures turned out. There is no reason other than backup to worry about one's images on any vacation with this camera. I elected to go with the black version of the S100 and I am well-pleased with it. The black looks very snappy and professional. The aluminum body has a nice anti-skid texture that is very pleasing to the eyes and to the touch, and there is a rubber grip on the front that further aids in gripping the camera. The one issue as far as handling is concerned is that I do occasionally find my left hand blocking the pop-up flash at times. You have to watch that with this camera. Another nit: there is no recess or protective lip for the beautiful LCD viewfinder on the back of this camera. Buying one of the after-market protective products is an absolute must if you wish to avoid scratching this screen. Many are available and I recommend that users buy one at the same time as buying this camera. Last nit: this camera is a bit of a battery hog. Buying a spare battery is a good idea. A must, in fact, for the serious photographer. The camera features a 24-120 zoom lens that is F 2.0 when wide open. The lens becomes slower as you zoom in which is an inevitable trade-off for the smaller lens, but still, this is a fast lens for a camera of this class. Experienced users will know that to take good portrait shots a little zooming in from 24mm is a good idea; otherwise human subjects will be distorted. But for landscapes and other tight shots, 24mm is very nice to have. Canon has packed a lot of performance and features into the S100 and things have improved a lot since the last time I looked at the "pocketable" digital camera market. RJB.

並行輸入品ということだが、 画面表示は、メニュー操作で日本語に切り替えられるし、 取扱説明書もメーカーのＨＰからダウンロードすることができるので 何の問題も無い。 基本性能は定評通り素晴らしい。 しかし、高級機は実際手にした時に判るものだ。 手にした瞬間に高級のオーラが伝わってくる。 コンパクトながらがっちりとした造り、ずっしりとした感触 シルバーならではのメカニックな手触りは、まさに快感だ・・・。 手にする喜びが味わえる。 ポケットに忍ばせて毎日持ち歩けるこの幸せを、あなたも感じてほしい。

I bought this camera from Future Shop-Toronto, and I used it during my trip to the Caribbean's. I took many lovely shots for the beach and the sunset. It's a very high quality and easy to use I turned it back to Future Shop since I found it in Amazon cheaper and tax-free It's just great, and the shipping was super-fast!!

日本語の使用説明書がなく，何故かネット上にもこの機種の使用説明書ＰＤＦが見つからないのが残念です。 似たような機種の使用説明書ＰＤＦで対応してますが，，，

I bought this camera on the recommendation of Ken Rockwell (Google his photography site) and have been very happy with it. I recommend visting Kens site for advice on setting up the cameras shooting defaults. (However I would avoid "vivid" on landscape shots...he likes to shoot vivid as default). Pros: Small/lightweight, good menu system, good colour rendition, reasonably sharp pics, wide 5x zoom, reasonably good at low light, very good video. Cons: Short battery life (get 1 or 2 extras), flash isn't that great (but the fast 2.0 lens at wide end gets around that), I had hoped for sharper pics (it is a point and shoot though), high contrast shots lose highlight details Yes, I would buy this again.

I am a professional photographer tired of never having a camera handy for fun family and pet moments. My nephew, an electrical engineer, meanwhile has been taking great shots with an S95. He found that camera after exhaustive research. Anyway, he convinced me to buy a S100 and while it is about as much as I would want to spend for a little camera, it really delivers. In biz, I use Nikon exclusively so I am a little slow getting on to the Canon menus and buttons but by and large this is exactly what I wanted.