- Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 113 reviews Back to product review
- My rating: 0 stars
Full user review
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176 out of 180 people found this review helpful
4.5 stars
"Good but with some niggles"
Pros: Great Optics
Cons: Lens cap and port covers
Summary: Having owned a canon S2IS now for a week and having had both SLR and digital cameras before my overall impression of the S21S is that it is a very capable piece of kit that has much to offer both the novice and the more experience user.
The camera has a nice feel, solid without being too bulky and sits well in the hand. The best feature has to be the lens. Canon have always been noted for excellent optics and the x12 optical zoom is no exception giving remarkable clarity across its range with little evidence of distortion or fringing even at the extreme of its range. The additional x4 digital zoom is nice to have I suppose but is sensible disabled by default, better to shoot and then crop the 5mp image using your favourite software I feel.
There are one or two niggley things however which detract from the overall pleasure to use that the camera generally is. The most striking and soonest discovered is the appalling lens cap. It?s a fairly slack push-on affair which all too readily falls off. On the good side it is readily pushed aside by the lens should you forget to remove it before switching on, but surely canon could have come up with a better solution, on a camera of this quality its such a let down.
I found the Electronic viewfinder quite crisp and clear with most of the symbols quite intuitive. The substantial rubber surround means that even spectacle wearers can get up close and the dioptre adjustment is a real boon.
The image stabilisation (IS) seems to work reasonably well allowing hand held exposures to be made at quite low shutter speeds in low light and/or with the zoom lens extended.
The flip and turn LCD screen at the rear of the camera is somewhat of a novelty, its quite nice I suppose that it can be turned around so that the screen is recessed in the camera and is protected but beyond that it seems to be a gimmick with very limited use in the real world. A larger LCD screen protected by a sliding cover would have been of much more practical use I feel.
The flexible rubber covers on the USB and AV ports are also quite poor in design, the have to be prised off with the fingernail to insert the connecters and are secured by fairly flimsy rubber stalks which look like they wouldn?t take much to break them off.
In common with many compact SLR replacement cameras the lens lacks a filter thread which I find a bind. True the vast majority of users would not perhaps want to be able to use any of the vast range of creative filters that are available, but my expertise has shown that a UV filter permanently placed over the lens offers a lot of protection to the valuable optics and is something I miss.
Quite why Canon and other manufacturers of high resolution cameras insist in supplying a mean 16Mb SD card is beyond me. It is of such low capacity 5 or 6 images at high resolution, that its just not worth the effort of opening the packet. I wish they would either pack a decent sized card 256MB or better, or just not bother and knock a few pence of the price.
I find the gentle beeps that the camera issues in normal operation to be very positive and its volume can be varied. Even better it can simply be muted as required for occasions when extraneous noises are best avoided. I can?t help thinking however that the manpower spent on providing ?optional alternative noises? such as the sound of a dog barking when the shutter is fired, could have been better spent on other aspects of the design.
Of course the real test of any camera is the quality of the images it produces and despite the shortcoming outlined the S2IS produces some quite stunning results. Its Auto Mode and is able to cope with a range of scenes and conditions while shutter and aperture priority and even full manual control are available to those more demanding users.
- 14 replies to this review
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I noticed that you thought the swivel screen was little more than a novelty. Actually, I've found it to be incredibly useful. Not only can I get shot angles on any given subject (on the fly in the middle of a crowd), but I know exactly how it is framed in the shot. I've been at many car shows, Sea World, etc. where there were tons of people all around me. I was able to put my camera up over my head, swivel the screen down and get a perfect shot without anyone's head in my way. Taking cool shots of the kids from ground level with the screen swiveled up is lots of fun too when you know you aren't guessing at the framing. It might take a little imagination, but you'll find many different uses for it. People are amazed at some of the different perspectives I've been able to shoot from solely due to the ability to see what I was shooting at even though I wasn't in a standard shooting position directly behind the camera.
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The macro mode in Canon S2 does not work very well. Close ups (eg of flowers) are either not detailed enough or get too fuzzy. Any tips ?
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Engines noise is picked up by the microphone while zooming during taking movie
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It was fun to read a comment written in English. I am very critical or the degradation of our language by the online community. The people are giving up quality for quantity. Your article was very informative.
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Purchasing the accessory extention tube and lens shade for the Canon ShureShot S2IP (I feel the shade is essential) will allow fitting of 58 mm filters.
I use mine from my A2 on the extention and with careful mating they do fine.
With the camera set on B&W the yellow, green and red, plus UV filters and polar screens do fine. I also use star filters for effect and so on.
rominextra -
Re: the timer, yes, there is one which can be set at 2 or 10 seconds.
Re: the tilting LCD. I sold off a Nikon SLR to get the Canon S1 specifically for the tilting/swiveling LCD. Those of us with bad backs or arthritis find that this type of LCD allows us to take photos that are usually impossible because of the height or angle of the subject. I will never buy another camera without this feature and in fact I am thinking of upgrading to the Canon S2 or the Fuji S9000. -
I cannot find how to get the camera to take timed shot. can any oe assist please. eg. set the time and get in front of the camera for that all in family shot.
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I cannot find how to get the camera to take timed shot. can any oe assist please. eg. set the time and get in front of the camera for that all in family shot.
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You can get a lens adapter to use other lenses or a filter to protect the lens at http://www.newworldvideodirect.com/productdetail.asp?productid=1110
They sell the adapter and a lens hood, and you can get a uv filter or a set of filters. Adds a nice touch to the camera too. Happy shutter-bugging!! -
One of the selling features for me will be the swivel LCD screen. Also, it is my impression that mountable adapter rings are available - for wide angle and telephoto lenses and therefore for UV filters as well, by removing the chrome outer ring at the edge of the lens. (Haven't held one in my hands yet, so could be wrong, but I belive that one of the digicam reviews indicated this.
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After having the Canon A80 with this feature I found it to be an essential feature for me in choosing my next camera (the S2 IS). Being essential, it narrowed the field of choices considerably and made it easy for me to settle on the S2 IS.
This feature enables me to take shots froom ground level without putting my face in the dirt. It also enables me to see/photograph from anywhere my arm will stretch. A useful example for the average person would be using it at a view point railing with 50 other tourists. The extra arms length over that railing will give a great advantage for angles and eliminating the other people from the photo. If you can't reach the railing, hold it over their heads and you can still see where you are shooting. -
I would have liked to have a larger view finder but the pivoting feature is one of the reasons I selected this camera.
If you are doing any low level (unless you like to lie on the ground and try to look through the the evf) or closeup work on a tripod or even handheld the pivot is a great asset. Other wise one would have to purchase a 90 degree angle adapter to do the same thing. I have also used the pivot feature to shoot over the heads of people in front of me at street performers on the boardwalks of Atlantic City. -
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"The most striking and soonest discovered is the appalling lens cap. It?s a fairly slack push-on affair which all too readily falls off. On the good side it is readily pushed aside by the lens should you forget to remove it before switching on, but surely canon could have come up with a better solution, on a camera of this quality its such a let down."
The purpose of the slide-on lenscap is that when the camera is turned on, the lens can easily slide out from its housing without obstruction. Other manufacturers have for years put the standard SLR-type locking lenscap on their motorized extendable fixed zoom lenses and there have been problems. This isnt a problem on the film SLR's because the lens does not move. In some cameras, the engineering was good and the auto-lens would sense resistance and simply give the user an error. In other instances, as I have seen firsthand, the lens would stop or the motor would make a groaning sound. I have even heard popping.
Solution: Secure a nylon-wrapped elastic cord of about 3/16" thickness to the lenscap and wrap around the back end of the body.
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"The flip and turn LCD screen at the rear of the camera is somewhat of a novelty, its quite nice I suppose that it can be turned around so that the screen is recessed in the camera and is protected but beyond that it seems to be a gimmick with very limited use in the real world. A larger LCD screen protected by a sliding cover would have been of much more practical use I feel."
I too would like a sliding cover for an LCD screen. But there is an important factor against that engineering design. Grit. Sand, some little sharp foreign object getting in there and you close the slide and grind that rock or whatever all over your LCD screen. Not only would it get scratched but the extra pressure may damage or put stress on the screen that it is not designed to withstand. That is, of course, if there is no secondary window.
Point two... Camcorders have a flip out screen, whoohooo!! so what right? right. Some of them also have the eyecup stalk mobile so you can flip it up at yourself. That hurts your neck AND back. So they made the flip-out screen rotate. ooooo! aaahhh. Awesome. BUT, you could never flip those units around.. Then some units appeared that DID have that feature. And suddenly.. you could set your camcorder, or digicam up on a tripod or other surface, huddle with your family, and actually SEE the picture you will be taking! This is great for a timer, or remote control. Great for large gatherings, or just you, your wife and the kid. The fact that it can be slid back into the body is a bonus because you can 1) keep the screen hidden. and 2) SEE the screen whithout the risk of dropping the unit and breaking the movable screen off.
Thats the purpose of the lenscap and 360° screen, from an engineers standpoint. -
Contrary to what you say, the pivoting/swinging viewfinder is very useful. For one thing you can change the angle and/or the elevation of your shot without squating or changing your position. Just use your imagination.
