Canon PowerShot S50 5 Megapixel Compact Camera

hiDes

Strengths: Good picture quality, easy to use, comfortable to handle.

Weakness: Lens cover. Without it closing or opening properly the lens won't function.

After 2 years of use, this wonderful camera ceased to function due to the lense cover getting stuck. Never had a problem til this happened. Fortunately I bought it at Best Buy with 4 year insurance and not sure if they lost the camera or if it couldn't be fixed but I was allowed to get another camera (chose the Canon SD800) in exchange.

By hiDes - Dec 10, 2006

I would not buy this camera again...

Strengths: 15 sec exposure time for night shots. 5MP resolution. Several manual modes. Has video mode.

Weakness: Slow (~1sec to take a picture). Not very good on low light (indoors). Noisy ISO 400 mode. Purple fringing. Light sensibility does not change after you start shooting a video.

I would not buy this camera again because I have a toddler and this camera is slow and is not very good in low light. So, when I try to take a picture of him, by the time the camera focus/shoots (~1 sec), he is long gone.... The camera is not very good in low light and the flash always kick in when we try to take pictures indoors. This causes the subject to be too lit and the background to become...
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I would not buy this camera again because I have a toddler and this camera is slow and is not very good in low light. So, when I try to take a picture of him, by the time the camera focus/shoots (~1 sec), he is long gone....

The camera is not very good in low light and the flash always kick in when we try to take pictures indoors. This causes the subject to be too lit and the background to become dark. ISO 400 would help, but it is too noisy.

The manual modes are very good. I use it to do some photography with my telescope and I was able to take some decent pictures. However, the purple fringing kicks in for high contrast targets, such as stars in long exposures...

This camera has also noticeable vignetting on the wide field mode.

It is also a bit bulky.

I would not buy it again, newer cameras are faster and better.

The manual modes and resolution are good. This camera is okay if you are going to take pictures of adults in sunlight.

By tiberio_bulhoes - May 31, 2005

Best camera I have ever owned,...

Strengths: Great pictures, easy to use. Great batttery.

Weakness: Needs more optical zoom and a brighter display. Should come with a bigger Compact Flash Memory, but the larger ones are not that exspensive.

Best camera I have ever owned, even better then the S-30 I had before. Fits in your hand. Lots of manual and automatic features. Battery last a long time on one charge. Pictures look great.

By gambler - Aug 10, 2004

This is a nice cam but is hardly...

Strengths: 5 mps, extensive range of features, solid construction, quick operation, nice bright quality snapshot

Weakness: auto mode yields some odd results, a bit bulky compared to the competition so so metering, buttons fiddly to operate quickly, two tone quality Lack of helpful critique from reviews,

This is a nice cam but is hardly any different from the S45 and thats much cheaper. It has marginally better colour lacking the two tone quality of the s45 though it is still there...red yellow...blue green and so on. Flash picture are good and are about average and outdoor pictures vary, there seems be some odd results that I cannot explain when photographing normal scenes. Many of sample images...
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This is a nice cam but is hardly any different from the S45 and thats much cheaper. It has marginally better colour lacking the two tone quality of the s45 though it is still there...red yellow...blue green and so on. Flash picture are good and are about average and outdoor pictures vary, there seems be some odd results that I cannot explain when photographing normal scenes.

Many of sample images look great in the reviews however, but Steve Digicams pics look very different to DCR. I hope I did not buy this cam based on contrived imagery. Loads of options but they can wait while I sort the auto modes.
My advice is to try and give perfect reviews a pinch of salt or go for something cheaper if you don't need extensive control or go for the S45. Happy hunting.

By mikoers - Jun 2, 2003

If you buy a 256MB card, which is...

Strengths: Top quality pictures and features. Need weeks to learn all features.

Weakness: Lens cover is very poor design and can't be closed directly with a single move. Battry is poor quality, not even enough for the 32 MB card depending on what you do. Battry dies after 1 hour :(

If you buy a 256MB card, which is great for this camera, buy also a car charger for the battry. The lens cover is so poor quality that I don't think it will last more than a year. The first time I tried to close it I had to battle during minutes with he cover. I am a carefull and patient person ... I think Canon will have a class action on this or a recall. Those two things were very...
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If you buy a 256MB card, which is great for this camera, buy also a car charger for the battry. The lens cover is so poor quality that I don't think it will last more than a year. The first time I tried to close it I had to battle during minutes with he cover. I am a carefull and patient person ... I think Canon will have a class action on this or a recall. Those two things were very disappointing.

However the camera is great (5 stars) as long as it runs. I can't point out any useless features or missing features on the camera. I am still trying to understand all the features there are so many. The image quality is very good. Unless you are a professional you will not be able to notice the small defects.

By andkovacs - Dec 25, 2003