Canon PowerShot S90 10MP Digital Camera with 3 8x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom and 3 inch LCD
The pocketable PowerShot S90 gives powerful everyday shooting. Shoot quickly with a lens control ring and get superior low-light performance with a high-sensitivity 10.0 MP CCD and f/2.0 lens.A high-sensitivity CCD sensor gives outstanding image quality in a wide variety of lighting conditions. Even images taken at high ISOs show exceptionally low noise levels and a wide dynamic range.A bright f/2.0 aperture allows exceptional versatility, capturing low-light images and fast-moving subjects at higher shutter speeds. A wide angle of 28mm lets you put more in the frame, while Canon’s optical IS reduces blur caused by camera shake.
User Ratings and Reviews
5 Stars Awesome Camera
This camera takes great pictures and is so convenient I use it much more than my bulky Nikon DSLR, which I also love. But this Canon s90 shoots extremely well in low light. And it is fast. So I find I tend to reach for it whenever I am going to be in a dark place or when I know I won’t have a lot of time to set the shot. Plus it is very well built and so easy to carry around in a pocket. I highly recommend this camera.
5 Stars Excellent equipment
A very good piece of equipment. I did study it profoundly before purchasing the Canon S90, but the features presented really surprised me. An excellent equipment for serious photographers to have on hand and very cool camera for the photographic enthusiast. It’s the perfect match to an DSLR, as a “backup gun”.
There are few bad things about it. The very small size of the camera makes it difficult to hold.
I am actually considering buying a second one to have as a spare. I really wouldn’t like Canon to discontinue this one. Highly recommended.
4 Stars GOOD SNAPSHOT CAMERA. SLR USERS WILL NOT BE HAPPY WITH COMPOSING A PICTURE IN BRIGHT LIGHT ENVIRONMENT.
GOOD SNAPSHOT CAMERA. SLR USERS WILL NOT BE HAPPY WITH COMPOSING A PICTURE IN BRIGHT LIGHT ENVIRONMENT.
5 Stars Great camera so far-very glad I got it
I own a Nikon D300 and a Casio Exilim EX-Z750. Since the Casio was showing its age, I was looking for a very compact camera to carry in a belt-pouch as a replacement.
My review might be a little premature since I’ve only owned the camera a few weeks but so far, WOW! The rear control ring, which adjusts EV value by default, is easy to knock if you’re not careful but since relative EV value shows on the LCD, it’s just as easy to get into the habit of checking the EV setting as you would shutter speed or F-stop (and it shows right down in the same area of the LCD that those settings do). And if you’re a skilled photographer making the most of your camera, you will often want to check and tweak the EV value to optimize your shots, anyway.
The camera LCD is breathtaking (not quite as good as a Nikon D300′s but great for appreciating your pictures as you take them). The pictures are very sharp. The low-light capability of the camera is impressive and I like the motion-warning that’s very obvious when you’re about to cross the threshold of acceptable shutter speeds in a low-light situation. See ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/71ylIfu832L.jpg (0.5 sec exposure, ISO 1600, hand-held by available light!)
The zoom, as other reviewers have noted, is a bit incremental but with the quality of the pictures taken, hey, I don’t mind zooming out a bit more than I want if needed and cropping later.
I like the ability to shoot simultaneously in RAW and JPEG. If you do, you lose some of the special tweaks the camera is capable of but I enjoy the latitude having a RAW image affords for post-capture processing.
The Digital Photo Professional software that comes with the camera for handling RAW images is pretty easy and intuitive to use, too. Too bad it doesn’t offer local area correction like Nikon Capture NX2 does but I guess one can always plunk down the money for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2, which offers local corrections and handles Canon S90 RAW images.
I tried two belt cases for the S90 based on online reviews. Both the Canon Powershot 500 case and the LowePro Rezo 30 case fit the S90 well. The Rezo 30 case closes with a zipper, not as convenient as the Velcro flap on the Canon case but better for keeping the dust and dirt out of the case. Canon case has a permanent belt loop while the Rezo case easily detaches from the belt, using a combination of a Velcro flap and button snap to securely attach the case to a belt.
All in all, I highly recommend the Canon S90 for a camera you can easily carry anywhere on your belt but takes GREAT pictures and is a joy to use.
4 Stars Not perfect, but close
This is going to be more like a story than a product review, but maybe it will be helpful to others who were looking for the same features I was.
First of all, I wasn’t in the market for a camera at all: I have a Casio EX-Z750 that, frankly, is still nearly unbeatable in its class (subcompact P&S). I happened to be browsing a recent B&H catalog and noticed the Olympus E-P2 – very attractive retro look! Started reading up on it (especially the outstanding information on [...]) and decided I had to see one of these in the flesh. Found one at a local store, and while it’s gorgeous, it’s nowhere near as compact as I imagined from the catalog photo. And it has no viewfinder (Casio does) and no flash! But it has a large image sensor and apparently amazing image quality. So I got to thinking: what else is out there that can do better than my beautiful little Casio? I’ve always lamented its lack of RAW images, and eventually it will break, but pretty much everything about it is incredible. So my research turned up these cameras (data largely gathered from [...], with additional info from manufacturers’ websites):
Camera || Sensor size || Aperture || Focal length || Flash
Canon PS S90 || .43 cm2 || f/2.0 || 28-105mm || Yes
Olympus E-P2 || 2.43 cm2 || f/2.8* || 17mm* || No
Panasonic LX3 || .45 cm2 || f/2.0 || 24-60mm || Yes
Sigma DP2 || 2.85 cm2 || f/2.8 || 24mm || Yes
* The Olympus camera has interchangeable lens; the 17mm F/2.8 was the fastest “normal” lens that fits my needs.
The Panasonic’s lens is a Leica that’s very highly regarded.
The Canon S90 is, by far, the most compact of the cameras in this group. The Olympus could never be considered a pocket camera. The Panasonic is somewhat larger than the Canon, though perhaps still “pocketable”. The Sigma is really too large for a pocket, though quite a bit more compact than the Olympus.
All of these cameras have RAW mode. None of them has an integral viewfinder (not many subcompact P&S cameras do, anymore, but I still like them for when the sun is shining directly on the LCD).
I ruminated about all of this for quite a while before settling on the Canon. Its lens is excellent, the image sensor is the .43cm2 size (1/1.7″) of the best-in-class subcompact P&S cameras, and it has RAW image mode. The other cameras were all larger – enough to be the deciding factor for me. But I really do like the idea of the very large sensor – eventually someone will offer a camera closer to my wishes, but there isn’t one around at the present time.
Concerning the camera itself: there’s little need to repeat what’s already been said very well by others. I’ve compared the JPEG images to my Casio (which is probably the best I’ve seen on any camera for color balance, saturation, etc.) and they’re just as good. I haven’t seen a P&S that does better. But having RAW image recording opens up a world of processing that’s not possible with the Casio. There’s some barrel distortion, but it’s no worse than on any other camera with a similar lens (and marginally better than the Casio, which can be fairly annoying). And, for the desperate, this can be corrected with PhotoShop and other software.
My only real complaints have been voiced numerous times by others: the rear control dial looseness and the flash location.
The control dial on the rear of the camera is outrageously loose. It’s virtually impossible to use the camera in any mode but fully automatic without inadvertantly changing whatever setting the dial controls for the chosen mode (the dial does nothing in full automatic). In fact, the entire control assembly of which it’s a part is so poorly designed as to be an utter anomaly in Canon cameras. How on earth could they not notice such a shortcoming before releasing the product? Nevertheless, I knew about this and had even tried the camera in a store, and it still didn’t deter me from buying it. But it will be a constant nuisance. No doubt Canon will eventually get around to addressing this, but as it can’t be fixed by a firmware update, those of us who bought this camera are stuck with it.
Second, the location of the pop-up flash is absurd: it’s at the top left front corner of the camera, exactly where my left index finger is all the time! I’ve had the camera for exactly two days, and I can’t count the number of times that the damn thing decided to pop up (since it’s usually preferable to leave the flash in automatic than turned off all the time) and promptly retract after bumping into my finger, with the resulting “restart camera” error message. I hope that this doesn’t eventually cause the flash mechanism to self-destruct, and, with luck, I may get used to holding the camera differently, but even though I knew about this before buying, it is unexpectedly annoying. Given the size and layout of the camera, it’s not an unreasonable location for the flash, but still …
So it’s not quite the perfect pocket camera, but for me, it’s the best currently available. I really miss a viewfinder, and that control dial and flash are a royal pain. But I finally got my RAW mode on a very compact camera with a good, fast lens and a larger image sensor. So I’ll carry both the Casio and the Canon for a while until I decide which one will become the spare. I suspect the Casio might end up in a drawer – unless that dial on the S90 finally drives me crazy.
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July 7, 2010 8:22 am | 
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