Canon Announces 10 New PowerShot Models

Highlights of these new point-and-shoots:

PowerShot A1300 & A810
Canon maintains their commitment to the AA-battery crowd!
The 1300 has an optical viewfinder as well as an LCD.
The B&H article has a mistake: they do both have a 2.7" LCD display.

PowerShot D20
Shockproof, waterproof to 33 feet, and GPS-enabled to automatically geotag your photos.
"Sharp focus can be had even if you’re shivering, as the D20’s Intelligent IS automatically chooses one of six different modes to best cancel out the shake."
It's only rated down to 14°F but I think most of us who winter hike ignore the camera ratings to begin with.

PowerShot Elph 320 & 520
Built-in WiFi supports directly communicating your photos to your Android or iOS phone, your computer, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Canon's own iMAGE GATEWAY.

There are also 5 other new models that run the gamut of photo features from low to high end, some with touch screens, etc…

Read all about these new Canon models here at B&H Photo.

Some of them are also covered at DPReview.

I've always loved the Canon A series for point and shoots and currently have my third one. Just picked up the A1200 for $70 from Amazon to replace the SX130 that is having lens issues. Really like the SX130 but with a broken seal and dust getting inside the lens and no reasonable way to get it apart to clean it this was a cheap fix. Nice having the optical viewfinder again that the SX series lacks (and the LDC on the A1200 is good too). Always like the AA battery option better than the proprietary rechargeables. A set of lithium AAs lasts many months of regular shooting and doesn't have issues with cold. You can see examples of my first day experimenting with the A1200 in my post of our hike last Sunday: http://www.vftt.org/forums/showpost.php?p=368344

Unfortunately, the A1300/810 don't have Image Stabilization. They are pretty bare bones cameras. And at 16 MP I question what the image quality will be like.

And I wish the ELPHs didn't have the touch screens - difficult to use with gloves on.

I complain, I know.

David Metsky said:

Unfortunately, the A1300/810 don't have Image Stabilization.

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Perhaps, but I shot a lot of photos before the days of stabilization and they didn't suck. In fact, for most hiking purposes (read: daylight) it shouldn't even matter. I imagine a lot of people would prefer the option of a less expensive camera to take on hikes.

MichaelJ said:

I imagine a lot of people would prefer the option of a less expensive camera to take on hikes.

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If that's the case, and people really want an optical view finder and AAs, then the A1300 is pretty much their only choice. But it really is an entry level camera, and I'm not willing to trade that for an optical view finder (the AAs don't do anything for me.

Personally, I've never worried about taking my cameras on hikes. I wouldn't buy a cheaper camera to use in those situations because I don't want to sacrifice image quality.

David Metsky said:

If that's the case, and people really want an optical view finder and AAs, then the A1300 is pretty much their only choice. But it really is an entry level camera, and I'm not willing to trade that for an optical view finder (the AAs don't do anything for me.

Personally, I've never worried about taking my cameras on hikes. I wouldn't buy a cheaper camera to use in those situations because I don't want to sacrifice image quality.

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I fall into the category that Michael mentions. I have to say that in general for images on the trail the Powershot A series has served me well over the years. One reason that I prefer the P&S for hiking is that it's so much more easily accessible and I therefore have it out much more often and don't miss any shots. It's not so much that I'm worried about damaging my better cameras. I understand your point about not wanting to sacrifice image quality but for a $79 P&S the A1200 does a pretty good job. What I really wish all the manufacturers would stop doing is constantly increasing the resolution with the tiny sensors in these cameras. 5-8MP is more than enough for this kind of camera but we're now getting up to 16 without a much better sensor. That's really the biggest problem...

mtruman said:

I understand your point about not wanting to sacrifice image quality but for a $79 P&S the A1200 does a pretty good job.

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I'm sure it does, but for an extra $30-40 you can get a camera that does more and does it better. Neither is really an option for me since I want a good camera for all uses, and I'll carry that with me everywhere I go.

mtruman said:

What I really wish all the manufacturers would stop doing is constantly increasing the resolution with the tiny sensors in these cameras. 5-8MP is more than enough for this kind of camera but we're now getting up to 16 without a much better sensor. That's really the biggest problem...

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Unfortunately, MP has become "the" marketing number whether it makes technical sense or not*. A good resampling program can improve the picture in some situations--for instance a down sampling by a factor of two averages four pixels into one and reduces the MP by a factor of four. This can, for instance, reduce the noise. One pundit has spoken highly of using his Canon 5D Mk II (21MP) at one of its fewer MP settings.

* Lens imperfections or diffraction can limit the system resolution to be significantly less than the sensor resolution in some situations. In such situations more MP can simply increase the noise. This is one reason that small-sensor P&Ses often limit the smallest aperture to be f/8--smaller sensors exacerbate these problems.

Doug