Used Canon PowerShot G10 Digital Point & Shoot Camera

MY MOVE FROM THE G7 to the G10. I own and really like the Canon G7. I passed on purchasing the G9, not seeing much that would attract me over the G7. But as I read about the G10, I began to see enough new stuff to make it sound interesting to me. Little did I guess what a huge leap up this purchase was going to be. I'll try to focus here on items you may not have read about in the reviews below, or at least items that may not have been covered in any detail. Overall, the feel and build of the G10 is simply great. Nothing about it feels flimsy or cheap to me. It has a bigger grip on the right front where your fingers wrap around the camera and the camera is a delight to hold and use. The LCD is now 3" of course, and much sharper and crisper than my G7. The G10 still uses my SD and SD HC (SD High Capacity) cards and I am happy about that. I wanted to test the new "I-Contrast" feature I had been hearing about, so I sat my wife in the bay window with a fully sunlit window behind her. I took a series of photographs from several feet away, focusing (with face detect) on her face. With the test shots where I had "I-Contrast" turned off, her face was visible but pretty dark as were the interior walls around the window behind her. Not an unusable picture, but certainly not a good picture either. I was surprised they were as good as they were but I still wanted better than this. So I enabled "I-Contrast" and shot the same scene. The results were a very pleasant surprise. The outside scene through the window was still slightly overblown ... almost exactly as in the first series. But my wife's face and the interior walls were now much more properly exposed and the pictures were truly usable ... something most of us would be happy to have taken. It was clear that "I-Contrast" really does work and since it is easy (using the camera menu) to engage "I-Contrast" I will certainly be using that feature often in contrasty scenes where I want to avoid harsh black shadows. I was quite impressed with the quality of this new lens. I thought I had a sharp crisp lens on my G7 but the lens on my G10 is a definite step up. Or maybe it is the additional pixels ... whatever, the difference is remarkable and was totally unexpected. I was a bit concerned about the loss of Optical zoom range from the zoom range available with my G7. I never used digital zoom on the G7 because it was too easy to lose picture quality and I didn't want to risk that. But I had read about a new feature of the G10 where it if you set the digital zoom to "standard", the camera would combine Optical and Digital zoom and allow you to seamlessly use them together up to a point just shy of where picture degradation would begin. Then it would stop zooming. If you then tried to zoom some more, the G10 will allow that but you will then be digital zooming into the range where there is a risk of picture degradation. All very clever I thought, but did it actually work? I decided to test that. I sat the camera on a block wall and shot the street sign across the intersection (about 150 feet). As I expected, when I zoomed in the zoom ran seamlessly to what appeared to be maximum and stopped. I took the picture. Then I twisted the zoom button again and sure enough, the zoom continued zooming (into the possible degradation zone) to the true maximum zoom using not only all optical capability but ALL digital capability. I fired up my computer and loaded the first shot ... the "standard" zoom. Taken at 14.7 Mega Pixels, I was immediately stunned by the quality of the shot. It wasn't just good, it was simply flawless! There was absolutely nothing about that shot that I wanted to improve except, perhaps, it still didn't bring the street sign all that close. So, using my photo editor, I just kept zooming in on the street sign until it virtually filled my monitor ... and the image was STILL FLAWLESS! I simply couldn't believe my eyes. Color was perfect, edges of the lettering were crisp and absolutely sharp. There was nothing for me to improve in a photo editor. I was stunned. (I may have even laughed out loud). Even the leaves of the mesquite tree in my neighbor's yard which is some 20 feet behind the sign were all visible and definable. WOW! WOW! WOW! Then I loaded the next shot where I had zoomed the G10 out until it paused, then zoomed more to push the combination of Optical and Digital zoom to the absolute limit. To keep it short: It was about as good as I was used to getting from my G7 using Optical zoom only ... which is OK, but not truly sharp, crisp and the green color of the sign looked somewhat faded. Also the tree leaves in the background were no longer distinct ... Again this is not a picture you'd throw away by any means and one which could be improved with some work in Photoshop but even with that effort, it would be nothing near the quality I could get with the G10s method of combining Optical and just the right amount of Digital zoom. And the G10 gave it to me without any additional effort whatsoever. My future approach to photography of distant objects in the future was immediately obvious. I will use the G10's built in magic (as I did in the first zoom shot) and then simply crop and enlarge the crop to the size I want for flawless, effortless results. As I said, I skipped the G9 so I cannot compare the G9 and the G10, but I couldn't be happier with my decision to upgrade my G7 to the G10. The G10 clearly takes this type of photography to a new level with features, a great lens and picture quality. For several years, I actually had a $6,500 setup including the Canon Mark II and some "L" glass lenses. It was heavy, cumbersome and took pictures which, as expected, cried out for work in Photoshop. Professional cameras produce pictures that expect the photographer to work on them. While I enjoyed fiddling with the pictures from the Mark II, I eventually tired of that weight, bulk and switching lenses so I gave the camera to my son. Now, that I have this G10, I will never look back. I guess I will need Photoshop again if I try to take pictures in the dark with the G10, it does have a bit more noise at higher ISOs. And if you are a true pro, you will probably rant and rave about noise at higher ISOs I suppose. For the rest of us, the pictures up to ISO 400 are quite acceptable and if are really picky, noise removal is simple enough to accomplish with Photoshop or any other software capable of noise reduction. In real life, I guess I don't shoot much where I use ISOs beyond 400 anyway. I have owned cameras all my life and I have never owned a camera I liked more than this G10, or from which I got better pictures right out of the camera than this G10. This camera is Worth every penny to me.

The G10 is an amazing camera. I bought it two weeks ago based on Michael Reichman's (luminouslandscape website) and Thom Hogan's (bythom[...]) reviews. I am an advanced amateur/prosumer -- I sell fine art landscapes, and have been photographing for about 35 years. The G10 is heavy at about a pound, but I like the heft. It is quite compact (at least from my perspective) -- the lens fully retracts and it will fit in a large jacket pocket. I have a medium-large Zing pouch I put it in and carry in my backpack, or alternatively put the Zing pouch on my belt loop. I'm astonished at the image quality and functionality offered by the G10. I haven't shot any jpegs, only RAW (using DPP to process RAW; the RAW images will no doubt be more malleable with other software when they support the G10 -- DPP is fairly limited). In RAW, at ISO 80 on a tripod, I think the detail rendered by the G10 exceeds or at least equals the Canon 5D. It may have a weaker or virtually no AA filter. The lens on the G10 is fantastic. There is very little resolution fall off, even wide open, edge to edge and into the corners. In my mind, the closest equivalent to the G10 is a Fuji 645 medium format rangefinder (remember the small zoom range Fuji 645 compact?), but the G10 is better in almost every way. The G10 is far lighter and more compact, offers a great zoom range (and is sharp throughout the zoom range) and image stabilization, and has enough resolution to produce fine art quality prints, up to 18" or 24" in the long dimension without stitching. I think the G10 is opening up a whole new world of landscape, street photography possibilities, and what about the incredible macro versatility? There is a substantial drop off in image quality from ISO 200 to ISO 400 on the G10, but ISO 400 is still very very good (again shooting RAW), much better than the panasonic LX3 that I tried for a week or two at ISO 400. I must be crazy. I can't believe a compact with such a small sensor can render detail this well. I'm seeing the G10 as a whole new tool that will open up different possibilities and different ways of seeing (and have different limitations than a Canon DSLR). I haven't been this excited about a photographic tool since I purchased my Canon 5D over 3 years ago. The Canon G10 offers "automatic" settings that I haven't tried. For an advanced photographer it offers a wealth of manual controls and customization, which I'm still learning. One very nice touch is that the custom settings on the top dial (there are two) allow you to save the zoom settings and manual focus setting -- so I have one saved at a 35mm focal length equivalent and another at a 50mm equivalent. This allows quick, street shooting, similar to what one can do with a Leica rangefinder, though the G10 has a much different look given the virtually infinite depth of field due to the small sensor.

(Purchased on 01/05/2009) Received camera much later than when I ordered. Not a problem wasn't in hurry anyway. Once in hand camera seemed very solid. I had read all the reviews from amazon and elsewhere, and even considered getting the Nikon P6000 in its stead. One issues arose immediately, a light banding issue in the LCD. Whenever I pointed the camera in the direction of a light source (ie. a energy saving light bulb hanging from the ceiling and its reflection in a mirror) perfect solid bands of light would streak across the LCD screen emanating from the lights. I contacted Canon and they seemed baffled by this. They suggested that it might have been firmly jostled during shipping and affected the processor. If I sent it to them I was looking at a two week turn around, or I could just send it back to the shipper as defective, which I ultimately did. .....TO BE CONTINUED (Purchased on 01/16/2009) I received a another G10 because the first was thought defective. Now, this new camera had the same light banding issue, and this time it also had a few dead pixels on the LCD. I could not believe my luck. The dead pixels was a no brainer this camera was going back too. However, in all the reviews I had read, I had not come across one regarding the light banding issue. So, I sent this camera back. I did replace the order. I have since received yet another G10. I also purchased two 16gb SD cards a PQI and a Transcend. I had also purchased two extra batteries, so I was committed to make this work. [As a side note, each 16gb card can take up to 2450 shots on superfine mode @ 15MP, 3984 @ 9M, 6126 @ 5M, 9999 @ 2M and web size, 3267 @ WS, and 756 using RAW. If you set RAW+JPG you only get 636, this is the setting I use mostly.] So with three batteries [400 shots per battery] I am supposedly good for up to 1200 shots. Can't comment on video, because I have not really delved into it. (Purchased on 02/02/2009) Finally, received my third attempt at purchasing this camera. As I said before I am committed to making this work. Review after review insists that this camera is unparalleled in its class, and I am a Nikon leaning personality. Anywho, my third attempt. Camera in hand. LCD screen is perfect. No issues with either memory card. I point towards a light source, stare at the LCD. Light banding issue? YES. as it turns out it happens no matter what type of light I point towards. Although it shows in the LCD it does not translate to the actual pic. So, LCD- Yes, photo- No. Overall the camera seems to be a very decent choice. I bought it to take pictures you might take with a good DSLR but not have to carry one. Something to fit in the pocket. I am barely a photo enthusiast, but like to have quality and the ability to achieve more than my initial intentions. Who knows, might actually take this more seriously in the future as a hobby. Most of the shots I have taken are marco, and I have to say I am impressed. I do not regret the choice, for the most part I am satisfied with the G10. ** I'm told that all CCD cameras have this issue when pointed at a light source. However, my Sony HD camcorder does not, but then too that is has CMOS. Also my iPhone does not either. Only real knock about the camera besides, not the best thing for capturing moving objects. So I tend to use video mode for that.

Here is a no-nonsense review of an "advanced" POINT AND SHOOT. I've seen lots of back and forth arguments of good and bad and this and that. Canon states that this camera is for the "advanced amateur". (It's usually the Pros that complain the most.) Its a very sexy looking camera that has a lot of cool features that can make some beautiful images if you have a good understanding of photography. It can go full automatic for those of you who don't (yet). The camera feels like quality, from weight (13 oz.) to the clicks of the knobs, to the smoothness of the lens movements. The battery lasts a good 400 shots if you don't do the on camera slide shows or forget to shut it off (it has power saving feature as well). If you ask me, it's about as good as a $400 - $500 camera can get. The rest of this review is for the ones who are worried about the negative reviews still. It's not going to stand up to a DSLR but it will give you very high quality vacation, wedding guest, birthday and family event type pictures. I am told you can get a very acceptable 11 X 14 print from it. I use it to find interesting locations for pro shoots and shutter bugging or if I just want to give my shoulder a rest from carrying around a DSLR. If you shoot a lot of night scenes, this camera may NOT be for you (there aren't too many affordable DSLR's that can't pull this off either) you will see noise (red, green and blue colored digital grain). Here's why, in the simplest terms I can think of: Think of the sensor as a very smart solar panel (smart because it sees colors too). It generates electricity when light hits it telling the brain of the camera that there is a certain amount of light intensity there. If there is no light, you get blackness, no electricity. If you try to force detail into an area of a picture that is absent of light, by using a long shutter time, you get noise. It could be a stray signal from the camera's system or other heavily scientific stuff going on to cause these dots. AND IF YOUR SHOOTING BELOW A 1/4 OF SECOND, EVEN WITH A HIGH ISO, YOU WILL GET SOME DEGREE OF NOISE. It's the nature of of the digital format. Use a flash. Raw Format, although very impressive with it's "oops!" correction abilities, will not save every image. It should not be used as a crutch or a cheat. It still needs to be exposed within a reasonable exposure latitude or "in the ball park". OK. I'm down off my soap box. Great little camera. Bottom line.

I bought a G10 about 18 months ago. It was half the price on Amazon it is now, by the way. I have noticed that Amazon has significantly raised the prices on all of the cameras I've looked at over the past couple of weeks. Taking advantage at Christmas time???? Anyway, at first I loved my G10; however, I had a couple of problems with it. First, the LCD screen was warped and that allowed dirt to get behind the screen making it very hard to see your image. I had that repaired. Then, so subtly as to go unnoticed at first, the focus got softer and softer until suddenly 9 of every 10 shots taken are out of focus. The only setting that I can use to get a clear shot now is the flower setting - and if you were wondering it is possible to take a portrait of someone on the flower setting. :) I have been unable to remedy this myself, and I even reset the camera (per Canon's instruction) but to no avail. I received an estimate for repair (~$200) from my local camera shop which is half the original price of the camera. I'm going to just say no for now. I am now looking at an SLR, Canon 50D perhaps, but in the back of my mind worry that the focusing problem may be a characteristic of the Canon brand. Maybe Nikon is the way to go. At any rate, this camera may not be worth your money should it develop similar issues. UPDATE: my friend bought her G10 at the same time as I did. She used it primarily as a back up camera so didn't take too many shots with it. Hers has stopped working completely. Based on this, I'm downgrading my review from 2 to 1 stars. This camera takes nice pictures while it works, but when it doesn't work, it's just an expensive paperweight.

It's important to understand this camera within context: This isn't a digital SLR replacement or a pocket d-SLR. This is an excellent camera for someone who is a dSLR shooter as a backup, or even someone wanting to graduate from a point and shoot to allow them more control over the camera. The Powershot G10 incorporates a few new features over it's predecessor, the G9. It loses it's 6x optical zoom down to 5x optical zoom, but packs 14.7 megapixels, features a wide-angle zoom compared to the G9, and uses Canon's new Digic IV processing engine. The Pros: * RAW capture. RAW photos don't feature any of the conversions that JPGs do, but also takes up a lot more space. Your typical RAW photo out of this camera will be 15MB, versus 4MB for a high quality JPG. It's nice having this flexibility. * Supports Canon's Speedlite external flash units. * Manual controls over aperture and shutter speed for additional controls. This is the single biggest advantage to the G10: if you have a SLR of any type, you're used to changing f-stops, shutter speed and other things on the fly to take better and more creative photos. * Shoots VGA video. I would have like to have seen 720p video myself. The cons: * Expensive spare batteries. $70? Seriously, that's insane. * Early adopters will find out that Adobe products (Lightroom, Photoshop) and Apple Aperture won't support the G10's RAW - yet. *fingers crossed* You can use the included Canon software, which I find unweildy and a pain to deal with. I do recommend picking up a 4gb SDHC card, such as a Kingston or Sandisk. Class 6 cards are recommended to handle those large files that you'll be shooting. Also, this won't fit in most camera pouches (I couldn't get it to fit in any of the Lowepro pouches without me feeling like I'm smushing it in there) so you're better off going to a camera store and trying them out. In the few days that I've had this camera, I feel happy for having it, and it definitely feels like a more "adult" camera than my previous Powershots (not to say that they weren't any good, it's just that I've gotten to the point as a photographer where I *need* the flexibility that this camera can provide.) If you're looking at making the jump to something more advanced, then give this camera a try. You won't regret it.

Construction/quality control: very disappointed! Both, the original new G10 that I bought straight from Amazon, AND it's new replacement, had specs of white fuzz under the enclosed lens! I'm guessing Canon is getting hit hard by the "global financial crisis" too and decided that clean rooms were over-rated! Sorry to sound so negative, but paying this much for "the best," you'd expect great quality control! Anyway, the first camera I received had a large piece of white dust easily visible to the unaided eye, though it happened to be on the outer edge of the focal area. It never seemed to be noticeable in average photos, but I would get an artifact from sun glaring photos that seemed to originate from that area of the lens, so to be safe, I returned it to get it replaced. The second unit had a much smaller piece of fuzz, but at this time I just needed a camera and gave up on the frustration of getting even another questionable unit. Last complaint is the eyepiece, even though I never use it, I was dismayed to find out how easily ambient dust finds it's way into the eyepiece aperture. Even though we always keep the camera in a bag, it somehow gets dust under the eyepiece. I'm guessing it sneaks in through the focusing dial? I frankly don't care since I doubt I will ever use the eyepiece, but hey, maybe this is bad news for some other people. I must say, putting all this aside, the body is solid, I like its feel! Features: Fast, I love how I almost dropped the camera when I first turned it on; the lens speed open so fast I lost my grip, then I grabbed the camera to get a better hold of it, then accidentally hit the camera button and took a photo, in what all seemed to be a millisecond... WOW that was fast! I also must say... more buttons is very good! This unit is awesome, since it has so many easy to get to buttons right on the device, less fishing through countless dialogs to get what you want. But now that Canon focused on making a camera with more buttons, one can still complain that their is still not enough! I could bore you with a list, but I just have to give them credit for such a nice camera. Probably my only complaint is that some modes don't save adjusted settings, like auto mode for instance... if you say "no flash," but then switch to a manual mode, then come back, you lost your "no flash" setting. But oddly other settings are sometimes kept in the manual modes.... weird! This is where an additional button for using stored or default settings would be nice. LOL Picture Quality: had trouble viewing canon RAW format in Linux. Some reason three different interpreters distorted the coloring and made the photos unusable. Maybe Canon changed their format since the G10, and Linux community hasn't kept up? Quality of photos, not too shabby, but like other people, I wish they would drop the megapixel race and focus on ISO quality! Megapixels are no match for lousy dark photo shots! Video mode: the video camera... ugh, drives me crazy when you buy a camera only to find out optical zoom is turned off when in video mode. Funny, some cameras get bad reviews because the zoom motor makes noise in the microphone when people use it, so they complain about it. Canon must have taken note of this and decided to turn the feature off, but to those who complain about the noise, DON'T USE THE ZOOM then, or just use digital zoom instead! Geesh, bad marketing scheme for Canon, VERY bad! Otherwise, camera is very good. I like how it seems that stabilization is linear rather than logarithmic. Some cameras' stabilization is jerky and unnatural, and if you take off the stabilization, all you see is shake shake shake. This camera's stabilization is built in and is smooth. It has a VERY slight "swing" or "rubber band" effect to it, but a much more natural one! You probably wouldn't even notice it, but it helps greatly. You can still get a shake in the recording, but it is nothing like other cameras! VERY NICE! Firmware: this is the first Canon I have ever owned, and I must say, I find the menu system has a very large learning curve to get used to it! I think once in a while companies should leave bad ideas and move to more useful ones, but I don't blame them for trying to adopt and maintain a menu standard to make it easier for previous Canon users. Good approach, but I dread to find out where they might place the next 20 features that come out in their next model, maybe another button? That would be nice! :) Battery life: not too bad... as expected, one can always wish for more life, nothing new here! Hope this helped!

Canon Powershot G10 14.7MP Digital Camera with 5x Wide Angle Optical Image Stabilized Zoom I am a serious amateur photographer. I want a camera that will perform in all types of situations. The G-10 is a successor to the prior top end range finder digital cameras in the Canon line. It is more expensive than most range finder digitals but I think it is well worth it. The new model offers a 5X Optical Zoom (28 MM lens). It allows full control of ISO and White Balance and a number of other features that can be toggled - like Image Stabilization. Plus the image quality is up to 14.7 MP. I normally shoot with a 40D SLR but there are times when I simply do not want to carry along lenses and the other equipment. I first used this on a trip to Veracruz, Mexico and tried to push the limits of the camera. I don't like flash photography except in exceptional circumstances. With the available controls I was able to get the shots I wanted. That included some macro shots which would have been chancy with any other range finder camera. The G-10 has a large view finder to be able to see what you shot. I will continue to use my SLR but the handy size and bounty of features will make this a prime candidate for everyday use. If you want to see some of the results of this camera - check out my shots from Tajin or the Cortez landing site on my FLickr site at [...]