 "Canon PowerShot SX120IS 10MP Digital Camera" | 2009-11-17 |
| - Reviewed By User: A17WG968DGXEUX |
I bought this camera because of the optical 10x zoom and image stabilization. My previous experience with Canon PowerShot cameras has been very good. The picture environment selections (Auto, night, portrait, and so on) are excellent, especially the indoor lighting modes. The video mode is especially good, and much improved over my previous PowerShot.
I've noticed that I do a little less photo fixing in Adobe Photoshop Elements as the images are clearer and the color seems to be better.
I was a little concerned about the lack of an optical viewfinder, but the LCD screen has so far been very good, even in bright daylight. |
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 "Perfect for daily use" | 2009-11-13 |
| - Reviewed By Anonymous |
Took 40-50 pictures with different options(auto manual easy use etc)
I especially loved quality of manual mode...If u r looking for something pro, it is not your camera guys... |
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| "Great camera for the advanced photographer that's all about control" | 2009-11-10 |
| - Reviewed By whyzir |
The Canon Sx120 is for the advanced photographer who wants more control than the typical digital camera, but without the extra bulk or price. I got this camera after having used the previous SX100 and Sx110 and some DSLRs. The main upgrade from the past is the DIGIC IV processor and the noise reduction at ISO 800 and 1600. In the previous SX models the noise was pretty bad, specks of odd color pixels were very obvious at high ISO, but with the SX120's new NR processing, it's a noticeable improvement. Granted it's not DSLR level, but very usable for a compact digital camera. All the other features are just minor tweaks from the previous models.
This is a great camera for the money. It allows manual operation of aperture, shutter speed, even flash intensity (which comes in useful for optically triggering off-camera flashes). I wish more compact cameras allowed this kind of control for creative shooting. The aperture operation isn't like some other manufacturers that only have 2 settings, wide and small. It actually has increments in 1/3 stop steps which gives great control. One other feature you can't find in any other value compact digital camera is how fast the lens is. I mean how much light it lets in even when zoomed in (f2.8-f4.3). This allows faster shutter speeds to freeze the action in dimly lit areas. Most cameras have tiny lenses that lets even less light through when zoomed in, this makes the camera turn up the ISO (more noise), or slows the shutter speed (more blur). The Canon SX120 has a big enough lens to counter these effects. Even the new Canon SX200 has compromised in this area of the lens.
Other nice features of this camera I like are being able to adjust contrast, saturation, and sharpness of images. I prefer to turn these down as much as possible to capture the most data at first, I can post-process the pictures later on a computer if I wanted (alternative when RAW isn't availble).
This camera has so many great little things about it. I'll just list them here for completeness sake. It has great image quality, a lot of control for the user, intuitive interface, adequate performance speed for the category, uses convenient & greener AA batteries. I just have a few minor gripes that would make this an even better camera:
1) Super-fine JPG mode is not available anymore, I wish the JPG compression was more adjustable.
2) The Zoom level is not precisely displayed. I prefer an equivalent focal length display instead of an ambiguous zoom bar that only appears for a second or two when the zoom is activated.
3) Flash recharge is slow, but it's to be expected since it uses AA batteries. This really isn't so bad since I don't use flash very much because the camera is able to take good photos in low-light with the big lens and good high ISO performance along with the optical image stabilizer. I get good performance out of the camera using slow-discharge NiMH batteries (don't get the high mAH rating ones, they have a high self-discharge rate).
4) There's no way to turn off the auto-lens retraction when playing back images, which resets the settings when I turn the camera back on to shoot again (I have to readjust my zoom level and exposure compensation settings for example.)
5) Wide-angle isn't very wide at 36mm EFL, I prefer a bit wider and give up some in the telephoto end, while keeping the same lens performance.
6) Video recording is ok (640x480 in mJPEG), optical zoom disabled while recording. I dont' take a lot of videos and figured this camera is really for taking creative still photos. So it's an ok compromise for me.
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 "Not good enough for me to keep" | 2009-11-02 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1CE9VC94WOEMX |
I own a Canon SD1100 IS and was looking for a camera with more zoom and more manual options. I expected the SX120 IS to take good snapshots of my kids indoors, using Auto mode, in various lighting conditions (by "good" I mean as good as my SD1100). Unfortunately, this is not the case. I haven't even tried the SX outdoors, but the results I've gotten indoors have prompted me to return the camera to the retailer. I simply need a camera that takes great shots of my kids in Auto mode.
A few other things I did not care for:
- The battery door was tricky to open and in some instances took me 20 seconds to successfully open. Perhaps my camera was just a lemon in this regard; I can't be certain.
- The camera is somewhat heavy but does not provide a good way to hold it, at least for my small-ish hands. The very place I want to place my thumb has the Play button, and the rest of my hand seems to search for something to really hold on to.
- The scroll wheel (not sure what to call it) sometimes "moves" when I could swear I haven't even touched it. I feel that the scroll wheel, while handy in some instances, causes more problems than it's worth.
Any one of these annoyances might be all right on its own, but when I put all of the factors together, it's clear that this is not the camera for me. |
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| "Very good point and shoot" | 2009-11-01 |
| - Reviewed By User: A361QA5UHV69YO |
I was a little skeptical about this camera at the beginning. But I was looking for a point and shoot that would take great pictures and I have found one in this camera. It's easy to use, does not weight a lot and is not as bulky as a DSLR but it takes great quality pictures. I was impressed with the quality and my family was very impressed so much that they are looking at buying the same camera. They loved the fact that is easy to carry and that you don't have to take another bag for a camera (DSLR) and they saw the crispness in the pictures too..
The only complaint I have is the battery life. It uses 2 AA batteries which is very convenient for you don't have to carry cables and chargers, but after a day of heavy use, the batteries can be drained pretty quickly.
Overall I am very satisfied with the camera. |
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| "did a compare and contrast with a canon A640" | 2009-10-29 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1NUDHU6HSLVEY |
I'd been shopping around for a digital camera for a while now. Just when I thought I got the right camera - it turns out to be not much of an upgrade at all.
My Canon A640 is about 3 years old and I wanted to replace with a camera that has an Image Stabilizer. Canon SX110 IS and this model seemed to be likely choices. Although the SX110 seems to be sold out everywhere except for Ebay. I actually bought a Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ5A 9.1MP Digital Camera with 10x Wide Angle MEGA Optical Image Stabilized Zoom (Blue) and did some image tests - the tests did not come out the way that I'd liked, Canon had better image quality for sure.
So I ended up buying this camera upon the return of the Panasonic. I took pictures with the A640 and SX120 cameras side-by-side. Then saved files into my computer and saw them on the screen blown up 100%. Taken at the same lighting, same angle, same ISO, etc. My Canon A640 took more vivid pictures than the SX120. However, the SX120 did take some clearer pictures. When both cameras were in Auto mode. The IS almost didn't matter in low-light situations. The quality of images were almost similar - blurry without a tripod. This leads me to think that this whole "Image Stabilization" was just a marketing technique to sell more cameras with the same technology. Granted, the sx120 did take better videos. With IS, the videos did not shake as much. However, I determined that photo quality was my main reason for getting and switching cameras. The photo quality in the SX120 seemed to be lower, less vivid, yet the pixels were higher, this seems to be because the "superfine" setting in manual mode was done away with (as someone else had previously mentioned). I found it funny that the files taken without the "superfine" feature were smaller, yet the photo was larger.
The moral of the story is that if you already have a Canon that has great image quality, then the SX120 isn't worth it, it's not an upgrade by any means, more like a waste of [...] bucks.
However, if you were a first time Canon customer, I would HIGHLY recommend this camera, as I have done image comparisons with the Sony DSC-H10 and the Panasonic DMC-TZ5A, and neither can beat the Canon in photo quality. |
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