Canon PowerShot A85/A95

[dodecahedron]

i would like some input from anyone who has one of these cameras.
i'm thinking of getting one of them.

i'd like to hear any opinions of the camera, it's preformace etc.

but the particular issue i'm interested in is how does it perform at indoor photography with poor lighting conditions.
i have the Canon S1 IS, and alas for such photography it's very problematic. it has a very hard time focusing, taking a long time to focus or not managing to focus at all!
this is cruail to me - i want/need to photograph my baby! and can't wait around for the camera to figure out the focus. buy then he's looking the other way etc.
are the A85 and A95 OK in this respect ?

TIA
any other comments are welcome.

[Ian]

I have the A85, but I really can't give you any valid feedback on performance. I'm far from being a camera expert as you can probably tell by som eof my review pictures.

[dodecahedron]

but then i guess you do use it quite a lot in situations like i asked - indoor photography, not always under very good lighting.
do you have comments about how well/quickly it focuses like i asked?
(i'm not asking for any professional evaluation or anything of the like. i'm not an expert photographer either, and i've read some reviews so i got that angle covered).

[CowboySlim]

Turn the automatic redeye reduction off and remove any redeye with a photo editor. That will make it shoot faster.

Slim

[dodecahedron]

thanks for the tip.
but as a matter of fact (having today spent some time delving into online reviews etc.) noticed that the redeye reduction was off.

anyway this camera (the S1 IS) is know to be problematic at focusing under low-light conditions.
it doesn't have a focus-assist lamp. that's part of the reason i guess.

hey, 'slim, don't you have a A95?
how do you like it?

[CowboySlim]

I have the A85, and like it real well. I haven't used it that much yet, however. OTH, what little I have used it low light with flash, the photos didn't seem badly focused, IIRC. Now, I've a predecessor, the A40, for a couple of years and wouldn't have gone for the A85 if I weren't happy with it.

But here is the deal with digital photography of which I'm sure that you are aware. Each photo itself (unprinted) is without cost, so just blast away. If you are lucky, you'll get one keeper out of one or two dozen, but they are free. Look at them in your monitor before printing, which is where the cost is.

Then there is one other thing that I do to keep the cost way down. I have a Canon printer and I use their 8 1/2 x 11 "High Resolution Paper". It is a thin stock like regular inkjet paper but it is coated like photo paper. As such the ink does soak and blur in and it yields quite good prints. Now this paper costs $10 (US) for a 100 pack so it is much cheaper than top quality photo printer. I initially print out all my photos on this in "Index" or "Contact Sheet" format which is 20 per page. I give these to my wife from which to select the "keepers." I then print those out for her on top quality Canon photo paper. I use nothing but genuine Canon paper and inks. After spending $300 (US) on a top notch camera, it didn't seem smart to save 20 cents per photo for 2nd class prints.

Slim

[eric93se]

If you want good indoor shooting then I would have to reccomend a camera with a hot shoe. I've had the G3 with a 420ex flash, indoor shooting is incredible, you get to bounce the flash off the ceiling and it yields a very natural well lite shot. I know a camera with external flash is a bit more $$ but its well worth it. Built in flash photography is a little tricky.

I sold my G3 (just the camera) a while back, looking to upgrade but there were no significant improvments in canon's G line. Now with the G6 I'm tempted but not sure yet (DSLR?). I have to stick with canon sice I still have the canon flash and microdrive, the quality was awesome so I have no problem with that. And as for purple fringing, out of the thousands of shots I've taken only one stood out and slapped me in the face as an extreme case of PF where the lighting condition was a bit extreme.

good luck with your purchase.

[UALOneKPlus]

I have the Canon A70 and A95. I think they do fine in low light. Sony cameras may be slightly better, but I don't like the memory stick format.

I use both for indoor shots a lot, and most of the time the photos seem fine to me, but I'm not an expert photographer either.

[Bhairav]

A95 here. Nice camera, good for low-light situations. Manual controls are a plus.

[CowboySlim]

Ok, Dode, that's plenty many good comments. You are good to go!

Slim

[overclockxp]

I am about to pull the trigger on a Digital Rebel and am contemplating getting the 420ex. The A series gives too much red eye. Any compact camera will give serious red eye. The closer the flash is to the lens, the more red eye you will have in the picture. I had an awesome HP 715 (I think that was the model) 3 megapixel camera that produced very little red eye. Why I sold that one I'll never know.

[eric93se]

I am about to pull the trigger on a Digital Rebel and am contemplating getting the 420ex. The A series gives too much red eye. Any compact camera will give serious red eye. The closer the flash is to the lens, the more red eye you will have in the picture. I had an awesome HP 715 (I think that was the model) 3 megapixel camera that produced very little red eye. Why I sold that one I'll never know.

Never had redeye problems with my G3, I think you overstated yourself a bit. Even when I had a regular film camera.

[Bung]

With the S1 or any camera with programmable custom settings you can preset the camera to be a point and shoot where everything in a range of say 5ft to INF is in focus. This eliminates the delay in getting focus lock..

This link should take you to a collection of posts at DPReview on setting up the S1

[Wesociety]

I have an older model (A70) ... well actually my brother has it but I use it ALOT now since I lost my Canon S200 in New York City.

I'm pretty happy with the performance and picture quality, but I prefer the smaller form factor Elphs or the super slim Canons.

[pranav81]

Hey dodecahedron,why dont you check out the cybershot series from Sony?I hear that have a 8 MP camera in market with good features.I have a Sony DCR-PC330E digicam and when I used red eye reduction,ut too took lot of time to focus.But when the red eye reduc is switched off,the camera focuses faster.


::Pranav::

[dodecahedron]

thanks for everyone's comments.

i went to Office Depot the other day (with my S1) and looked at and played around with the Canon A95.
a little hard to test inside a store, but it didn't seem to be much better at focusing than the S1. we went to a darker spot in the store and it had a bit of trouble focusing too.

also done a bit of reading at dpreview forums.
it seems that the focus assist lamp (that most digicams have but the S1 does not, and this was i had thought the reason it has a hard time focusing) doesn't make all that much of a difference.

Bung, thanks a lot for that tip about hyperfocal. i'll do that! according to many reports at dpreview it really helps shoot in low-light conditions!!!

anyway, my wife (who is the amateur photographer in the house) is disappointed that she can't shoot our kid, inside the house (=low light), very close up (=using a high zoom or from a very short distance). but from the reading i've done, these are exactly the conditions in which
all digital cameras have a hard time focusing...!

oh well, i guess this means that we'll have to get her Nikon SLR camera fixed, back to film phogography