Canon S1 IS Digital Camera (1 Viewer)

[TimDoss]

If anyone is interested some of my shots can be seen at

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/tkdoss....net/my_photos

 

[Patrick Sun]

Woo hoo! It only took 2 days for the camera to get to my doorsteps, unfortunately I wasn't home to sign for the Fedex package, so I have to go to the Fedex place and pick it up after work. First thing I'm going to do is find out exactly how many photos I can shot with flash on one set of rechargeable batteries. I need to know how many sets to bring with me if I plan on shooting over 500 shots/day.

 

[Patrick Sun]

So... any recommendations/links to a bag for this camera? I'm looking for one that I could hook onto my belt, or sling it around my neck with neckstrap.

 

[John Chow]

In depth Dpreview review here:
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canons1is/

 

[Andrew Pratt]

Very nice photo's! I'll try and get my San Diego Zoo photo's up this coming week once I catch up from being away all week

 

[Patrick Sun]

What brand of re-chargeables are they using to get 350 shots per set of 4 AA NiMH batteries?

Update: Perhaps I got a bum set of rechargeables. I bought another set (relatively cheap 2000 mah AA's from Microcenter for $4.50 for 4 of them) and was able to get at least 300 shots (no flash). My earlier 1st set netted me around 40 shots before the 1st set of batteries died on me.

Next test is to see how many flash photos I can get on another re-charge of the "good" set of batteries.

 

[Chuck_W]

Patrick..I bought an inexpensive Lowepro brand bag at Best Buy for mine. It has a belt loop and neck strap, and the external pouch is large enough for me to carry my Monster battery charger.

 

[Chuck_W]

Patrick:
I think this is the one I bought.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....2&type=product

It was on sale for 13.49 when I got it...

 

[Patrick Sun]

I did go by Best Buy, and came out with the Trax TCP-10 camera bag. it's a little big, but the S1 requires some depth, so I opted for a larger bag, and it has plenty of room for extra batteries and CF cards, and I can put in some extra padding as well.

Oh, on the batteries update, that 2nd set lasted for over 600 shots at 640x480 with no flash, just set the camera in AUTO mode and just took photos off everything in the house and on the TV. The 1st (bad) set of batteries seems to be getting more juiced up with each recharge, I was able to get another 120 shots before my finger gave out, which was better than its previous output/effort.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Is it possible my "bum" set of batteries just needed to be totally drained and then recharged? I'm now over 300 shots on the "bum" batteries and will keep going until the set of batteries die on me. I've heard that some people of create some impact on the batteries to get their cell in a prime charge-up state.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

> Is it possible my "bum" set of batteries just needed to be totally drained and then recharged?

That often helps revive worn-out rechargeables. Maybe they had a partial charge when you got them -- even if you charged them fully yourself, that could cause them to only partially charge.

 

[BobV]

Best, longest lasting,rechargeable batteries I've ever used...

Rayovac I-C3. Awesome.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Hmm... it seems I may have under-reported how many shots I got with one set of batteries (no flash, 640x480 resolution), I finally downloaded all the photos that filled up my 256MB CF card (over 2200 photos, took a few at the max resolution, which ate up some disk space), and I wound up taking over 900 photos on one set of batteries.

Now with the 1st set of batteries, I've taken at least 600 photos with them. So perhaps it was just a matter of draining the batteries for proper use.

Once I'm done with that 1st set of batteries, I'll see how many flash photos I can take before they run out of juice.

Next up, I'll post some photos showing off the power of the 10x Zoom.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Just having fun with the 10X zoom lens in daylight:

The Stop Sign

1X (122 kb)
5X (146 kb)
10X (124 kb)


The Van

1X (130 kb)
5X (144 kb)
10X (116 kb)

Side profile

1X (97 kb)
10X (114 kb)

The cat

Pooh (91 kb)

TV screenshots (shows in SD or HD from my Samsung SIR-T165 on my RPTV HDTV - used no flash, AUTO, indoors)

Buffy (77 kb)
Willow and Xander (99 kb)
Faith (76 kb)
Fred (64 kb)

Shannon Miller (100 kb)

David Schwimmer (76 kb)
Christopher Walken (90 kb)
Brendan Fraser (91 kb)

Beauty (78 kb)
Beast (84 kb)

She Spies:

Shane (84 kb)
Cassie (93 kb)
D.D. (90 kb)
All (86 kb)

 

[Patrick Sun]

If you're shooting in Auto mode (and low light conditions), can you still lock focus, or are you reliant on the auto-focus? The reason I ask is that it's been hit-or-miss for the AF to focus on a distant object correctly, when it's miss, it's a nice blurry shot, when it's hit, it's nice and crisp.

With decent office lighting (flourescent lights), the AF works pretty well.

The 32X mode isn't all that bad either (of course, digital zooming isn't great, but if you need a tighter shot from far away, it's a nice option to have.

 

[Patrick Sun]

I got roughly 450 shots on a set of batteries with the Flash on auto mode. These are the same cheapo Microcenter AA 2000 maH NiMH rechargeables.

The shots with auto-flash can come out a little to bright/washed out. Going with manual mode, using the lowest flash setting gives dim photos, the middle flash setting is okay, but sometimes too bright (depends on how far away the subject is from the camera).

Keeping your hands still at 32X (digitally zoomed) is durn tough.

I need to figure out how I accidentally got into burst mode shooting (took 3 shoots in rapid fire succession).

 

[TimDoss]

When I was using my camera all day, I set the the shortcut
button to turn off the display, seems like that helped out battery life
a lot, without having to keep turning the camera on and off each time I wanted to take a shot.

"I need to figure out how I accidentally got into burst mode"
The bracketing feature is in the function menu.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Oh yes, I wasn't using the LCD much, but rather the EVF during my battery life testing. I figure I'd only use the LCD for special situations.

 

[TimDoss]

It will actually turn off the EVF as well, and it will turn back on when any button is used.

 

[Andrew Pratt]

I never use anything higher then the 10X optical zoom as I find the digital modes don't look that good.

Anyway did you know there's a firmware available for this camaera now? its available here

There's also some very good accessories for the S1 here. The metal lens conversion kit looks like it could be a good addition