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Wonderful compact camera with hd video,
I’m a DSLR photographer who shoots professionally and has managed a camera store in the past. I wanted something I can take with me everywhere but still produces good quality shots. I also wanted a camera that could shoot good looking videos. I researched several models and after much deliberation decided on the Canon 300 HS. I’m very happy I did.
Image Quality:
I tested cameras and lenses all the time while managing the camera store so whenever I purchase a new camera or lens I always test it. The Canon 300 HS doesn’t produce the quality of images my Nikon D7000 does but I didn’t expect it to. The edges get a little soft with the 300 HS when looking at the image at 100% whereas the D7000 images are almost tact sharp.
Comparing the 300 HS to the Canon Powershot SD1000 from a few years ago, the 300 HS blows it out of the water. The SD1000 is a 7 MP camera. Shooting the same shots on a tripod with the same focal length on the lens the 300 HS uses its extra MPs well. When looking at the images from each camera at 100%, at the wide angle zoom setting and normal zoom setting both cameras have about the same relative slight softness on the edges. However the 300 HS has more MP so it actually produces much more detail in the image. I think it was smart for Canon to keep the MP at 12 because last years models while being 14 MP (SD1400) didn’t give any extra detail from what I could tell than the 12 MP version (SD1300). The SD1400 was basically just creating larger files. When zooming in the telephoto setting the 300 HS clearly produced a sharper image than the SD1000. Often cameras have sweet spots in the zoom range in which it will produce crisper images. The 300 HS has consistently good sharpness throughout it’s zoom range.
HS system and ISO:
The image processing with the HS system truly works to reduce noise at higher ISOs enabling people to produce better quality images in low light. The improvement in image quality gets more and more visible the greater and greater the ISO. ISO 400 with the 300 HS was almost as good as ISO 200 on the SD1000. ISO 800 on the 300 HS was a tad better than ISO 400 on the SD1000. ISO 1600 on the 300 HS was between ISO 400 and 800 on the SD1000. ISO 3200 on the 300 HS produced the same quality of image (noise) as ISO 800 on the SD1000. A 2 stop in film speed improvement is big.
1080p video and slow motion:
With good light, the 300 HS produces wonderful smooth 1080 videos. If you look at a lot of HD videos from compact cameras the video often looks jumpy. From what I’ve seen it wasn’t until you got to the Canon G12 or Panasonic LX5 that the video looked smooth. Both of those cameras only shoot 720p whereas this camera shoots 1080p. The video also very good detail. It truly looks HD.
If you are wanting zoom and continuous AF with your video this camera is the one you want compared to the 100 HS which doesn’t allow you to zoom. The continuous AF with face recognition is stellar with this camera in video mode. I was videoing my wife while she was driving. It focused on her face. I switched to the scenery outside. It immediately focused on that. I then went back to my wife and it found her face and focused on it right away. I even videoed her reflection in the rear view mirror and it found her face in the mirror no problem and focused on it. AMAZING!!!!
Commenting on a complaint I’ve read about the zoom being slow in video mode. If you like getting motion sickness whenever someone rapidly zooms in or out during their video this is not your camera. As smooth looking as the video is, the zoom is also. The smooth zoom creates nice looking transitions instead of warp speed ahead looks.
The slow motion is a fun feature that works well. You need to have good lighting though. In low light even with high ISO’s it produced very dark videos. In a review someone commented that it should have sound with the slow motion video. I honestly don’t know how that could work unless you want to listen to everything at 1/5 it’s normal speed. I think it’s a good thing that it doesn’t have sound with the slow motion videos.
AF:
I commented on AF partially in the video portion of the review. It does have several AF modes for various situations. The face detection works great. If you have a person in the picture but want something other than the person to be in focus you will need to change AF modes from face detection. The reviewer that had the problem with the 300 HS focusing on things he didn’t want the camera to focus on likely didn’t have the correct AF mode for the shooting situations. The 300 HS does have a center AF if you prefer that.
Areas for Canon to improve on with the 300 HS:
The camera is so well thought out that I’m surprised Canon let this slip. I love having a wide angle zoom go down to 24mm. It’s great for scenery and photojournalist type…
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|Awesome Point and Shoot,
This is a point and shoot class camera, if you understand that going in, you are going to be more than impressed with it. I’m going from an SD630 and hands down, this beats it. I even had an SX210IS and these images are on par with it, if not better. I had to return my SX210IS as it had issues with dust on the image sensor and I’ve been waiting for a new P&S class to come out. I bit the bullet on this, well, the black version Canon PowerShot ELPH 300 HS 12 MP CMOS Digital Camera with Full 1080p HD Video (Black) and what can I say – I am happy!
300HS vs 500HS:
There is a 500HS version of the camera, which is approx $50 more. To this point, the only differences I can tell are the LCD on the back as well as aperture priority and shutter priority, while the 300hs does not. The touch screen on the 500hs can also be used to focus on a particular subject. The 500hs also has a wider aperture at 2.0, the 300hs has 2.7.
Form Factor/Display:
Small. Awesome. There is a texture on the camera, I really like this as it seems like it will help if you hands are wet (sweat, snow, etc). Easy to operate one hand and if using both hands, flash isn’t in a horrible place. Display is very bright and button seem intuitive as with other Canon cameras. Battery and SD are on the bottom door, USB and HDMI are in a covered side port. Comes with a wrist strap if you desire a little extra security.
Boot Time/Software:
Camera is ready to take photos very fast. From the time you press the button, it’s pretty much set to catch the action. Time between photos wasn’t terrible (about 1.5 seconds) and if you need it, there is continuous shot mode. Had no problem with the Canon software on Windows 7. I’ve used the Canon Photo Window import for a while, does a good job of getting photos off the camera without duplicates. I use Picasa to then manage my photo library (I skip the Zoom Browser, but it’s really not bad if you want to use it, I’m just a slave to Google/gmail)
Computer Connectivity:
I didn’t find this anywhere in the specs, so if you’re looking, the camera uses mini-USB, similar to all Canon’s that have come out over the last few years.
Optical Zoom:
You’re going to be impressed with the form factor of this camera and it’s 5x OPTICAL zoom. I immediately disabled digital zoom as 12.1MP + 5x Optical will get you very close to the action. You’re better off digitally enhancing the photos later on.
Battery + Memory Card:
This uses the NBL-4 (again, I found confusion on this and accessories) – so if you have some of those laying around keep them as they’ll work just fine in this camera. This is nice as my SD630 uses the NBL-4 so now I have 2 chargers + 3 batteries. It took my 32GB SDHC without any issues and holds thousands of images. Images have tended to be between 2 and 3mb on the highest settings.
Image Quality:
Look, I’m no photo fanatic, I don’t expect the people buying this camera are. I am looking for solid images and this camera delivers. There are a ton a feature you can delve into and I’m sure they are good. It has manual mode, so if you fancy that, you can go down that path. But I’m the type of person that knows when something looks good, OK or great. This camera consistently delivers GREAT photos. I’m happy with the low light and images aren’t blurry or grainy (within reasonable expectations).
Video:
FINALLY! Optical zoom on a Canon during video! 1080p brings this camera up to par with others in its class and it does a decent job. I didn’t notice any major noise when zooming in and out while recording video. I know this is the excuse Canon has used in the past as to why they never had this feature. It shoots nice clips for those quick moments. This will NOT replace a true DV cam, but hey, for a few minute clips here and there, you will simply not be dissapointed.
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|The best pocket-sized Canon yet,
BOTTOM LINE:
With each generation, Canon makes the ELPH series easier to use and still get great results. Like it’s predecessors, this one fits easily into your pocket (or the case I recommend toward the end of this review). That point alone may make this the best camera you own; having a $5k DSLR doesn’t do you much good if you left it home because it wasn’t worth the effort to lug it along.
However, unlike many other small cameras, this one does not sacrifice either features or quality. Well, it does give up on any reasonable manual control, things like setting shutter speed, lens aperture, ISO. What access you do have to that level of control is buried deep inside menus. It took Canon a while to realize that for most of us, if we wanted to fool with that kind of thing on a regular basis, we would be using a different camera. This camera is designed to leverage convenience over extreme control or nth degree quality.
DETAILS:
It is a small camera and carries with it the baggage that comes with the convenience of having to carry so little baggage. (sorry, couldn’t resist) None of the issues raised, given that they comes as part of the convenience trade-off made me consider anything other than the 5-star rating this camera deserves.
One issue with all small cameras is the built-in flash. They are all underpowered and create red eye. Both problems are caused by the need to keep the camera small; the flash needs to be small and positioned close to the lens. Canon addresses it by putting in some really good noise reduction so you (actually the camera) can shoot at a relatively high ISO in low light allowing for a faster shutter speed. The result is an image that is both low noise and not blurry. And the best part is the camera takes care of all that so you don’t have to. As a result you can take pictures in a well lit room without having to use the flash at all.
– The shutter response, as with any small digital camera for less that $500, is a bit slow for effectively capturing children and pets. The trick for doing that is to either have a great sense of timing and a shutter that reacts instantly or a reasonably fast ( > 4x / sec ) burst mode. This camera has neither.
Some other suggestions that apply:
Normally at this point I would put in some details about manually setting ISO or selecting a color space. However, for this camera it just isn’t relevant. You are buying this camera because you want to take great pictures without having to worry about that stuff. If you do want to “take your photography to the next level then a great resource is the Confessions of a Compact Camera Shooter: Get Professional Quality Photos with Your Compact Camera.
Finally, I’ve found the Caselogic QPB-1 Compact Digital Camera Case (Black/Gray) is just the right size for this camera. It’s semi-rigid so you get a fair amount of protection but doesn’t add a lot of bulk. It’s made even better by using one of these, Nite Ize SB1-2PK-01 Size-1 S-Biner, Black, 2-Pack, to secure it to a belt loop.
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|Canon ELPH 100 HS — U R going to luv it,
Just received my Canon ELPH 100 HS {orange} and I absolutely love it. The camera boots up almost instantly. Installed a 16GB SDHC class 10 card and now have 5000+ 12MB photo capacity or 60 minutes for HD video. The image stabilization at max digital zoom 4X4/16x works great! The camera easily fits in my pocket and is very light @ ~5 ounces.
The Canon’s Digic 4 processor & CMOS sensor make this camera truly point and shoot. By default it automatically selects the light level, shaking, target focus, shutter speed, flash/noflash and ISO to pick the optimal scene type. Perfect pictures virtually every time when button is correctly pressed 1/2 way (1) before fully in (2) for photo shot. But be sure to get a class 10 card for the best video.
The only 2 minor problems I believe are:
1) It comes with a 700 mAh 3.7 Volt battery instead of the 1400 mAh 3.7 OEM version which doubles it run-time for 230 photos to almost 500 pictures per charge. This is easily fixed when ordering additional batteries just get the larger mAh capacity ones.
2) The CameraWindow transfer software doesn’t automatically delete pictures after they are transferred. Some people like this as not to delete photos improperly transferred.(I do not). Some camera blogs suggest a quick format after transfer is the way to quickly delete photos/video after successful transfer.
However, this is the best point and shoot camera I have used and I still think it’s a 5 star camera @ $199 MSRP.
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|Good but no Video zoom – Get the 300 HS,
The product description for the Canon 100 HS and the 300 HS are very similar and it appears to be mostly just the wide angle and zoom. I compared the two cameras in the store and preferred the look and feel of the grey 100 HS. Only when I was testing the camera did I realize that the 100 HS does not allow you to zoom while shooting video. Another missing feature of the 100 HS is the smart auto scene detection is not active when shooting video. If you don’t care about video, save $50 on the 100 HS otherwise get the 300 HS. I exchanged mine and love the 300 HS.
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