| A | is outstanding and exceptional, rated in the top 10% of digital cameras. |
| B | means they are good, with some standout features. |
| C | means they are mediocre, and probably more trouble than they are worth. |
| D & F | mean they are absolutely awful or old. Avoid at all costs. |
- 4 out of 5
- 4 out of 5
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- 26th of 92 in Point and Shoot
- 10th of 52 in 7 Megapixel
- 54th of 82 in Canon
- 38th of 87 in $350 - $600
- 32nd of 71 in Over $600
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| 47digital | $599.00 |
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- 4 out of 5
Good camera for pro-wannabe's but poor flash.
(donO - 10/30/06)Hi, I bought the A710 IS 10 days ago and I'm mixed up in my opinion about it. On one hand it can do all the smart things and manual settings, that even would please a professional, on the other hand as a point and shoot camera it fails espacially in low light conditions where wide angle 35 mm and flash is used. The flash is very poor in wide angle situations, as the light is not spread to the whole area. You can see what I mean here: http://www.trustedreviews.com/article.aspx?page=8417&head=0
It seems however that canon wanted to make it possible to change almost every possible settings in this camera, so they even added the possibility to change the flash strength, and this would have been very good if the flash just didn't suffer this major spreading problem. Having said that, it is possible to make very good indoor pictures with or without the flash, if you use the manual settings and compensates for this fault i.e. by zooming in to the illuminated area, put down the flash strenght, and compensate for the low light by using, ISO, Aperture, Shutter speed, OIS settings.
It's very easy to change settings on the A710 and this is really positive. There are a lot of build in programs, and some of them are set quickly by turning the mode-selector wheel. I can really recoomend using some of these modes espacially aperture-priority. Some times it is better that you and not the camera's Auto-setting decides if there is enough light or not, and by adjusting aperture and ISO, the Camera will decide which fastest shutterspeed could be used with these settings.
About the batteries:
The supplied Business Alkalines did pretty well, but my used 1600 mAH AA NiMH batteries did very very poor, so I bought som new 2500mAH NiMH batteries, and they perform better - however not as good as Canon promise.
About the movie-Zoom.
It does not have optical movie zoom, but the digital movie zoom seems to be quite usefull, as long as you dont go all the way.
My conclusion:
If you want a point and shoot camera, stay away from Canon A710, as it's not good in Auto mode. But if you want to buy a low price camera, with all possible manual adjustments, and excellent features and specifications, this might be the one for you as you can "learn" how to act as an professional photographer on this camera. So for you low budget pro-wannabe's - go get it.
pros:
- All manual adjustments possible: Aperture, Shutterspeed, ISO, Manual Focus, White Balance, Flash Strength, metering (semi manual)
- Some very useful program-modes (but not the full auto program)
- 6 x zoom
- Optical Stabilizer (very useful)
- Good image quality
- Possible to take useful indoor pictures without flash
- pretty good movie mode
- Easy to use interface, even on manual settings
Cons:
- Poor flash light spreading (worst in 35 mm mode)
- Poor flash light recycle time (because of the batteries)
- The Full Auto program not reallly good
- Battery life not impressing
- only 10 secs Audio note taker (to attach to pictures)
