Great high quality photographs (Canon Digital Ixus 980 IS)

Member Name: smc1985

Product:	Canon Digital Ixus 980 IS
Date:	04/01/09 (152 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: 14.7 Megapixels, Small Camera

Disadvantages: View finder, processing time

I purchased this Camera in black last week and I love it.
The Canon IXUS 980 has 14.7 megapixels, a 3.7 optical zoom lens and a view finder. What I personally love about this camera is that it is a very professional camera and takes good high quality shots while still being easy to use.

I would defiantly say it is a camera that is more attractive to somebody who is willing to pay more for a better quality. I paid £230 for the Camera. So this is pricey for a digital camera but definitely worth it.

Here are the manufactures specifications taken from the website

Type of Camera - Compact digital
Still camera with built-in flash,
3.7x Optical/4x Digital/15x
Combined Zoom with Optical Image Stabilizer System
Image Capture Device
Type14.7 Megapixel,
1/1.7 inch type Charge Coupled Device (CCD)
Total PixelsApprox. 15.0 Megapixels
Effective Pixels Approx. 14.7 Megapixels Lens
Focal Length7.7-28.5mm f/2.8-5.8 (35mm film equivalent: 36-133mm)
Digital Zoom4xFocusing
Range Normal: 1.6 ft./50cm-infinity Macro: 2.0 in.-1.6 ft./5-50cm (W), 1.3-1.6 ft./40-50cm (T)
Digital Macro: 2.0 in. - 1.6 ft./5-50cm (W)
Autofocus SystemTTL Autofocus

As you can see the specifications are impressive but does this camera does as it says on the tin.

The Camera is smooth and the curves make the camera appear stylish and sleek. There is a view finder which I think is a great item which many new camera's do not seem to have. The view finder however is actually very small and I prefer to use the digital image on the screen. The camera comes in black or silver. It is 96.7 x 62.2 x 27.9mm and weighs 160g. It takes lithium ion (NB-5L) but the battery and charger are included in the box. I love not having to buy batteries.

14.7 megapixel camera is impressive. High quality photographs are what you will get. You can also change the quality photograph you want if for instance you have a smaller memory card. However I suggest buying an 8GB or 16GB memory card. The high quality images gives you scope to crop down the image while still retaining the quality. Canon supplies a 32mb memory card. But on the 14.7mp quality I only managed to take 7 photographs until that was full.

The time can be annoying. As the quality of photograph is so high, it can take the camera longer than usual to process it. This can be annoying if you want to take snap after snap.

The Camera is very easy to use with lots of extra options.
I have not yet taken any blury shots. The image stabilisor seems to sort that out.
You can change the settings if you want to take outdoors, beach, indoor, landscape etc shots.

Another thing worth mentioning is the video quality. I was very impressed. Even at night time when there is not much light, the quality is superb.

My conclusion is - I love the picture quality and this is what I look for when choosing a camera. It is the smallest camera I could find with such high quality photographs. If money is not important to you then this is worth it. But I would say if you are not willing to pay this, there are cheaper cameras around that do a good job also.

Summary: Definatley worth paying extra

Processing/Quality:
Reliability:
Ease of use:
Features:
Picture quality: