Nice snapper for nice money (Canon Powershot A590 IS)

Member Name: davomrmac

Product:	Canon Powershot A590 IS
Date:	20/10/08 (117 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good lens, good quality images

Disadvantages: Poor screen

The Canon A590 is part of the company's Powershot range, which I have always found to be very good. Costing around £120 it is quite affordable and offers some great features.

The sensor captures 8.0 Megapixels which is enough for printing up to about A3 in size. Of course most of us print 8x10 maximum, myself included, so this camera is perfectly fine for everyday use. The 4x zoom with optical Image Stabilizer is superb. OK, so the zoom does not get you in very close, but it is a good lens, nice and clear and seems pretty quick to me. The Motion Detection Technology built in also seems pretty neat. It tries to evaluate the picture you are taken and eliminate any motion so you avoid blurred pictures.

It also has Face Detection Technology, this has been talked about a lot in the latest cameras. What is does is detect faces in the scene, and sets the exposure, focus, white balance and flash, so that you get really nice faces. Red-Eye Correction is expected on most cameras, and stops those annoying red eyes in your photos. The A590 has only not worked on this once, where I had a person with one normal eye and one red, weird. All the other times I have used it, this has never happened.

There is a 2.5" LCD on the back of the camera. The screen is nice in colour, but is quite a low resolution, so you can see the dots. The optical viewfinder (OVF) is what I use most of the time anyway, especially in bright sun, so this doesn't bother me. Shame though, the screen does let the camera down a little.

It can also capture movies at 640x480 resolution. Only 20 frames per second though, so not the best quality, but OK for YouTube. There is no awkward charging either, as it runs off standard AA batteries. I have some good 2700 mAh rechargeable NiMh batteries and off a full charge I managed around 310 photos. That is pretty darn good.

Size is OK, a large pocket will accommodate it. The 175g weight is a little heavy, but again OK. I like to take this camera everywhere for those opportune moments. It is a little old now, but will last me another year before I swap it in for a newer model.

Summary: I like to take this camera everywhere for those opportune moments

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