No Fluff or Mumbo Jumbo - "Just The Basics" on Digital Cameras

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Short Review

Canon PowerShot A300

Introduction

It wasn't long ago at all that a 3 megapixel camera would cost you well over $500.00.  Today you can pick them up for less, but Canon has decided to drop it even further by introducing the PowerShot A300 for UNDER $200.00 (U.S.).  Surely you give up a lot at this price, right?  Let's find out.  

For your money (around $198.00), you get of course the camera, USB cable for image transfer, a pair of batteries, memory card, setup cards and manual, and two software disks - one being the driver and programs for creating panoramic photos and storing photos, and the other being "Arcsoft Photoimpression & Videoimpression".

The A300 is a fairly small digital camera, measuring about 4 1/4 inches wide, by close to 2 1/2 inches tall, and just shy of 1 1/2 inches thick.  Not quick a "pocket" camera unless you have larger pants pockets, but still not bulky by any means.  The camera has the appearance of being made of metal, but once you pick it up you'll quickly discover that it's made of plastic, and in my opinion, a somewhat cheap grade of plastic as well.  I wondered at first if I was holding a toy camera as it really does feel like one before the batteries are inserted to add weight.  The front of the camera features a plastic sliding lens cover that also acts as the power switch.  Slide it open, and the camera powers up; close it, and the camera powers down.  Easy enough.  There is also an "on" button on the back of the camera, which is used to turn the camera on to review photos you've taken - sliding the lens cover open only puts you in "record" mode so you can take still shots or movie clips.  

Above the lens (non-zoom by the way), is a slightly larger than average optical viewfinder, and the built-in flash.  The A303 includes a 5.2X digital zoom, but as most sites on digicams tell you, digital zooms greatly degrade image quality in most cases.  Below is a sample taken with the A300.  The left shows a full sized crop of a car and tree with no digital zoom applied.  The middle section is at 3X digital zoom, and the last is at 5.2X.  You can see the image degradation the more you use the digital zoom feature...

The camera is powered by 2 AA sized batteries, which share the same compartment as the Compact Flash memory card (a 16 meg card is included).  This is accessed by a panel on the right side of the camera, and is opened by pushing and sliding out - it sounds easy, but I found the door to be hard to open, and made from such a cheap plastic I was almost afraid of breaking it.  The camera comes with a pair of alkaline batteries which only lasted for about 24 shots before dying, but as always, I recommend you use NiMh rechargeable batteries, which will give you better run times and can be reused hundreds of times.

The top of the A300 features three things.  First, is the microphone which allows sound to be captured with the movie clips.  Too bad it's situated right in the top corner where you want to place your left hand when holding it.  Care must be taken, or you cover the microphone (there wasn't enough room in front of the camera for this?).  A switch allows you to go from still capture mode to movie mode, and the shutter button completes the top controls.  You'll likely notice a strange "Boing" noise if you tap the shutter - which I believe is a spring underneath it.   Yikes.  The back of the camera features a fairly clear 1 1/2 inch LCD screen, navigation button, a swich that controls the digital zoom feature, and buttons for the menu and mode functions, display, and the speaker.  Looks great, really; I must repeat my disappointment again however, of the cheap feel of the A300.  It may not do so well if dropped, so care should be taken by using the included wrist strap at all times while carrying the camera.

Features / Image Quality

After being so disappointed with the build quality of the A300, I really wasn't expecting much else from the camera.  I was rewarded, however.  The A300 has features not normally seen on cameras of this price level at all.  One, is the inclusion of an "auto focus assist light", which is an orange lamp that illuminates a dark area so the auto focus can get a fix in dark conditions; this is something that is missing in many digital cameras even today, so I applaud Canon for including it in a camera of this price point.  Unfortunately, it's very weak, and I found that it was only 100% effective at around 3 feet from the subject, and nearly always noneffective further than that in a dark room.  In other words, it's better than not having one, but not by much in the case of this model.  Auto focus works pretty well in good light, picking one or two of several spots where it detects the best contrast, showing you a green box (or two) on the LCD showing you where in the photo it is focusing on, before you complete the snapshot process.

The cookie jar here is in a darker room and turns out fine, but the auto focus assist light did not "find" it until I got as close as three feet from the white, reflective jar.  With darker objects the assist light was not bright enough to allow the auto focus to see them at all, until I turned up the lights in the room.

Still image quality surprised me.  With a few negatives plaguing the camera so far, I wasn't expecting much, but the images are actually very good.  Sharpness is good, colors are fine, and exposure was for the most part, correct on most shots.  Bright sun on grass and trees tended to give images a slight yellow-green cast to them, but this is easy corrected in any image correction software, including that which comes with the camera.  I noticed a small amount of blurring in the four corners of some shots, and around the edges, but nothing severe.  Prints up to 5 x 7 inches looked very good, but once I cranked it up to 8 x 10 some limitations of the lens could be seen; still "ok", but they're not going to fool you for film, so it's best to stick to 5 x 7 or lower.  Image size choices include 2048 x 1536 pixels (top), as well as 1600 x 1200, 1024 x 768, and 640 x 480, with three quality setting of normal, fine, and superfine.  The camera offers advanced controls as well, and too many to go into here being a "short review" after all.  You can however, adjust the way the camera focuses, change the white balance for tricky lighting situations, use "macro" mode for close up shots, and even record short sound clips to still images.  Want to take a black and white or old time looking "sepia" toned photo?  You can do that, too.  I do however, have to take a point off for the fact that "barrel distortion" is pretty severe on this camera.  On a shot like the sample below, you won't notice it much or at all, but on shots where verticle lines are close to the edges of your frame, you will see a pretty noticeable "bow" on them.  It can be fixed in most image editors, but not quite a novice exercise to do so.

This cropped section of my yard is slightly compressed for quicker browser loading, but it still shows the amount of detail captured by the A300, which is good.  A yellow-green tint can sometimes show if large areas of grass are hit by direct sun, but it's easily corrected.

Also new in this camera is a 640 x 480 pixel movie clip capture mode with sound, something found in only a handful of more expensive cameras as of this writing (April 2003).  Most cameras capture video clips at 320 x 240 pixels in size, which are large enough to make out the subject matter, but not very good in quality.  This new 640 x 480 movie mode isn't the same quality of a real camcorder, but it's a huge improvement over old systems.  Sound (when your finger isn't covering the again ill-placed microphone on top) is captured in mono, and the video is clear so long as you do not pan or move about much.  If you do, it gets a bit jerky.  You can also pick a standard 320 x 240 movie or small 160 pixel size, too.  Keep in mind that the full 640 sized movie take A LOT of memory space. You're only going to be able to record a few seconds of large video on the included 16 meg memory card, and even a 64 meg card won't hold much.  If you're planning on using the video feature much I'd strongly suggest buying a 128 or even 256 meg memory card.   An applause to Canon for including this feature.  It's considered gimmicky by some, but it's fun, and if you don't have your camcorder with you, it's better than no video, right?

Summary and Opinion

This review was HARD, as there are a number of things like about the A300 such as it's good image quality and nice video clip feature.  There are some serious things to not like as well, such as the overall build quality, placement of the microphone, and a very flimsy and hard to open battery compartment.

Overall I would recommend the A300, with some reservations.  If you can live without an optical zoom, and can find a store that offers inexpensive extended warranties, I'd say you'll be fine with the A300 as a casual use or "second" camera.  If you can find it on sale then even better.  I can see this as being a nice casual camera to take around town, to family gatherings, or for use with Ebayers for product photos.  Keep in mind however, that for only $50 more you can purchase the Canon A60, which offers a better build quality and has a 3X optical zoom, though you will lose 1 megapixel in resolution as it is only a 2 megapixel camera compared with the A300's 3 megapixel image size.  The A60 also does not have the 640x480 movie mode, but for around $299 you can purchase the A70, which has the 3X optical zoom, 640x480 movie mode with sound, and 3 megapixel image size.

My "Grades" For The A300?

For overall image quality    -    7

( Would be an "8" but loses a point for barrel distortion problems )

For movie clip quality (compared to other digital cameras)    -   9

For build quality/design    -    5

( Averaged-out value?  =  7 )

For an excellent second review of this camera, go to Steves Digicams by clicking HERE.

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