CANON POWERSHOT G5 REVIEW

First of all, I've always had pretty small cameras, and the G5 is a lot bigger than anything else I'd ever had. I do a LOT of travelling, and have always been able to pop a camera in my pocket, even the F300. No way with the G5 - you need to use the neck strap or a carry bag.

Good things about the G5: it has virtually all the features of the SLR (but no easy lens changes) at a price significantly lower than an EOS or other dSLR. The front dial allows easy & fast changes to things such as aperture & shutter speeds, and the LCD screen provides all the info you need. The selector dial allows you to quickly change to av/tv modes and manual, and there's a built-in ND filter too. Picture quality is excellent, much better than the Minolta F300 I had (much too much noise in the F300), and slightly better than the Yashica S4L I had (great picture quality in a tiny body, very nice camera!). Battery life is excellent. Optional adapters for 52 & 58mm filters & lenses available (see lensmate). Good solid body. Fantastic night shots!

Bad things: Lens barrel obscures the viewfinder considerably, and also blocks out the bottom right corner in quite a few situations when using the flash. Can be overcome by use of external flash, but most of the time I don't carry that with me. Viewfinder is not particularly representative of the actual capture area. Bulky size & heavy. Overexposed for indoor flash shots, but can be reduced in-camera. Lens cap is absolute rubbish - I'm getting a 52mm lens adapter, UV filter and standard snap cap to solve this problem.

Overall; I find this to be an excellent camera, but I wouldn't recommend it if you just want a "point & shoot" digital - go for something small that will do the job, like an optio, exilim etc. This G5 will give great results for the "prosumer" - clear, sharp images - providing you don't rely heavily on the built-in flash.