Canon PowerShot S5 IS

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Features
The S5 IS has upgraded from being a 6- to an 8-megapixel camera, so now it offers up to a maximum resolution of 3,264 x 2,448 pixels. Compared with the S3 IS, it has also upgraded to the DIGIC III imaging chip. It also incorporates Multi-Face Detection technology which detects up to nine faces.



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During operation, the face detection mode was easy to activate. Pressing the set button allowed us to switch quickly between Face detection mode and Center focus mode. The rest was done automatically for us. In our tests, it detected faces accurately most of the time.

Another feature of the camera is the improved shutter drive mechanism. Purportedly, it now achieves shutter speeds ranging from 15 secs to 1/3,200 sec. In practice, we are not sure exactly how useful that is; we got a lot of blurry pictures, although granted we were shooting from a moving vehicle. In operation, we did not see any significant speed improvement between the S2 IS and the S5 IS.

The S5 IS handles almost identically to its predecessors, with the same menus and interface. One con, though, is that you will need the S5 IS's packaged software to download your photos. Just plugging the memory card into a PC won't get your pictures downloaded, which can be a hassle especially if you're traveling.

If you've owned a previous version of the camera, you should also note that your old software will not work with this camera even though it is similar to previous models; you will need to install the accompanying software if you want to download pictures from your S5 IS.

Video recording has improved significantly since the S3 IS. Instead of the original 1GB file size, it now allows you to record up to 4GB, although the length is still set at 60 mins. As in previous versions, it features the "Photo in Movie" function, meaning you can snap a photo while you're recording a video halfway. This sounds great until when you take a picture and find your recorded video will have a similar pause before continuing.

The S5 IS now features 22 shooting modes including nine special scenes (pre-programmed settings). The previous S3 IS had 20 shooting modes and eight special scenes.

The S5 IS also offers a "My Category" function which allows you to tag your images and movies under specific categories for easier viewing, searching and editing. If you're the kind who likes to view your pictures from the camera's LCD, this can be a useful function, but we'd guess most people will just download it onto their PC before sorting the pictures.

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