Canon PowerShot SX50 HS: Not your average compact
By Ben Boswell - Tuesday, January 15, 2013 Camera Review| Introduction | Measurement | Comparisons | Conclusion |
Looking at the specifications for Canon’s new PowerShot SX50 HS may leave you thinking that you have opened the pages of some futuristic fantasy: a compact camera with a zoom lens that covers a range equivalent to 24mm up to 1200mm with a digital zoom doubling this figure! Well specifications don’t take pictures; photographers do, if they have the right camera. Is this the right camera?
The Canon PowerShot SX50 HS is a compact camera with a 12.1 Megapixel BSI CMOS 1/2.3" sensor (6.17x4.55 mm), data is handled by Canon’s DIGIC 5 processor. The most striking feature is the lens: 4.3mm to 215mm zoom, that’s 50x. With a focal length multiplier of 5.64x that gives a 35mm equivalent of just a little over 24mm to 1200mm with a maximum aperture of f3.4 to f6.5. To make this immensely long lens viable Canon has included its Intelligent IS image stabilization rated by them at 4.5 stops, meaning that theoretically you could shoot at 1/30 and get the result of shooting at 1/750. With full HD video and a range of other enhancements: Zoom framing Assist, Smart Auto, Multi-area White Balance and High-speed Burst HQ, plus manual over-rides for pretty much everything and RAW capture too. The decider though is the price tag, which is well below others, like the Panasonic DMC-FZ150, so you can see that this is a camera that should at least make people look a little closer.
Measurement
Comparisons
Conclusion
Comments
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Added by HNEPLEX |
January 17
Great sensor but the max. aperture of the lens...
This would be a fantastic bridge camera if the optics were faster. Max. aperture "only" f/3.4 @24mm - f/6.5 @1200mm.
Assuming the max. aperture grows linearly when zooming in, you get f/5 @600mm. Panasonic FZ200 has f/2.8 @ 600mm! This means 2 2/3 EV advantage, in other words shooting FZ200 @600mm f/2.8 & ISO400 would mean @600mm SX50 f/5 & around ISO 1300! That high ISO will destroy the image badly. Of course, you cannot enjoy the long end of the zoom 600mm - 1200mm with FZ200... Reply | Read all replies for this comment |
First replies for this comment
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Added by Mikedie |
January 22
Re: Great sensor but the max. aperture of the lens...
Well, the f2.8 of the FZ200 sounds better than it is in reality.
Compare to the SX50, the noise performence of the FZ200 is much worse. For example, when you zoom to 600mm with the FZ200 in F2.8 iso100 and you have.. lets say a shutterspeed of 1/120s ... you just can put the SX50 in ISO400 easily and still have the same noise performence as the FZ200. The very good noise performence of the SX50 compare to the FZ200 is kind of an equalizer to the constant aperture of the FZ200. The SX50 delivers a better imagequality in general. i would say the best of all bridge/megazooms so far. in addition.. iso1600 is still very good usable on the SX50(especially in raw).. on the FZ200 its total crap. Reply |
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Added by fashaoding |
January 17
well done!
great performance for a small cmos!
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