Customer Reviews:
Pro1 not so pro.......2005-11-24
I bought a Canon powershot pro1 in January 05 from amazon and have taken about a thousand excellent quality pictures. I bought it because I wanted a professional camera that was small enough to carry around without taking up too much space. Fot that its brilliant. Now for the bad part. Recently the camera's battery started to loose its charge very quickly and then the view finder and screen stopped woking but it would still take pictures. I sent it back to Canon's authorised repairers but it was returned marked "uneconomical repair - warranty invalid due to corrosion" - it did not say which part of the camera had corroded. The camera was never mis treated. When not in use it was stored either in or out of its case in the house. It has only been used in what I would consider as normal conditions including on occasions, light rain but wiped dry immediately afterwards. Is this normal use? I would have expected a device designed for outdoor use to have resistance to moderate elements. Anyway It looks like £480 down the swanny. On a customer service note - Canon use a call center to handle its customer enquiries who respond with " We are just a call center you have to log a complaint" - it took ages to get through to them. Canon also use independent camera dealers to make repairs so in the end you are dealing with three separate groups of people. Hope this helps.
Best camera upgrade........2005-10-05
I have always used a pentax slr. It was only recently that i decided to upgrade to a digital camera, i was first unsure of what to buy as there were so many camera's on offer. I have always known that canon is definatly one of the best makes. so i brought it. i was and still am shocked with joy but this beautiful peice of electronics. it is so easy to use, the quality is always very good. and it comes wiht everything you need. i am so happy with it, and recommend this to all photographers.
Proshot 1 - an upgrade from SLR.......2005-07-18
Having used a Pentax SLR for over 25 years, I approached the move to digital with some trepidation, but the Powershot Pro 1 convinced me this was the right move - it felt right in the hand, the zoom ring on the lens barrel felt familiar, everthing fell naturally to hand. The results - after 600 shots in 6 weeks - are excellent. Marvelleous lens - I wish I could select a smaller aperture than F8 for those shots where depth of field is most important (although the results so far don't seem to call for this) and even super macro at 3cm doesn't quite equal the Pentax with extension tubes. But I like having everything there in a handy package instead of carrying a huge bag full of accessories - or risking leaving something essential at home! Great camera, great fun.
Well built, great lens, good to use.......2005-04-05
Like many people, my first couple of digital cameras piqued my interest in photography. But because they were fully automatic, there were times when I couldn't take the shot I wanted.
I fancied a digital SLR to get the flexibility I wanted, but bought the Pro 1 instead in the end. Why? Mainly because I wanted a variable-angle LCD screen that I could use to frame shots in awkward places. The Pro 1's LCD monitor is very good in bright light, and at 235,000 pixels, probably the highest resolution LCD available on a camera. The viewing angle is more critical than I would like though, made slightly worse because it snaps into certain preset positions which make tiny adjustments impossible.
I like the electronic viewfinder too, which shows all the menu items and settings, shutter speed etc. and has dioptre adjustment. I wear glasses and there's no problem. It's the same resolution as the main LCD.
There's also a top mounted LCD for basic information, which is thankfully illuminated and very handy.
You might think that the battery life would suffer on a camera with three LCDs, a myriad of blinking LEDs, a heavy lens with continuous focus and a long zoom... but I've found the battery life excellent. You can turn off continuous focus to make it last a bit longer.
I suppose the outstanding feature of the Pro 1 is the lens. At 28-200mm equivalent, this is a very flexible zoom. And because the widest aperture at full telephoto is still f3.5, it's pretty usable handheld if the light's good.
An unusual feature is that you turn the ring on the lens barrel to zoom, or to focus in manual mode. I quite like this, but to me, it turns the wrong way, and I still haven't got the hang of it. That may just be me though.
Manual focus gives you an enlarged central area on the display and a distance reading. But I found it still wasn't easy to tell if the focus was right. But the camera can sharpen up your manual focus attempt, which is useful.
As you'd expect from a camera at this level, it is bristling with features. I won't mention them all. The only one I would've liked that it doesn't have is a live histogram display. It's also a bit of a shame that the excellent 3cm super macro is only available at 4MP resolution.
Minor annoyances in use are a non-tethered lens cap, a strap that always seems to be in the way of the swivelling screen, a manual focus button that's too easy to press by mistake and a screen that freezes momentarily while the camera focuses.
But pretty much everything else is more than satisfactory. This is a very well built camera that's satisfyingly simple to use, and most importantly, has a great lens. The photos I've taken so far have impressed me enormously: sharp, great colour, great subtlety and naturalness. And with 8MP, you have all the flexibility you need to enlarge and crop.
The ideal camera for moving on up from a compact to SLR.......2004-11-17
I had been looking for a camera that offered more scope than a compact and would allow me to learn some of the techniques of shooting with an SLR. But I also wanted sometimes to be able to take the sort of no-fuss autofocus shots that you get with a compact, and without needing to change lenses. Finally I didn't want anything that was too bulky.
This camera is the perfect solution. The main reasons I'm enjoying it so much are:
- Sheer image quality (and excellence of optical zoom)
- a handy size and shape (and no extra-lens attachments) but very flexible in allowing me to set aperture and shutter speed, white-balance and ISO speed when I need to.
- extremely userfriendly - you can pick it up and get taking pictures from the first moment, but then work your way up through the various extra settings as you feel the need for them.
I work for a news photo agency (but not as a photographer!) and the clincher for me was that our own photographers, who are used to using professional grade kit, were also bowled over by the quality of the pictures and technology within this little piece of wizardry.
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Canon FC64M 64Mb Compact Flash card
Canon FC128M 128Mb Compact Flash card
CANON SC-DC30 Soft case for PowerShot Pro 1
Canon CA560 Compact Power Charger for PowerShot Series and MV series
