This is my 4th Canon camera, having ventured into the world of digital photography with the Canon Powershot G5 in 2004. Later I replaced my film SLR with a Rebel XTi and last year acquired a Canon SD1100IS so I could have a small camera on the fly.
Since I liked the Canon interface so much I got a Canon waterproof housing for my SD1100IS in the hopes that it would suffice. Needless to say, the housing is better designed for scuba than whitewater due to it's size, and when used, clipped to a bungie on my sea kayak - tends towards water spots on the lens and LCD. So when Canon announced the D10 for 2009, I pre-ordered it.
Here is the good - and I can really only compare it to the Olympus Stylus cameras my friends have.
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Standard SD card - can handle up to 8 gig for 1.35 hours of video.
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12.1 megapixels.
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Canon's CCD, which makes for some pretty fine pictures.
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Easy to use controls.
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It has optical image stabilization, which is useful when shooting videos from a not perfectly still boat.
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Goes up to 3200 ISO
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Big LCD
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Face detection, red eye correction, blink detection.
All of this adds up to really great pictures - even using one of the 18 automatic settings. I've gotten comments how photos from the same river, same day from my camera are better quality than my friend's cameras.
The bad? Well, its kind of "puffy" in shape compared to the tiny Olympus stylus cameras. Matter of fact my friends say it looks like a Stylus having an allergic reaction! This puffyness means that it might not fit in every PFD pocket. AND it seems that the lens which is not flush with the camera body may be vulnerable and can get fingerprints on it when removed from the PFD pocket.
The camera isn't entirely intuitive either. While the controls are easy to use, for example shooting video requires that the mode be changed from still to video in a specific sequence. Don't do it and ignore the fact the small red light isn't on, and you've shot nothing. Forget to change it back and your stills ARE video.
So you have to read the manual.
But other than that, I'm pretty happy. If you like the Canon interface and agree that their picture quality is great, I think this is it!
