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| While certainly not the thinnest
camera in the world, the Canon PowerShot A720 IS is compact
enough to meet the portable requirements of most shutterbugs
hungering for a camera they can stow on their person and keep
out of mind until it's time to capture a moment. If tight
jeans are your thing, the A720 at 3.83-by-2.64-by-1.65 inches
and weighing a tad over seven ounces, pocketing the camera
may be challenging, but for flannel shirt types like myself,
it will nestle comfortably in a breast pocket.
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| The silver unit with
blue, red, green and charcoal labeling is very comfortable to
hold, thanks to its excellent balance and a hand grip on its
right side. Although some fashion-conscious snappers may find
the grip's bulge in a pocket inelegant, it's an absolute necessity
for one-handed shooting--something that's easy to do with this
Canon offering. |
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The camera's controls are thoughtfully placed
and convenient to reach.
On top of the unit is the power switch, labeled on/off, speaker
and shutter release button. Around the button is a ring for
controlling the camera's 6x optical zoom lens (35-210 millimeters
equivalent). The DSC also has a 4x digital zoom.
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Between the power switch and
shutter button is the mode dial. Here are the modes that can
be accessed through the dial.
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Auto-The
camera automatically chooses all the appropriate
settings for a shot. |
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P-Programmed
mode. The camera picks the aperture and shutter
speed for a shot based on the brightness of the
subject. You can indirectly alter the aperture and
shutter settings by changing the exposure compensation,
light sensitivity (ISO) and white balance for the
shot. If the unit can't take the shot under the
existing lighting conditions, the aperture and shutter
speed values will be displayed in red on the camera's
LCD. |
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Tv-Shutter
priority. Despite what seems to me some bizarre
labeling, this is the shutter preferred mode for
the byteshooter. You set the shutter speed; the
camera picks the aperture. If the aperture is displayed
in red on the unit's LCD, you need to change your
shutter setting to avoid underexposing or overexposing
your shot. |
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Av-Aperture
priority. The flip side of Tv, you set the aperture
for a shot, and the camera picks the shutter speed.
Aperture determines your depth of field. At low
aperture settings-2.8, 3.2 and such-you have a shallow
depth of field. That's good for portrait shots where
you want your subject to pop out of a blurred background.
Higher settings—8.0, 7.1 and the like—give
you a deeper depth of field. They're good for subjects
like landscapes. What aperture settings are available
for a shot depends on what end of the unit's zoom
spectrum you're shooting in. At the wide end of
the zoom shooting at a shutter speed of 1/2000 second
or less, for example, the aperture range is limited
to f4.0-8.0. At the telephoto end, shooting at a
shutter speed of 1/2000 second or less constricts
the range to f7.1-8.0 |
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M-Manual.
This gives you the power to set both the aperture
and shutter speed for a shot. As you change those
settings, the camera's LCD will get brighter or
darker to reflect those changes. If your manual
settings result in a shot being over- or underexposed
by ±2 stops, you will be alerted to the problem
by a red +2 or -2 on the unit's display |
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Movie.
In this mode, you can shoot AVI movies with sound
that can be viewed with Apple's QuickTime media
player, which runs on both PCs and Macs. The camera
will set the focus, exposure and white balance for
a shot when you partially depress its shutter button.
Fully depressing the button will start recording;
depressing it again will stop it. |
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Panorama.
By displaying a portion of a previous shot, this
mode allows you to overlap a series of images. Later,
those images can be stitched together using a computer
to create panorama shots. Up to 26 photos can be
linked in this mode. Stitching software for both
Mac and PC is included with camera. |
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SCN-Special
Scene mode. Canon chose to split its array of preset
offerings into two groups. The first group is clustered
under this mode dial label. They include predetermined
settings for night scenes, foliage, snow, beach,
fireworks, aquarium and underwater. The company
sagely suggests you obtain an optional underwater
housing before trying to test the camera's submarine
capabilities. In this mode, a large icon for the
preset appears in the upper left corner of the screen.
Settings can be changed by using camera's arrow
dial. |
The
second group of presets can be accessed directly
from the unit's mode dial. |
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Portrait.
When photographing people, this mode will soften
the shot and blur the background behind the person.
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Landscape.
This setting is optimized for keeping objects both
near and far in focus. |
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Night Snapshot.
A slight variation from Night Scene mode, where
you want both you foreground and background subjects
visible, this mode concentrates on bringing the
target subject out of a dark background. |
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Kids & Pets.
While I have my doubts about crowding the mode dial
with presets, as a dad and pet owner, this setting
is one that I heartily endorse having on the dial.
It's weighed toward capturing subjects that just
won't stand still. |
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Indoors.
This mode contains settings optimized to offset
camera shake at low shutter speeds and to compensate
for indoor lighting. |
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| At the front of
the camera is its built-in lens. It has a built-in lens
cover--no need to worry about losing a lens cap--and 6x
optical zoom (the 35mm equivalent of a 35-210mm zoom).
At the maximum telephoto setting, the lens extends from
the camera about 1.25 inches. |
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At
10 o'clock from the lens is the camera's microphone.
It's used to add voice memos to photos and provides
sound for videos shot with the unit. Its location can
be problematic when shooting video. Care must be taken
to firmly wrap your fingers around the hand grip lest
you cover up the mic with them.
Above the microphone, is multi-purpose
lamp. When lighting conditions are murky, it lights
up a subject to assist the camera's auto focusing system.
When using a flash, it will pre-light a subject to counter
"red-eye." And it also blinks to tell you
the camera's self-timer is active.
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Beside the lamp is the front of the
unit's optical viewfinder and abutting that, the unit's
built-in flash. At five o'clock from the lens, there's
a ring release button. It's used to remove the ring
housing around the lens and attach an optional conversion
lens adapter (LA-DC58G) to the camera. With the adapter
attached, three converters can be used with the unit:
a wide converter (WC-DC58N), a teleconverter (TC-DC58N)
and a close-up lens (250D).
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At
the back of the camera is a 2.5-inch TFT LCD with a
resolution of 115,000 pixels. The unit is bright and
can be used in direct sunlight, but in those conditions
many photographers will prefer to use the unit's optical
viewfinder found above the display--even if it doesn't
show 100 percent of a shot. On the right side of unit
is a slide switch for toggling between shooting and
playback mode. |
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Below the slider switch
is the arrow pad. The circular pad is used for moving
through the camera's menu system. Press the pad at 12
o'clock to move up, six o'clock to move down and so
forth. In addition, in shooting mode, pressing the pad
a 12 o'clock will give you quick access to a menu for
choosing flash options and at six o'clock, access to
a menu for macro options. In playback mode the pad is
used for paging through photos.
Surrounding the arrow pad are four buttons. The one
at 11 o'clock, calls up an exposure compensation menu
in shooting mode and erases a single photo in playback
mode. At one o'clock, the button is for print sharing.
The button at seven o'clock turns the display on or
off. And at five o'clock, the button accesses the unit's
menu system. |
At
the center of the arrow pad is function button. It's
used to choose menu selections, as well as call up a
quick menu in shooting mode. The quick menu is a strip
of options that appear along the left side of the screen.
Not only does this give you immediate access to commonly
used functions--ISO, white balance, sequential shooting,
color manipulation, flash exposure compensation, metering,
image compression and image size--but it allows you
to continue to view your subject while you're doing
it. This is handy because it allows you to see what
happens when you change some of the settings, such as
white balance. |
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On
the right side of the camera there's a mount for a wrist
strap, which is included in the box, and on the left
side, a compartment that contains sockets for an AC
adapter (optional) and AV out (cable included) and a
USB port (cable included).
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The compartment for the camera's
two AA batteries and an SD card slot, as well as a tripod
socket are on the bottom of the unit.
Despite one or two quirks, the overall design of the
camera makes its controls intuitive to use and comfortable
to hold.
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Introduction
