Canon PowerShot G6

Whether you're a point-and-click shooter who's starting to want more control with your photography or an already-converted enthusiast who doesn't want to lug around a digital SLR, the satin-aluminum Canon PowerShot G6 could satisfy on both counts. It's not cheap—at $700, it ties the other enthusiast model here, the Sony V3, for the most expensive of our 7MP cameras—but it's well worth the money, making it an Editors' Choice in the enthusiast category.

The G6 is a worthy successor to the popular PowerShot G5, with refinements that make it even more appealing. It has a 7.1-megapixel CCD (up from the G5's 5.0). The excellent LCD is now a full 2 inches; you can swivel it out, up, and down for more shooting versatility. The G6's body is more compact than the G5's, but the grip is larger, making it quite easy to hold. And the G6 has a fast f/2.0 to f/3.0, 7.2 to 28.8 mm (a 35-mm equivalent of 35 to 140 mm) 4X optical zoom lens.

Canon's manual for the G6 is comprehensive and easy to follow. But for documentation-averse shooters, the camera is easy to use, even right out of the box. The menus are simple to navigate, and the controls have clear-cut functions and are handily placed. A mode dial gives you the choice of 12 shooting options, and we especially appreciate the camera's two custom buttons, which let you define and store your own settings.

For more creative shooting, in-camera effects include black-and-white, sepia, vivid color and neutral color, and low sharpening (for softer pictures). You can use automatic white balance or one of six presets. And you have the option of saving shots (onto compact flash cards) in JPEG or RAW mode. RAW gives you nearly unlimited control of post processing; it's a great feature, and one we'd like to see in more cameras. We were disappointed that G6 can only shoot video (at a max of 640-by-480) in clips of 30 seconds, at just 10 frames per second (fps).

The Canon G6 performed well in our labs. It wasn't lightning fast, scoring a moderate 4.3-second boot time, and fairly good 2.7-second recycle time between flash shots. The camera really shone, however, in resolution tests, where it scored an impressive 1,650 lines of resolution—the best of the 7MP cameras. Its pixel transition scores were also excellent, averaging just 1.8 percent—tying the Fujifilm FinePix E550 (in 12MP mode) and the Canon PowerShot S70 for the best in this roundup.

These scores were reflected in the test shots the G6 turned in. On our simulated daylight test, picture quality was as crisp as we've seen. The exposure was also spot on, as was color, though we did see small amounts of noise in the shadows. On our flash test, the picture quality was almost as crisp, and still qualifies as excellent; illumination was very well balanced and exposure was very good. The colors were cool, however, and the yellows were the slightest bit off. We saw no noise to speak of in the flash shot.

With a sleeker, more ergonomic shape, a powerful optical zoom, and a multitude of pro-level features, the Canon PowerShot G6 is a stride ahead of its predecessor, the PowerShot G5 and a leader among this first batch of 7MP cameras.

Benchmark Test
Compare the cameras in this roundup using our benchmark test results table