Canon IXUS 800IS Digital Camera

Canon IXUS 800IS digital camera is the first Canon compact size digital camera equipped with "IS" (Optical Image stabilizer). In order to keep the view finder, Canon IXUS 800IS still has the 2.5 inch LCD screen instead of the 3 inch LCD screen. 6 mega pixels effective resolution is capable to generate all popular size of photos. ISO value has been increased up to ISO 800, wide screen photo feature added and most important improvement is the 4X optical zoom compared to other IXUS series. Canon IXUS 800IS succeeds the tradition; metal alloy camera body. However, the metal material has been improved to get less fingerprint / smudges and still keep the solid metal feeling.

Due to the stylish compact camera body design, there is no "grip for easy holding" in IXUS family till now. Author has noticed that Canon has considerably designed the tilt side panel on the right hand side of Canon IXUS 800IS. I personally believe it's more easy for right hand camera users to hold the camera while taking photos. Unfortunately, there is no camera manufacturers to design a digital camera suitable for left hand users yet. According to my observation, I believe Canon will also implement the touch screen in IXUS family in the coming future.

Now let's have a look at some of the photos generated by Canon IXUS 800IS digital camera. All photos attached in this article have been resized to 500X375 pixels for quicker download purpose.

Sometimes, I really think digital camera is the greatest gadget to capture your feeling and how you see the world from your heart. The competition in our society and busy life style are cooling down our hearts; making us losing trust among people. Maybe there is not much we can do to change the reality. Perhaps we still can communicate with the nature through cameras to balance our soul.

The sepia colour feature can make your photos feel like back to your good old times.

Camera setting: 6MP, superfine quality setting, Manual mode with sepia colour; flash turn off.

The macro photo is taken in automatic mode which is 5cm to the subject. According to Canon IXUS 800IS specification, the macro mode can take photos close up to 2cm to the subject. I test the macro mode with 2cm close up to the subject, and I still can get clear photo under sufficient light. However, I did not show the testing photo here as I think showing flower photo looks better than coin photo.

This night shot photo is taken at 8:30PM Sydney winter time.

I am using manual mode, ISO setting 400, flash turn off, 4X optical zoom and tripod is used.

The night snapshot mode of Canon IXUS 800IS is designed for night portrait photos outdoor or indoor low light environment according to our test. To record night shot scene photo by its pre-program night snapshot mode is not suitable.

If you take portrait night shots by Canon IXUS 800IS night snapshot mode with flash and image stabilizer turned on, you will get very good night portrait photos even without using tripod. However, the photo subject must be within build-in flash reachable distance which is recommended.

It is a good thing to add the optical image stabilizer into compact size digital cameras as compact size digital cameras are most popular in family users. As due to the restriction of the camera size, most compact size digital cameras come with 3X optical zoom, 4X optical zoom in Canon IXUS 800IS gives users a little bit more of zooming and good zooming quality of photos. According to our test, the optical image stabilizer in Canon IXUS 800IS digital camera is more effective in environment with sufficient light than low light environment or especially zooming to infinity. Of course, the anti shake feature in other brand of compact size digital cameras have similar test result.

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