Canon Powershot A550

Another impressive camera from Canon's affordable range of Powershot cameras. Some of the specs are

7.1 megapixel
Retractable 4x optical zoom with 4x digital zoom
Large 2.0” LCD
16:9 Widescreen Still Shooting
13 shooting modes including 5 special scene modes.
Vertical/ Horizontal Gridline Display
5 Movie Modes
Selectable Lens Retraction Timing


Here are some of the reviews of A550.

Imaging Resource reviews: With its high quality imaging, competent feature set, and under $200 price point, the Canon PowerShot A550 can more easily meet the needs of a very wide audience of photographers. For pros and advanced amateurs, it’s nice to have a pocket-sized alternative to a more bulky digital SLR. The price makes this camera an attractive entry for anyone who has been thinking about going digital. As a gift for teens, the Canon PowerShot A550 costs less than a standard Apple iPod. As I’ll describe below, the camera is not only easy to use, but highly intuitive.

Digicamreview reviews: The sensor, electronics and optics used by Canon can produce good images. However, best results are achieved by tweaking the exposure compensation and white balance in manual mode. Exposure compensation is also available in the scene modes, but not in auto mode (which tends to produce overexposed images). Colours are rich and in a very wide range of situations the camera will take sharp, detailed pictures. Having some manual options does enable a certain amount of creativity. AiAF is a useful feature for portraits and macro shots, but on landscape setting, it tended to focus on close by objects, and was better disabled. This camera is reasonably good in low light situations as long as it is firmly supported. There is a good range of image quality settings to choose from. The camera was generally competent and fast at focusing and in low light, the focus assist lamp did the trick. (7.5/10)

Steve's Digicams reviews: The PowerShot A550 delivers high-resolution images without requiring users to exert additional effort. Using Canon’s AiAF “Smart” autofocus system with their patented iSAPS intelligent scene analysis algorithm to determine optimum settings for focusing, exposure and white balance. The user simply snaps the shot with the push of a button. This model features 11 standard shooting modes for still pictures, automatically adjusting the cameras’ settings to match the surroundings. Still shooting modes include Full Auto, Auto with manual adjustment of exposure compensation and white balance, Portrait, Night Snapshot, Kids and Pets, and other Special Scene modes. Additionally, the A550 can record movies with sound - so you can capture your baby’s first steps or first words with point and shoot simplicity.