Canon PowerShot G2

Much improved and powerful digital camera that produces very good results.

The first of Canon's new PowerShot G series was introduced late last year and provided an alternative to cameras such as Nikon's CoolPix 990.

Canon has now released the PowerShot G2, which offers a number of improvements over its predecessor, not least of which is a higher resolution CCD.

The most obvious difference is the contoured hand-grip on the right of the chassis, which replaces the PowerShot G1's rather insubstantial rubber inlay and gives it a similar appearance to Sony's Cyber-shot DSC-S85.

However, inside the plastic and magnesium alloy casing is a 4Megapixel CCD which increases the maximum resolution from 2,048 x 1,536 pixels to 2,272 x 1,704 pixels, an effective resolution of nearly 3.9Megapixels.

It still offers the 1.8in positionable LCD viewfinder, allowing you to frame your scene even when the camera's held in an awkward position, and letting you fold it out of harm's way when not in use.

The optics are also the same, with a centrally positioned F2.0-2.5, 7-21mm Canon lens (equivalent to a 34-102mm in 35mm format) providing a 3X optical zoom rating. Canon has stuck with a CompactFlash I/II slot and supplies a 32Mb card as standard.

Another key difference is the introduction of a new signal processor and colour filtering system, with the PowerShot G2 using a G/R/G/B filter array as opposed to the previous C/Y/G/M.

Canon claims that this combination allows for more accurate colour reproduction, although we felt the default setting tends to produce rather saturated colours.

However, you can compensate for this with the camera's Neutral setting - found alongside Vivid and Monochrome options - or by using the contrast, colour and saturation sliders under the manual controls. This results in a more realistic balance and the overall image quality and clarity of our test shots were extremely good.

Manual control is well catered for and includes options for exposure bracketing, aperture and exposure priority modes, exposure pre-sets and manual focusing.

When using manual focusing, the camera provides an enlarged view of the subject in the LCD for improved accuracy, but this display isn't that effective and we found the two-handed operation of this mode to be difficult to use.

Spot metering, flash exposure compensation and slow sync are also supported, with a focus assist lamp helping to provide enough light for the autofocus to work effectively in low-light situations.

It's a pity the manual focus control isn't a little easier to use and the Neutral colour mode isn't the default setting.

Contact: Canon 0800 616 417
www.canon.co.uk/digital_cameras/