Hello. I went on a cycling trip with my friend recently and upon exchanging photographs taken by our cameras after the trip, it dawned upon me that my Canon Powershot A570IS seems to be producing blurred photographs. I've provided the photographs below for reference. Both of them came straight out from the camera, without any post-processing done. Both shots were taken at 1/80s shutter speed, ISO 80, and the cameras were mounted on a tripod. Is there a fault with my Canon? Could someone please advise?

Thanks for your help!

http://www.khsquare.com/IMG_0514.JPG - Canon Powershot A570IS (2.78MB)

http://www.khsquare.com/P1020336.JPG - Panasonic Lumix FX01 (2.73MB)

It looks fine. You are talking about a point and shoot camera that by the looks doesn't have much of a focus point in the picture, thus its not going to be terribly sharp.

Try maybe ISO 200 with a higher shutter speed?

May I draw your attention to the 100% crops so as to compare the differences? From what I've noticed, even when I've downsized the photograph from both cameras to dimensions such as 600x450, there is still a slight but noticeable difference in the clarity of the two, thus the concern. Is it really a case of getting what I paid for? Dpreview and other sites did not mention problems with blurry photographs; in fact, Dpreview praised the Powershot for producing clear images.

you need a high shutter speed, boost up the ISO to 400-800 and use 1/250 shutter, maybe even 1/320

definitely do NOT boost up the iso to 400-800 on a powershot.. these cameras are horrible for iso noise. Even increasing your shutter speed to 1/100 may help a bit. But to be honest, it looks to me like just a bad shot, something may have moved the camera a bit while snapping it.. unless you consecutively get these results i wouldnt worry about it. But looking at the exif data for both images.. the canon is f/3.5 and the lumix is f/4.0. You can't expect everything to be in focus with f/3.5 .

Also.. focal length

Lumix: 9.6mm (35mm equivalent: 58mm)
Canon: 7.9mm


the shots are not taken with the same settings. Even a .5 difference in the f stop can make a huge difference.

also.. just to add something else, you're canon has built in IS technology, but when you're using a tripod to steady your camera, its best to disable IS as you will get sharper images. I've done this with both of my older powershots and it worked. There is no need for IS if you're using a tripod.

My canon powershot SD600 seems to deal with noise in high ISOs far better than my D50... Course, mine's an SD series, not the A series.

i Had an A540 and currently own an S3IS along with my SLR.. neither P&S have good iso past 200... 400 is fixable with alot of work, but 800 just ruins the photo completely. The rebel xt at 1600 is comparable to the p&S at about 400 for me anyway.

if i'm not mistaken, canon rebel > nikon D50 when it comes to noise control.

the D50 has outstanding noise control however.

Oh really? http://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=607060 Check out the shots there. Brandon does a fine job, but they're so noisy at iso1600 it's ridiculous! ISO 800/1600 is unusable to me on a D50.

I've never had a single problem with Noise across the board.

You are comparing CMOS vs CCD, where CMOS wins every time (Canon and the Nikon D300/D3).

The D50 can be great, and will defiantly beat and point and shoot out there. It has been known to have problems with reds though, where that gym is full of reds.

Yes, thank you for that tip, together with the rest in your post. Turning off the IS seems to help out when I tested it by shooting macro shots on random objects with the camera placed on my computer desk. However, I just checked with my friend and he says he never has to turn it off for tripod shots. Is it a Canon-only requirement?

it's not really a requirement.. more that it can only do harm to your images when your camera is already stable. If you have a camera secured on a tripod, having IS turned on can't make the picture MORE stable, what happens is that the IS tries to compensate for movement that's not there, and thus actually giving motion to the picture.
Hope this helps.. but to get really sharper images try using something a little higher then f/3.5 like you were using in that canon picture.

Ahh, I see. Alright, my doubts have been cleared for now. Thanks for your help! I'm just starting out so I've got loads to learn. Your guidance is very much appreciated.

I think something moved your camera/tripod a bit? May be when you clicked the shutter? (if you did not use a self-timer or something)