Review on Olympus Camedia Digital Camera Optical by Matt Louis

1) Size. Both cameras are small, but the crown goes to Olympus, albeit by a few cubic points. Olympus is also the lighter of the two. 2) permission. Both cameras are equipped with a 4.1 megapixel CCD. What Canon lacks and Olympus has are extrapolations to 3200 x 2400 (or 7+ megapixels). By extrapolating from a raw image (not even a TIFF!), the camera can make a much smarter decision than regular Photoshop. This is required if you want to print a poster from your photo. 3) image quality. Very good and comparable between both cameras. Even the most advanced reviewer has a hard time giving one or the other a clear advantage. Canon has a slightly better rendering algorithm, so it pays homage to Powershot, but not by much. .4) Lenses are the same for all purposes. Not as fast as the larger cameras, but satisfactory for most applications. 5) Magnification is the same. 6) media. Olympus uses SmartMedia and Canon uses CompactFlash (Type I and II). Both come out of the box at a paltry 16MB, so you'll need to buy larger modules. Memory prices are comparable, but Canon has the advantage that Compact Flash is more advanced and larger. However, 128 MB is more than enough for a day of shooting. 7) batteries. Both cameras are not perfect. Canon practically forces you to buy an additional module. since it uses a proprietary format but Olympus doesn't supply batteries or allow in-camera charging, so you'll need to buy NiMh AA batteries and a charger that costs the same (a reasonable investment). I would also give preference to Olympus as you can always find AA batteries in any store if you run out of charge. I would also like to address the power consumption here, since many users give up precisely because of this feature. Both cameras are bad. This is a sad reality if you want a compact car camera. But don't make a tragedy out of it. If you use both cameras wisely, this should be enough for a full day of shooting. 8) Price. IMHO still too high for both cameras. Canon is slightly more expensive, but not by much. You can now buy any camera for less [money]. With all the accessories (memory, batteries, case, etc.) it should just about fit in the. Budget.9) Lightning. Mediocre at best for both cameras. The Canon does a slightly better job of red-eye removal, but the Olympus does a slightly better job of adjusting white balance. Still, this is probably the weakest point of both cameras. 10) Videos. Both cameras have a built-in video mode with audio recording and a speaker for later viewing. Since I'm not very interested in this feature, I won't discuss it here. 11) Bundled Software. Olympus supplies Adobe Photoshop Elements with the camera, currently the best image processing package on the market. 12) Nice additions. The Canon comes in a metal case, giving it a very classy and durable look. The Olympus case is more stylish in my opinion and is made of very durable plastic. Both cameras feature automatic USB connection and optional waterproof housings. Olympus has three unique qualities that made me buy it. The first is low-light noise reduction, which can be activated when you switch the camera to night mode. A special algorithm that Olympus uses to compensate for long exposure errors (e.g. hot pixels) results in much better shots. If you like taking night photos (I do), you can't live without this feature. The second feature is pixel mapping, which allows the camera to compensate for dead pixels in the CCD. Until you have this problem, you probably won't think much about it. The third feature is "User Mode" which allows you to save your favorite settings and access them with a simple hard drive swap. I use it quite often and it saves a lot of preparation time before shooting and results in better image quality. This is particularly useful when taking a series of shots in difficult lighting conditions (e.g. twilight). Overall, I chose the Olympus for the features above, but you really can't go wrong with any of these small cameras.