Camera Review Canon the SX160 IS has a lot to live up to, as it comes from a line which is known to deliver good features and performance with respect to price. Many a times, a newer camera does not mean a better camera than the predecessor, though that is expected. Canon has a long standing history of producing great cameras, one of which was 2009’s Powers hot SX120 IS. We absolutely loved our SX120 IS, so when we got the newest version of the camera – the SX160 IS, we were extremely excited to figure out what new capabilities it offered.

 

For starters, the camera features a 16 megapixel sensor, 2 megapixels higher than the SX150 IS, a lower model point and shoot camera. Interestingly, Canon has stuck with the CCD type sensor for this lineup of camera from the beginning. With the SX120 IS, Canon had pretty much nailed the ergonomic design. The camera was great to hold and use, with a button layout that made accessing most features very easy and intuitive. Nothing has changed in that regard to the SX160 IS. The buttons are placed exactly the same way they are in almost every single Canon point-and-shoot camera, so if you’ve ever used one of Canon’s cameras, you’d know almost immediately where everything is.

The body of the SX160 IS gave us some mixed feelings. Normally the phrase “plastic-like” tends to denote flimsy or weak, but that is definitely not the case with the SX160 IS. The metal lens mount ring, though a good practical solution to protecting the lens, adds to the polarity of the plastic-metal design of the camera.

The right side of the camera has a neatly tucked away rubber door, behind which lie the mini-HDMI and mini-USB port for connectivity. Features

The Canon Powers hot SX160 IS packs in quite an impressive set of features, which doesn’t seem like much if you compare it with the SX150 IS, but observing the growth of this camera overtime, you realize it has come a long way. While the SX150 IS’s aperture moved between f/3.4-5.6, the SX160 IS loses a little by having an aperture range of f/3.5-5.9. The video on the SX160 IS gets a very slight bump in video spec too, retaining the 720p video recording, but also offering 25p frame rate along with the standard 30.

Here is one thing that we absolutely love about the SX160. It runs on AA batteries. Ever been in a situation where you need your camera but the battery died on you prematurely? Yeah, good luck finding a proprietary lithium ion packs to power your camera. Lately, we’ve been seeing that the PASM options along with the mode dial have been disappearing from a lot of point-and-shoot camera segments, deepening the divide between the regular cameras and the advanced ones. The SX160 IS isn’t an average camera and certainly by no means an advanced point and shoot , so seeing the PASM modes here is a great relief as it allows some creative control even for those who might at some point wants to experiment.

Image Quality

Like we had said earlier, the camera houses a CCD sensor instead of a back-side illuminated CMOS sensor. The images out of the SX160 IS look as vibrant in color and with a good deep contrast. Minimum focusing distance seemed to increase drastically as we zoomed in. Regardless, we love the ridiculously small minimum focusing distance. The images shot at this range come out tack sharp too, with very little to no JPG artifact.

The low light performance of the SX160 IS left us feeling quite disappointed. As good as it performs in good light; the low light performance on this camera leaves a lot more to be desired. Skin tones were also quite easily affected in low light, with browns quickly developing red dots.

The video behavior of the SX160 IS follows the same pattern as the image quality. Great video quality in broad daylight, with a tendency to expose for highlights, but low light video is just riddled with blotches of red and blue dots. The Canon Powers hot SX160 IS a camera that comes from line of cameras that have historically and very delicately balanced the price, feature set and overall performance. Improvement in low light performance would have been greatly appreciated and 1080p HD video would have made this our favorite camera. We love the focal length, especially the relatively wide 28mm starting focal length. There is also the PASM mode dial and full control on the shooting that’s great. The macro mode on the SX160 IS also another feature that we’ve absolutely enjoyed playing with.