I decided to upgrade my trusty camera to a Canon S95 (retail about $400), because I often find myself shooting in low existing light conditions, and I sought a larger aperture and higher ISO. One of the first shots of the box, hand-held, was the one below. It’s pretty amazing to see the detail in this photo, which was taken about 9pm, just outside of the biggest church in St. Louis. I’m impressed with the detail, which you can also see if you click for the “full” image, which is actually a less than full-res shot. The 2.3 mb image on my hard drive shows even more detail.
That's a spectacular picture! And under low light conditions, too. How long was the exposure on this?
I've been very happy with the camera I have, a Canon PowerShot SD1200 – for the price, it takes excellent pictures – but I've been thinking for a while that it may be time to upgrade to a better model. I definitely want to be able to take pictures like this one.
Ebonmuse: I have been happily using a SD1100IS for several years–I've taken 6,000 photos with it. It's a beautiful little machine. The only thing it doesn't do is reach into dark areas and pull out crisp photos. The S95 is only a little bigger than the SD1100IS (which is the same size as your camera). The S95 also takes HD movies with stereo sound, and many other improvements. I'll post the stats for the stadium photo below. I suspect that the S95 (which has the same innards as the G12, except a slightly smaller zoom-3.8 optical) is going to tempt you sorely. I was stunned by how sharp the stadium photo turned out. I also took a series of photos in the dark at my office and I was equally and pleasantly surprised.
<img src="http://dangerousintersection.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/ballpark-photo-stats.jpg" alt="S95 settings for stadium photo" />