The G9 is as good as it gets!

The Canon Powershot G9 is a 12 megapixel digital camera with a 6x optical zoom lens. Those headline features only tell part of the story as the Powershot G9 is about the most advanced compact camera on the market. In terms of features it has a roll call similar to what you would expect from an SLR camera. It is ideal for a photography enthusiast or someone who owns an SLR, but is looking for a more portable second camera.

The G9’s image quality is (in my opinion) noticeably better than the G7’s – and that isn’t due to the insignificant 20 percent increase in resolution. Outdoor images are dependably well exposed and color is consistently hue accurate, but slightly over saturated. Reds are very warm, blues are a tad bright, and Caucasian skin tones are very slightly ruddy. All my images showed balanced, but slightly hard contrast. There is some negligible chromatic aberration (purple fringing) visible in high contrast color transition/edge demarcation areas, but overall chromatic aberration is amazingly well controlled.

All in all, the Canon PowerShot G9 Digital Camera has a few warts, but at this point in time and when compared to the other cameras in its class - the G9 is as good as it gets. If that’s not enough, RAW is back, the G9 is more powerful, it has more features, and it’s cheaper (MSRP) than its predecessor.