Canon G12 or S95?

[scubadive425]

I've been using a Canon A570 with a Canon housing for the past 3 years and really liked it. Unfortunately, there's an issue with that model camera where eventually it stops properly drawing power from the batteries, so now my camera is useless

I'm looking to buy either a Canon G12 or a Canon S95. They seem relatively similar, so I'm not sure how to pick between them. Any help would be great. I'd get the Canon housing with either one.

My camera use:
-This will be my primary land and underwater camera
-I'm not a professional photographer, just a recreational one, but I take a lot of pictures
-I used mostly just auto and macro mode on my old camera but I wouldn't mind learning how to use more manual controls
-I don't use external lenses or strobes
-I probably take about 100 photos per dive
-I dive once to twice a year, maybe about 20-30 dives
-I take a lot of macro pictures underwater
-I was disappointed with low-light pictures with my old camera
-Good battery life is important to me
-The price difference doesn't effect my decision

 

[crandf]

The 2 are mostly equivalent in terms of their manual settings capability and low light image quality. Their WP-__ underwater casings are also about the same size if you're worried about bulk. And if you dun think you will make use of the extras controls, knobs, viewfinder, hotshoe, and abilities to add external strobes/lenses etc of G12, then a G12 to you will only be almost like a larger sized S95.

However, if taking lots of macro is more important to you, then get G12 since it can focus to much closer than S95, very important for those tiny shrimpies and nudis. (How I lust after my friend's G11 shots of that tiny shrimp on a pillow star.....)
Else get the S95, its compact size coupled with almost as powerful capability is really a crowd pleaser.

 

[Gilligan]

I would ad for land use the S95 is more of a "pocket size" camera. The G12 is "beefier" and has an articulating monitor if that matters to you.

The S95 Canon housing is also smaller than the G12 as shown below in the S90 and G10 housing comparison (same sizes as S95 & G12) if that also matters to you.

 

[chris196]

I haven't used either underwater yet, but you mentioned land use.
The S95 is truly a pocketable camera. It's really quite amazing the photos that come out of that thing and the fact that you sometimes forget you have it with you.
I have a Nikon DSLR, but find more and more on land that I reach for the S95 just for the carry factor.

 

[PatW]

I have the G11. It is a nice little camera. As for size, it is plenty small enough. Of course, the camera with housing gets much larger. The G11 with an Ike case gets to be a fair bit bigger.

By the way, if you like macro shots, you may want to get a macro wet lens like the Inon. You can focus in quite close with the G12 but you have to zoom out. You can not use the full tele zoom in macro. That means you have to get really, really, really close to your subject. Often that is too close for the subjec to tolerate.

I do not think that the Canon housing will accomodate one of the after market macro lenses. But I am not sure. The ikelite housing will.

Also, I understand that the S95 fires any strobe with its own strobe which saps battery life pretty quickly. The G12 with an ike case can fire the strobe electronically.

Housings can get awfully pricey awfully fast. The Canon housing for the G11 is about $250, the Ike housing is $600, and with the fancier housings you can get over $1000. Of course, some of the fancy housings give you access to wide angle wet lens options that would be pretty cool but also expensive.

If you want to look into the options, you can go to Backscatter which is a store that specializes in underwater photography. They have a decent web sight which gives you an idea of the various options. Also you can go to Ikelites web site to see what they have.

 

[BluewaterPhoto]

if you stick to the Canon or Ikelite housings, the G12 will give you better macro out of the box, although the S95 can also do excellent macro with 1 or 2 macro lenses added, and the "high end" housings like Recsea are less expensive than the G12 versions.

However, just keep in mind that with the Ike and Canon housings for the G12 your wide-angle options will be quite limited, but for the S95 you can use lenses such as the Dyron 15mm wide-angle.

hope this helps
Scott

 

[Cumbo]

I have the G11. It is a nice little camera. As for size, it is plenty small enough. Of course, the camera with housing gets much larger. The G11 with an Ike case gets to be a fair bit bigger.

By the way, if you like macro shots, you may want to get a macro wet lens like the Inon. You can focus in quite close with the G12 but you have to zoom out. You can not use the full tele zoom in macro. That means you have to get really, really, really close to your subject. Often that is too close for the subjec to tolerate.

I do not think that the Canon housing will accomodate one of the after market macro lenses. But I am not sure. The ikelite housing will.

Also, I understand that the S95 fires any strobe with its own strobe which saps battery life pretty quickly. The G12 with an ike case can fire the strobe electronically.

Housings can get awfully pricey awfully fast. The Canon housing for the G11 is about $250, the Ike housing is $600, and with the fancier housings you can get over $1000. Of course, some of the fancy housings give you access to wide angle wet lens options that would be pretty cool but also expensive.

If you want to look into the options, you can go to Backscatter which is a store that specializes in underwater photography. They have a decent web sight which gives you an idea of the various options. Also you can go to Ikelites web site to see what they have.

Weight (without Camera) Approx. 6 lbs (2.7kg)

^Any idea how much the Ikelite 6146.12 case weights without the tray? I assume, that 2,7 kilos is with the tray.

 

[nevennett]

I went for the S95 with the Canon housing. I figured that this would be my basic setup, and if (more likely when) I get more serious about my underwater photography it wouldn't be a G-whatever I upgrade to, but something considerably better. With the all the above mentioned bells and whistles.

The S95 takes beautiful photos in shallow depths on auto mode, either with auto white balance or with Canon's underwater settings. It takes reasonable photos in good visibility at medium depth (less than 20m), particularly if you are patient enough to play with the settings - something which I find is usually more limited by my buddy getting impatient than myself. I find getting good white balance more tricky here, and the compromise between aperture and shot speed more difficult to get right. More often, I don't have the time to fiddle (either I'm too excited or the fish won't hang around) so I shoot either in Av or custom modes with preselected F stop and shutter speed. However, in poor visibility (say 7m or less) and at depth (30+m) I really struggle to get a good photo. Probably a bit of poor photography skills on my part, a bit of narcosis, and the inherent limitations of what is probably only an enthusiastic amateur setup. I don't shoot RAW (seriously, who has this much time on their hands?) and there is only so much photoshop can do! I find I can get some nice macro too, within the same limitations.

Granted I've only used a G10/11 above the water, but I just couldn't imagine using it to create significantly better photos under the water. That the S95 is tiny, and no longer suffers from the bar of wet soap handling characteristics of the S90, are very welcome additions.

Every time I come back from a dive, review my photos, and realise how little of what I snapped was any good, it makes me respect the pioneers of this art form more and more...

 

[nevennett]

Oh, one caveat... the battery life on the S95 is NOT its strong point. But it will comfortably last two 60 min dives, and I rarely dive more than that in a day