Canon’s Powershot series of point and shoots have typically always been king, and despite the fact that I’ve personally really warmed up to Ricoh, Fujifilm, and Sony, the new Canon G9X Mk II seems very tempting. With a 20.1MP 1 inch sensor at its heart and stunning good looks, this is a pretty classy point and shoot.
We got time to play with the camera before CES 2017.
Tech Specs
- 20.1MP 1 inch sensor f2 lens at its widest. F2.0 to f4.9 28-84mm equivalent
- Manual controls
- Exposure compensation
- Comes in Black, or a Silver and brown look
- Increased capability of the lens control ring
- New digic7 process
- 3 inch touch screen
- Constant low energy bluetooth connection possible
- USB charging
- Improved tracking performance that works with faces even when they’re not in sight
- Improved scene detection
- Dual sensing IS gives it 3.5 stops of stabilization overall.
- Better resolution at a higher ISO
- 8.2 fps raw shooting
- Time lapse movie mode: program shift. If you’re shooting in time lapse you still need to lock your white balance manually.
- Wireless data transfer
- $529.99
Ergonomics
The Canon G9x Mk II in many ways looks like a true retro point and shoot. The only company that could have possibly done a better job is Fujifilm. Imagine if you took the Sony RX100 V type of cameras, removed the viewfinder and made it sexy. That’s where you get the G9x Mk II.
Indeed, it looks absolutely stunning in the silver and brown–and due to time constraints, I wasn’t able to truly do this camera’s looks any justice.
The top of the camera features the mode dial, zoom rocker, power switch, pop-up flash, and the ring around the lens used to control many parameters.
Turn to the back of the camera, and you get a massive LCD screen. This is a touch screen and dominates much of the back. The right side of the camera has buttons.
Turn to the side and what you’ll spot is the USB connection along with the grip. This grip is textured and feels nice in the hand. Honestly, Canon did a very nice job here.
Build Quality
The camera doesn’t have weather sealing, but it seems to be made of metal or something like this. It feels nice in the hand and it is obviously designed to mostly focus on the giant LCD screen’s output. Thankfully, Canon’s touchscreen interface with their deep menus helps a lot.
Autofocus
During the few minutes that I got to play with the camera, the autofocus at Canon’s Manhattan offices seemed fairly okay. There’s nothing ground breaking here, but I’ll need to test the actual camera to give a full evaluation.
Image Quality
Unfortunately, Canon didn’t let us put an SD card in the camera. But to be fair, all of these types of cameras essentially seem to be using the same sensors from Sony.
First Impressions
I really like this camera. It feels nice and Canon surely paid a lot of attention to the ergonomics and feel. My favorite Canon point and shoot though is the Canon G1x Mk II, and this isn’t that. But I totally see how someone would like a camera like this.