So there you are, at a dimly-lit restaurant, taking pictures of the food as it is served to you.  You go home to upload the pictures and what do you get?  Either a washed out picture from the bright flash, or a dark picture that looks grainy (lots of noise!).  Honestly, those hand-held compact cameras are lousy when it comes to taking pictures in low light.  While a dSLR camera might just be the solution, it’s bulky and inconvenient to lug around.  Well, not to fear because the Canon S90 is here!

Never would I thought to write a camera review on this site, but here I am.  I was never satisfied with the quality of the food pictures that my compact camera snapped, and I was fed up carrying my dSLR every where I went.  So when I heard the Canon S90 was a compact camera that performed well at taking low light pictures, I went out and got myself one.

I spent a month taking pictures of almost everything I ate when I dined out with the S90.  It’s not as slim as the other present Canon compacts, it’s about the size of the older Canon PowerShot Digital Elph 400.  Still, it’s small enough to fit in the front pants pocket without being too bulky.

While it’s not the best camera to use in low-light situations, it sure has beat out every other compact camera I have owned.  This model is also marketed to camera enthusiasts, but I think photographers of all levels should own one of these babies.  For those unfamiliar with using manual settings on a dSLR, there will be a learning curve.  Sure, the automatic function is good and all, but to truly make the pictures shine, they should be taken in manual mode, so the files can be saved in the RAW format for further tinkering as well.

Below are a bunch of pictures I took in the past 30 days or so.  All pictures were taken in Manual mode with an aperture of 2.0, shutter speed of 1/6 to 1/250, and ISO ranging from 200 to 400 in macro mode.  No flash was fired, the pictures were taken indoors and saved in RAW format, and some were enhanced with the included photo editing software (Canon’s Digital Photo Professional).  I only tinkered with the brightness, contrast, tone, and saturation settings.  No noise reduction was used either.

Tonkatsu ISO 250, F2.0 1/50 – No Retouching.

Stuffed Pancakes ISO 250, F2.0, 1/250 – Increased saturation and brightness a bit post snap

Sushi ISO 200, F2.0, 1/40 – Increased saturation and brightness post snap.

Beef Chow Fun ISO 400, F2.0, 1/30 – Increased saturation, tone, contrast, and brightness post snap.  I was seated in a very dark corner.

Shepherd’s Pie ISO 400, F2.0, 1/6 – Increased saturation, tone, contrast, and brightness post snap.  This place was pretty dimly lit.

Penne Vodka ISO 400, F2.0, 1/6 – Increased saturation, tone, contrast, and brightness post snap.  Same location as above.

Roti Canai ISO 200, F2.0, 1/10 – Slight tone correction post snap.

Toasted Bread ISO 400, F2.0, 1/25 – Increased saturation, tone, contrast, and brightness post snap.

Biscuits ISO 400, F2.0, 1/20 – Increased saturation, tone, contrast, and brightness post snap.

Meat ISO 200, F2.0, 1/30 – Slight saturation increase post snap.

Clams ISO 200, F2.0, 1/30 – Slight saturation increase, tone correction, and brightness increase post snap.

The camera performs remarkably well up to ISO 400, any more and the pictures will start to get noisy.  The image stabilization performs well and those with minor hand trembles will find this camera to be a good ally. Unfortunately, the camera’s cost comes at a premium, hovering around the $400.00 mark.

So it’s time to be the food photographer that you were meant to be!  Check out more samples here.

~ Kin