Canon PowerShot G2 (2001)
Yes, the Canon PowerShot G2: The man, the myth, the legend. Or as I call it, The Cronker-Donker.
Over the last few years, this little digicam has been developing a bit of a cult following. Released in 2001 as a “prosumer” camera with a massive 4.0 megapixels, it seems hard to believe that people are still playing with this thing - and liking it. On paper, there really isn’t much there. Virtually every phone now has better shooting parameters than this guy… but here we are. The only real “bragging” point is that it has a (now) coveted CCD sensor.
I picked up a copy from Ebay about 3 years ago, after the hype had been established and although I haven’t really used it too much, I have to agree with the hype – there is something special about this camera. I certainly packs a punch greater than it should and despite having comically small files, the pictures are quite remarkable.
For what I understand, back in the digicam days of the early 2000s, most camera companies were not focusing on making colors as “realistic” or clinical as today and were more pushing the look to be similar to popular film stocks. From my experience CCD sensors allow for this and have a color rendering that is punchier and more dynamic than CMOS sensors. Additionally, there is a weird type of sharpness that just has a very different look than my CMOS or X-Trans cameras, again in a punchier way. It’s really hard to describe or nail down what it is - kind of like the Leica look or Zeiss 3D pop. And yes, I do subscribe to both of those being real things, just look at their respective images.
It’s not all positive however. This camera handles like complete junk. It is slow, it is clunky and it’s only kind of reliable and basic functions can be painfully hard to adjust. The response time is slow. The start-up time is slow. The zoom time is slow and the focus time is… slow. To make a reference from a car review from which I stole the namesake “Cronker-Donker”:
Style: 1/5
Speed: 1/5
Handling: 1/5
Overall: 5/5
It doesn’t make sense. Believe my I know. This camera just has that X-factor, the Je ne sais quoi, it’s magic. If you are looking for something fun and outside of the normal, it can actually an enjoyable experience for the same reason people love film - you have to slow down and be deliberate. So don’t bring it for any high-stakes shoots or anything with consequences.
The file handling is a bit of a different beast too. Cropping is not really an option with the files beyond minor corrections. With such small files, there just isn’t that much room to do so. Without cropping however, the files are strikingly usable and are oddly sharp looking. The dynamic range is a bit challenging to work with as it is less than what you’d likely be used to, but again is kind of like film in that regard and the sliders in Lightroom just seem to behave differently with the files. I don’t quite know how, but I find my usual moves to be ineffective.
If you have been looking at buying one, I’m not too sure what the going rate is these days, but I paid ~$120CDN for mine. Initially I was hoping the hype would take over and I could flip it for more, but at this point, I’d need prices to be considerably higher to sell mine. It’s just kind of fun to have and shakes things up when in a rut or when experimenting with familiar places.
The short is, if you’ve been thinking about getting one, I would recommend it. Just be aware that it has strong limitations and will perform like a camera from 2001… that makes surprisingly unique and nice photos. Anyway, I took mine out today and managed to shoot a number of photos that I quite liked. See below.
