Canon PowerShot A50, a digital camera for the last millennium
What does a digital camera of the last millennium offer? I bought a Canon PowerShot A50 at an auction and have been taking photos with it. As I take a trip back to the Stone Age of digital photography, I realise just how much progress has been made in the last 20 years.
Back in 1999: computers are equipped with cathode ray tube monitors, the Internet connection makes strange noises and takes up the phone line for hours. The Web is made up of building site symbols and @ signs. Only a few nerds know what Google is. The best desktop computers take between 20 and 50 seconds to open a 90 MB Tiff in Photoshop. With mobile phones, all you can do is make calls and write text messages. And often even that isn't possible if you don't have a network nearby. Welcome to the last millennium.
At this time, Canon introduced the PowerShot A50, a compact digital camera aimed at amateur photographers. To a very special kind of amateur photographer. Digital photography was not yet suitable for the masses. The camera costs over 1000 Swiss francs (1300 DM) and has just 1280×980 pixels, or just under 1.3 megapixels.
In the early days of digital photography, low camera resolution was the biggest of many big problems. Film negatives scanned from analogue cameras offered much higher resolutions and by then we were used to much better quality. Digital cameras with much higher resolution were also available from 1999, but at surreal prices. Kodak, for example, released the DCS 660, a 6-megapixel digital model based on the Nikon F5 film camera. Costs: 46,690 francs (excluding VAT).
It works!
At 50 francs for a vintage camera in its original packaging, I'm getting off pretty lightly. Three small screws and a small piece of the battery cover are missing, and the screen is also somewhat scratched. None of this is serious. The question is whether the device still works perfectly.
My parcel contains two batteries. One is as good as new, supposedly has a higher capacity and a nice Swiss cross, which is supposed to serve as a seal of quality. It doesn't work though. The second looks completely broken with a ripped off bottom, but it does work.
Unbelievable. With devices this old, the battery is almost always dead. As new batteries of this type are no longer made, I made sure I could use a battery if necessary: the PowerShot A50 accepts a lithium type 2CR5.
Using it is not the same as it is today. At first, I don't know how to turn the camera on. But fortunately, I've already written an article about it. In my own manual, I read, "Consult the instructions for use."
So I look at the instruction manual: switching on and off is done with the mode wheel. This may seem clever at first glance, but it's not. If the camera goes to sleep in P mode, I can't turn it off without turning it back on. Because there's another mode in between, the wheel can't be turned directly to off. This is probably why all later cameras have a separate on/off switch.
When I turn the camera on, the lens cap opens and the lens immediately extends. Then nothing happens for at least five seconds. The 1999 computer has to boot up first.
By the way, the lens always stays out when the battery is empty. This is already the case after 20-30 photos with the old battery. The camera does not recognise in time that the power is low. There's no battery status display. I also have to retype the date and time each time. However, a new backup battery might fix this.
Yes, it supports RAW. No, that's not much help.
First I take some photos in JPEG format. The bright parts of the image are very quickly overexposed, as the image on the left shows. This cannot, of course, be corrected afterwards; see the image on the right.
The camera has exposure compensation, I have it set to -0.6 EV. I have to do it in the menu. Now the shadows are getting too dark, but that can be corrected.
The RAW format is better suited to these later corrections, and the camera supports it. So I switch from JPEG to RAW in the menu. When I try to take a picture afterwards, nothing happens. Nothing works any more, I can't even turn the camera off. Has it broken down already? No: the camera needs about 20 seconds to write the 1.5 MB file to the CF card. During this time, everything is blocked.
The added value of the RAW format is modest. I can't get much out of post-production. I suppose this is due to the resolution. JPEG has 8 bit per colour channel (256 colours). A modern camera has 14 bit (16384 colours). The PowerShot A50 calculates internally with 10 bit. According to this tool, the RAW file itself has only 8 bit. This is also what it looks like to me when I'm editing.
RAW images can only be viewed as mini icons (160×120 pixels) on the camera itself.
But the RAW format has an advantage. The colour scheme is quite different from the basic JPEG alignment, and I prefer it that way. It almost looks a bit like film.
Two examples with relatively low light, which I had to clear up later:
This is a backlight shot. Not bad at all.
So leeeent
The reason the camera has no video function is clear, the recording process is far too slow. Burst images switch to JPEG format with a reduced resolution (640×480 pixels). The camera therefore takes around one photo per second.
The autofocus is just as slow. In the user manual, "moving subjects" are described as "unsuitable for autofocus". However, manual focusing is not possible. The best I can do is try to focus with the shutter release only half-pressed.
Viewfinder and screen
You can't trust the colour representation on the screen at all. Blue skies usually appear turquoise. What's more, the representation is highly dependent on the viewing angle.
The screen, or rather its backlight quickly drains the battery. However, it is possible to take photos without the screen, in which case the battery will last four times as long. Information is displayed on the small secondary LCD screen, which operates without a backlight. The camera has an optical viewfinder that zooms in with the lens.
However, the part of the image that the viewfinder shows when shooting close-up is incorrect. You're not looking through the lens as you would with an SLR camera, but over it.
Dusk
In contrast to later compact cameras, there is virtually no image noise in low light. This is not surprising, as this little gem of technology always captures at ISO 65. In the dark, the image will simply go dark. Higher ISO values are possible with reduced resolution. But who wants to further reduce a 1.3 megapixel resolution?
Aperture and shutter speed cannot be set directly. There is only one setting, 'long time', which allows longer exposure times. The camera simply closes the aperture to the smallest possible value (f/11), which can result in longer exposure times. What's more, closing the aperture in low light to let in even less light is a rather original idea. Not to say crazy.
When I took photos at dusk with these settings, I had no idea that they had only been taken with f/11. And I was surprised that the autofocus worked so badly.
A closed aperture is great against the sun, but there are no "long times" (1/125 second).
This is all heavily edited, of course. Or at least insofar as the limited RAW format allows.
The panorama function: fantastic, amazing and wonderful
I'm surprised that a digital camera from 1999 has a panorama function. But the advantage is obvious: by combining several images, you get an image with better resolution. With a basic resolution of 1.3 megapixels, this is more than desirable.
Panoramas can be taken horizontally, vertically and as a 2×2 matrix. More than four images can be combined horizontally and vertically. The camera displays the previously captured image and the viewfinder image overlapping, so I can select the appropriate view. Care is also taken to ensure that the overlap area is sufficiently wide.
Of course, the camera doesn't calculate every frame itself. What are you going to imagine? The year is 1999. To do this, I install software with the CD provided. Compatible with Windows 95, 98 and NT 4.0. Great.
With my horizontal panorama, it works really well. Better than with Adobe Lightroom, which I've opened so I can compare. Lightroom's panorama function creates a clearly visible error during an image transition. The panorama made up of four images is 3424 pixels wide; that's something.
The software, on the other hand, has difficulty with the registration of matrices. The bridge appears to be an adventurous construction. The metal post and electric wires show some artificial bumps.
The reason for these problems: when the camera is pointed upwards, the lines scroll differently. Adobe Lightroom takes this into account and achieves a better result. The resolution of raster images is approximately 1950×1300 pixels.
Overview: my inner nerd is happy
I've just tested a camera that you can't buy any more and is useless. So one possible conclusion would be that I'm a nerd.
What about the camera in all this? This PowerShot A50 still works perfectly after all this time. That alone already deserves a round of applause. The lens cap certainly has something to do with it.
The camera isn't as bad as I first thought. I even managed to take some very nice photos with it. The light has to be just right and only static patterns can go on forever. I see it as training: it teaches me to only turn the camera on when there's a good chance of getting a great shot.
Of course the resolution is ridiculous, the speed a joke, the handling a pain and the battery life really bad, even with a new battery. But that was all to be expected. After all, you can't blame an 18th century car for not having a lane assistant.
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David Lee
Senior Editor
David.Lee@digitecgalaxus.chMy interest in IT and writing landed me in tech journalism early on (2000). I want to know how we can use technology without being used. Outside of the office, I’m a keen musician who makes up for lacking talent with excessive enthusiasm.
