Canon EOS 30D

Auto Mode (8.0)
A Full Auto mode in the 30D sets all the major controls on the camera: aperture, shutter speed, ISO, autofocus mode, and metering pattern. In Full Auto, the controls for all these functions are locked out, so it's not possible to accidentally change a setting. The 30D also has a Program mode, which controls both aperture and shutter speed, but allows control of other settings.

Full Auto mode worked well in typical shooting situations, as long as the lighting didn't get too contrasty or tricky. The 30D's exposure system prioritizes the shutter speed to avoid camera shake. In general, it keeps the aperture wide open until the shutter speed is the reciprocal of the lens's focal length – with a 50mm lens, it keeps the lens wide open up to a shutter speed of 1/45, and with an 80mm lens, it keeps it wide open up to a shutter speed of about 1/90. That's a good rule to follow. In general, the 30D sets shooting parameters about the way an experienced photographer would.

We found that the 30D handles difficult lighting no better than other digital cameras – in short, it takes a middle-of-the-road approach with backlighting, trying to retain detail everywhere in the frame, even when that's not possible. The result is that backlit subjects are a bit darker than they should be and their backgrounds retain a bit of detail, and very light, small subjects on dark backgrounds are too light, while their backgrounds retain detail as well. In both cases, the 30D does better in automatic with evaluative metering than it would with straight averaging metering, which would expose for the background. Still, setting the correct exposure for a contrasty scene depends on the photographer's intent, and manually controlling the camera will achieve the best results.

Drive / Burst Mode (8.0)
The 30D maintains the 20D's 5-frames-per-second performance, with a maximum burst of about 30 high-quality, full-resolution JPEGs. When the 20D came out, this level of performance was ground-breaking, but others have caught up by now. The Nikon D200 shoots 10.2 megapixel images at 5 frames per second, with a maximum burst of 30 images, and is in the same price category as the 30D. Higher-end cameras do better: the Nikon D2X hits 5 fps with 12 megapixel images, and the real high-speed cameras, the Canon EOS 1D Mark II n and the Nikon D2Hs, hit 8.5 fps and 8 fps respectively.

Still, 5 fps is solid performance for weddings, most photojournalism and sports, and it's a big advantage over 3fps, the common speed for entry-level DSLRs. The 30D has a low-speed burst mode, which shoots at a fixed 3 fps rate and is not customizable, like Nikon’s implementation on the D200.

Playback Mode (7.5)
The 30D plays back images in a few ways. Its default display shows the last image shot full-screen, with the file number and the total number of images in memory, shutter and aperture. Pressing the Info button brings up more comprehensive data, including date and time, white balance, file format, exposure compensation data, ISO, file size, shooting mode, color space, metering pattern and white balance compensation, along with a thumbnail of the image. Pressing it again gets rid of all of the text and shows the image full frame.

In addition, the 30D offers a 9-image index display, for searching the card for a particular image, and a magnified view, which enlarges the image up to 10x. We found 10x sufficient for evaluating focus, and were pleased to have the four-way controller for navigating around the enlarged view. Users can skip 10 or 100 images, or find a specific shooting date, with the 30D’s Jump button, which speeds up the searching process considerably.

Everyone loves slide shows, and the 30D doesn't skip this important feature. Unfortunately, its implementation is pretty bare-bones – it shows all the images on the memory card, has a fixed interval of 3 seconds, and doesn't offer transitions or sound effects.

Direct printing functions are also activated through the playback menu.

Movie Mode (0.0)
Conventional DSLRs like the 30D can't offer movie modes, because their image sensors are covered by the camera shutter except when taking still exposures. The new, live-preview Four-Thirds DSLRs could theoretically offer movie modes, but so far, they don't.