Canon EOS Digital Rebel Digital Camera Review

Front (7.0)
The Front of the Canon EOS Digital Rebel doesn’t differ much in format from other digital or film SLRs. On the left side of the camera, there is a black handgrip for ease of use and handling. The black material is made of plastic, similar to the rest of the outer shell, but it's more rubbery to enhance gripping ability. Directly to the right of the handgrip is the red-eye reduction/self-timer lamp, which flashes bright white when either of these functions is activated. (The self-timer button is on the top of the camera, and red-eye reduction is turned on or off in the menu.) The largest feature on the front of the Canon EOS Digital Rebel is the digital EF-S zoom lens. With an aperture range of f/3.5-5.6, the Digital Rebel’s kit lens reaches from 18mm to 55mm. At the base of the lens is a switch that allows you to switch from auto to manual focus.

Above the lens is a built-in flash that can be popped up or pushed down, depending on your lighting preferences. The built-in flash ranges from 2.3 feet to 30.2 feet, depending on ISO setting and focal range. To manually pop up the flash, you need to hit the flash button to the upper right of the lens. Directly below the flash, to the right of the lens, is a large black button that is used to release the lens from the camera. To use it, you need to press the button and turn the lens to the right until it can pull away from the body. The last button on the front of the Digital Rebel is the Depth of Field button to the bottom right of the lens. When this button is pressed, the camera steps down to the current aperture setting and allows you to see the depth of field through the viewfinder before you press the shutter button.

Back (8.0)
The back of Canon’s EOS Digital Rebel is laid out very nicely. Along the left side, there are five evenly spaced and easily reachable control buttons: Menu, Information, Jump, Playback, and Trash. If you press any of these buttons once, they will give you options. If you press them again, they will return to record mode. At the top is the Menu button common to most digital cameras. When pressed, the menu appears on the LCD screen and allows you to change various settings and controls. The Info button displays the current camera settings, such as Date/Time, AEB (auto exposure bracketing) amount, WB-BKT (White Balance Auto Bracketing) amount, Processing Parameter Setting, Image review, Image review time, Auto rotate, and ISO speed. The Jump button can be used to skip ahead or behind ten images, allowing quick jumping around without having to click through each image if you have a large amount of images on your card.

The next button down is the Playback button, which allows you to view and scroll through all your images, look at their shooting information (by also pressing the Info button), zoom in to see details, rotate them, and continuously view them in Auto playback. The bottom button in this string is the Erase button. This function, only active in Playback mode, allows you to erase either one image at a time or the entire card at once.

The largest feature on the back of the camera is the LCD screen. This TFT color liquid crystal monitor is 1.8 inches at 118,000 pixels. This is a pretty standard size for an SLR — the 10D is virtually identical — but the Canon LCDs have slightly fewer pixels than the Nikon D70's, at 130,000 pixels. Directly above the LCD is the LCD panel, which displays shutter speed, date/time, battery level, white balance, exposure level, ISO speed, AF point selection, error codes, aperture value, shots remaining, image-recording quality, and other features such as red-eye reduction, single or continuous shooting mode, and self-timer. Above the LCD panel is the viewfinder, with a dioptric adjustment feature to aid in focusing. The rubber piece encasing the viewfinder is removable, allowing the user to attach a cover to prevent extra light from entering.

To the left of the LCD panel are two separate buttons and the four-button cross key set. The top button is the Aperture value/Exposure compensation button, which permits the main control dial to change the aperture value. The other button is the LCD panel illuminator button, useful in situations where it’s too dark to view the camera settings. The four cross key set is important for navigating the Canon EOS Digital Rebel's options. Replacing the large black dial that has appeared on all other Canon Digital SLRs, the four keys allow you to navigate up and down and side to side on menus, with images in playback mode. The top and bottom cross keys have two functions each; the up arrow also functions as an ISO speed set button, and the arrow pointing down functions as a White Balance button. (These two buttons work similar to the Av +/- button in that they activate the function as the main dial is used to change the setting within it.) The Set button in the middle is used as an “okay” or “select” button that allows the user to proceed to the next step of the task. To the bottom right of the four-way navigation is a little light called the Access Lamp. This indicates anything having to do with the CF card: data being written, read, transferred, or erased.

The last two buttons on the back of the Canon EOS Digital Rebel are the in the top right corner of the body. On the left is the AE lock/FE lock button/Index/Reduce button. The AE locks an exposure and the FE (Flash exposure) locks a flash exposure from any scene; both allow you to shift your camera to a different scene while maintaining a desired exposure. In playback mode, this button can be used to view images in an index or zoom out if they have been enlarged or zoomed out. The button on the right is the AF point selector/Enlarge button. In shooting mode, this button helps you choose a specific point in your frame to focus on. In playback mode, it can be used to zoom in on any image. 

Left Side (7.5)
The left side of the Canon 300D Digital Rebel is covered with the same black rubbery material that is on the right-hand grip. At the top of the side, there is a strap mount used to attach the included strap. The only other feature is a long rubbery door encasing the Digital, Video Out, and Remote control terminals. The Digital terminal accepts a designated USB cable (included) and can be plugged into any computer to download images. The Video Out terminal connects the camera to a TV with the video cable (included) and allows you to view your images on a large screen. The Remote control terminal accepts an RS-60E3 Remote Switch (optional accessory) which acts as a shutter release cable to prevent camera shake in telephoto or long exposure shots.

Right Side (8.0)
The right-hand side of the Canon EOS Digital Rebel has the grip that is standard on all SLR cameras. Although the size and shape of the grip is standard I didn’t get the satisfaction that one often gets when you’re gripping something really substantial. This is due to the lightweight design of the Canon EOS Digital Rebel. Within the handgrip, a terminal cover conceals a CF card slot. To open the cover, you need to push the door to the left a little bit and then swing it open. I like this design because it prevents the door from popping open easily. The CF card slides right into the slot and locks into place, requiring you to use the little black eject button to release it again. Above the terminal cover is a strap mount, identical to the one of the left side.

Top (8.5)
In addition to the built-in flash, the Canon EOS Digital Rebel also has a hot shoe for external flash units. This is a standard feature in all SLRs and some higher-end non-SLRs as well (e.g. the Fuji S7000). To the right of the flash features is the Mode dial. This differs from other SLRs, such as the Canon EOS 10D and Nikon D70, which have their mode dials positioned on the left side of the flash units. Both are easily accessible with your thumb and index finger, but I prefer dials on the right, since I’m right-handed and the other control functions on the Rebel are all located on the right.

The Canon EOS Digital Rebel divides the Mode dial functions into two zones: the Creative Zone and the Basic zone, which has a subdivision labeled the Image zone. The Creative Zone has settings that offer more control and flexibility: Program AE (P), Shutter priority AE (Tv), Aperture priority AE (Av), Manual exposure (M), and Automatic Depth-of-field AE (A-DEP). The Basic Zone has fully automatic settings, with six Image Zones within it: Portrait, Landscape, Close-up, Sports, Night Portrait, and Flash Off.