Canon PowerShot SD970 IS

Color (12.70)

In our tests for color accuracy, the Canon SD970 IS scored well; among our comparison group of cameras, only the Sony T900 surpassed it.

This is a test of color accuracy, not attractiveness, so we shoot in each color mode the camera offers to determine which one comes reproduces the hues in the X-Rite ColorChecker test chart with the least color error. We had a surprise with the SD970 IS here. While the wide range of available color settings includes both Neutral and Standard, the one with the most accurate color was actually Vivid Red. This is not to say that the Standard and Neutral settings were substantially flawed, and we would be inclined to use them for most shooting. However, while Vivid Red did produce an oversaturated result (nearly 107%), the actual colors in this mode were indisputably closer to the color chart values, according to Imatest image analysis software. The flesh tones were very close to the actual chart patches, greens, oranges and deep blues were spot on, though light blues demonstrated some color shift. As for the reds, while they were boosted in intensity, the colors were accurately rendered. More on how we test color.

In the chart below we illustrate the colors captured by the Canon and three similarly priced competitors, with the exposures corrected to display the same luminance.

Camera Color Comparisons
	Ideal	Canon PowerShot SD970 IS	Casio Exilim EX-FC100	Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR	Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T900
Dark Skin
Light Skin
Blue Sky
Foliage
Blue Flower
Bluish Green
	Ideal	Canon PowerShot SD970 IS	Casio Exilim EX-FC100	Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR	Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T900
Orange
Purplish Blue
Moderate Red
Purple
Yellow Green
Orange Yellow
	Ideal	Canon PowerShot SD970 IS	Casio Exilim EX-FC100	Fujifilm FinePix F200EXR	Sony Cyber-shot DSC-T900
Blue
Green
Red
Yellow
Magenta
Cyan

Color Modes (5.00)

There is certainly no shortage of color control available on the SD970 IS thanks to the My Colors feature, which offers eleven preset color adjustments. These include Vivid and Neutral, Sepia and Black and White, Positive Film (boosting colors to mimic color print film), Lighter Skin Tone and Darker Skin Tone, Vivid Red, Vivid Green and Vivid Blue. The changes you make are reflected on-screen as you make them, which makes the system much more practical and fun to fiddle with. And if the presets don’t suit your artistic temperament, the Custom Color option lets users adjust contrast, sharpness and color saturation, red, green, blue and skin tone levels. It’s not a precision tool, with only five available levels for each setting, but it’s useful if there’s a particular color you’d like to see ‘pop’ more, or want to soften up someone’s overly ruddy complexion.