3. Modes

Canon divides shooting modes into what they call the Creative Zone and the Image Zone. These two zones on the shooting mode dial are separated by the Auto mode, which is marked in green. In the Auto mode, the camera is essentially a point and shoot camera. It figures out everything for you.

In the image zone, the camera has preset configurations for specific types of scenes. There are individual settings for portraits, landscapes or night photos. The selection marked SCN (Special Scene) has options for 10 additional scene types including Night Snapshot, Kids and Pets, Indoor, Foliage, Snow, Beach, Fireworks and one that we hope to test, underwater (The camera isn’t waterproof. Canon offers an optional waterproof case - WP-DC8).

There’s a mode called Color Accent in which only specified colors remain, and all others are transformed to black and white. Similarly, there’s also a Color Swap mode that lets you transform one color to another specified color. The image zone also includes a Stitch Assist mode that helps you overlap pictures for stitching in your computer. Unlike the HP PhotoSmart cameras, the Canon A630 and A640 don’t perform in-camera stitching - stitching is done with a supplied application.

The last selection in the image zone is Movie Mode. In standard mode, you can shoot movies at 640X480 or 320X240 at either 15FPS or 30FPS. The maximum file size is 1 GB, and Canon recommends using high-speed SD memory cards to avoid buffer overflow problems. Both the color accent and the color swap features described above are also available for movies. There’s also a Compact movie mode, intended to produce videos suitable for emails, that shoots at a lower resolution and has a maximum length of three minutes.

The Creative Zone is probably where many A630 users will spend most of their shooting time. The Creative Zone gives you complete control of the camera. There’s a Program mode, Shutter Priority mode, Aperture Priority mode, Manual mode and a custom mode that you can define. In the creative zone, you have more options that aren’t available in image zone options such as manual focus and selection of Auto-focus frame areas.

By default, the camera automatically selects between nine auto focus frames. Even in the image zone, you also have the option of selecting center focus. But in the creative zone, you can also choose FlexiZone focusing that lets you select which autofocus zone the camera should use to focus. This can be a real help in framing hard-to-focus images. And, if auto focus doesn’t meet your needs, manual focus is available in many modes.

When using manual focus, the center portion of the screen is magnified to help you focus. An on-screen indicator also gives you an approximation of the current focal length. To focus, you use the left/right buttons on the control on the back of the camera. It’s nowhere as easy as using manual focus on a DSLR, but it’s better than not having manual focus at all.

While in capture mode, a tap of the Function/Set button brings up Canon’s familiar configuration screen. Functions being configured appear on the left of the screen, and selected values appear across the bottom of the screen. You use the four navigation arrows to make your choices, and press the Set button to confirm your choice.

In playback mode, you have a number of options. You can view the picture without any image information. A tap of the display button adds summary information including time/date resolution and image number. A second tap of the display button displays complete information about exposure, EV, mode show, White Balance and a histogram. The playback menu also allows you to auto play your pictures, change colors and save a new image using the built-in My Colors options. You can also save a sound file memo, a feature that’s useful for helping you remember why you may have taken a picture.