Canon PowerShot SX170 IS sample pictures

The budget-friendly SX170 IS can take some very nice pictures under the right conditions. Just don't look at them too closely.

Joshua Goldman

Nov. 20, 2013 1:23 p.m. PT

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ISO comparison

These are 100 percent crops from the center of our test scene. Though you probably won't want to use its photos at full size, the SX170 IS overall produces very nice photos, especially for its price and features. Pixel peepers will see noise even at ISO 100, but it's not noticeable at reduced sizes. It starts to be more visible at ISO 400. Going above that, you'll start to see more color noise, artifacts, and loss of detail. The camera definitely favors dropping shutter speed over raising ISO when left in auto. That's good in general, but if you're not paying attention it could result in blurry photos.

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Color

Color performance is generally very good up to ISO 400. Above that you start to end up with noise that makes colors look off.

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Zoom range

The SX170's zoom lens goes from a wide 28mm wide (top) to 448mm telephoto (bottom).

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Creative Filters

For those who are addicted to the photo filters of smartphone apps, Canon includes several of its high-quality Creative Filters: Fisheye Effect, Miniature Effect, Toy Camera Effect, Monochrome, Super Vivid, and Poster Effect (the latter four are pictured here).

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Full-resolution SX170 IS sample

This slide and those that follow, all have links to download the 16-megapixel version of each image. They are large files, so it may take several seconds for them to download. You can also look at the samples taken with the SX160 IS.

View at full size.