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The Canon EOS 50D has an impressive expanded ISO range of 100-12800 and a 3 inch LCD screen boasting 920,000 dots. It is a 15.1 megapixel camera.

I’ll start by telling you that this is a superb camera and stands as a serious investment for an amateur as well as an affordable and quality back up for a professional.

With its magnesium alloy body’s tough, resilient finish, the Canon 50D was made to last. The battery and memory card doors and both dust and moisture resistant adding to the quality of this camera by keeping it clean and safe when shooting outdoors in more demanding conditions such as on the beach.

The HDMI port is found on the left hand side of the body.

It might take a new user a little while to memorise and become familiar with all the buttons on the body of the camera, which dial does what etc, but Canon has made use of the 50D easier by showing all of the settings on the main screen as well as the status screen. The kind of camera that I think the Canon 50D is, you wouldn’t buy it only for use during those ‘special moments’. It’s more a here, there and everywhere use camera that a photographer would favour and when using it often, all of the feature and options would become somewhat of a second nature to you – so don’t let them daunt you at first.

The Numbers: shooting at an incredible 6.3 frames per second, weighing in at 730 grams without a lens fitted and surviving around 800 shots per battery charge, the numbers are looking great.
The Canon 50D is charged by a 1,390mAH BP-511A which is used by several generations of Canon cameras.

Auto Lighting Optimizer assists photography by analyzing the brightness of subjects and automatically adjusting darker images to appear brighter.

The Canon 50D has a few shooting modes which are aimed at assisting beginners: close-up, landscape, sports, portrait, and night portrait as well as flash off options.

There is an option called Auto Depth of Field which gives the image a wider depth of field between near and far objects / subjects.

There is a new mode aimed at assisting beginners who are past using Full Automatic mode. It is called Creative Mode. It allows you to change key settings using the LCD. You are given a basic ‘slider system’ for adjusting background and exposure.

The Canon 50D has three auto focus modes, namely: One Shot, AI Focus and AI Servo, each offering unique and different options for faster or slower shooting. In standard Auto Focus Mode the Canon EOS 50D offers fast, effective autofocus, which tracks moving subjects really well and operates near silently. Focus is set by use of the AF-On Lock button rather than the more common method of pressing the shutter button half way in.

This Canon is the first Canon SLR to present its user with the new DIGIC 4 processor. The DIGIC 4 generously and notably speeds up image review times, start up times and image processing. It also aids in better noise reduction when using higher ISO options.

The Canon 50D features Face Detection in Live View mode for up to thirty five faces, auto focusing on the faces by preference.

I did find that Live View was incredibly annoying to turn on. Canon has made a rather odd choice by hiding the on option in the menu and there is no on button on the body of the camera. Once you have turned Live View on, you can activate it by pressing the Print button found on the back of the camera left of the view finder. It was only later I found out that the PicBridge button on the body below the LCD allows you to toggle between regular and Live View mode! (silly me) So hopefully in reading this you will save yourself that frustration.

There are gridlines in live view mode to assist with photo composition.
The EOS 50D makes use of the same dust removing technology as other Canon models. The sensor is briefly shaken at high frequency to loosen and dislodge and dust from its surface.

Peripheral Illumination Correction is a new feature. It auto-corrects the unpleasant effect of vignetting seen in the corners of a typical wide angle photograph.

A Fantastic Feature: With most DSLR camera systems you would need to send your camera and lens off for calibration, you might even have to pay for this depending on where you go, but with the Canon EOS 50D you have a brilliant feature called AF Micro Adjustment. This allows you to calibrate your lenses yourself and store the settings for up to 20 of your own lenses.

Canon has managed to fit in an extra FN (Function) button just below the LCD. This button can be assigned to your favourite menu option.

My Conclusion: I really enjoyed using this camera and I am thrilled to give it 4.5 stars! It is brilliant for both professionals and enthusiasts wanting to invest in something worthwhile that will deliver in both quality and functionality.