Introduction

Ease of Use

Although not the biggest bridge camera on the market, the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS is still reasonably sizeable - you're not going to be able to fit into a coat or jacket pocket. You're also likely going to want use both hands when shooting with it - your left to steady the lens, especially when shooting at the far reach of the telephoto optic.

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS's grip has a textured coating which has a double effect of both giving it a higher quality feel and helping it to feel secure in the hand. The grip is recessed so your middle finger sits comfortably on the grip, while your forefinger rests naturally on the shutter release.

Just behind the shutter release button is a scrolling dial which is used for different functions, depending on the shooting mode you're in. In aperture priority, it controls aperture, while in shutter priority it controls shutter speed. If you're shooting in full manual, you can switch between altering shutter speed and aperture by pressing the exposure compensation button. The dial itself is very easily reached by your forefinger and has just the right amount of resistance to it.

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

The shutter button meanwhile needs to be pressed in quite firmly to take the shot. This can sometimes have an impact on very precise framing, as pressing the button down so firmly can cause the camera to shift just a fraction. It can also cause a little shake, which can be problematic when using slow shutter speeds, it's recommended therefore that you use the self-timer if you're shooting something like that to give the camera time to steady again before exposing the shot.

There's a reasonably large mode dial, which gives you quick access to all of the different exposure modes which the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS offers. There's manual and semi-automatic modes (P/A/S/M), along with automatic, Hybrid Auto, scene modes, Creative Shot and digital effects. There's also LIVE, which displays the effect making a change to certain settings makes. It's designed to help you get the shot you want without necessarily knowing the photographic terminology to achieve it.

Hybrid Automatic mode is a fun option for special occasions, such as a wedding or a party. The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS will take a short video just before the shutter button is pressed, giving you a movie at the end of the day which contains all your still photos along with the two second clips combined into one video. A new video is created each day, but there's no way to edit which photos / video make it into the final video for the day. You can't use this option if you're shooting on one of the other modes, either.

Moving to the back of the camera, there's a traditional four way navigational pad, with each of the directional keys having an assigned function. Up controls ISO, left controls focusing type (manual, general, macro), down changes the way the display looks, while right accesses flash controls. Although there is a button for flash controls, you still need to raise the flash yourself manually when you want to use it.

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

If you press the central button on the navipad, a sort of quick menu will appear. You'll be presented with different options depending on which shooting mode you're shooting in. If you're in one of the advanced (semi-automatic / manual) modes, you'll have more options than when shooting in automatic or scene mode. It's a handy way to access different options, such as white balance, aspect ratio, image size and so on without having to go into a long winded main menu. You'll have to press the central button again to get rid of the menu altogether. Although it will disappear if you half press the shutter release, it'll still be there when you let go.

There are three more buttons on the back of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS - a playback button, a main menu button and another button for quickly accessing the Wi-Fi settings.

If you press this latter button, the information you'll need to connect to the camera from a smart device will be displayed. Once you've connected, you need Canon's Camera Connect app where you can download images you've taken or control the camera remotely. Unfortunately, I was unable to get the app to recognise that the camera was connected to my smartphone - I suspect that the app hasn't been updated for the new camera. However, I've used Canon Camera Connect before and it's performed well in the past so hopefully this just requires a quick update from the company.

The main menu, accessed via its own button, is divided into two sections, one for altering picture settings, such as IS Settings and Date Stamp. Most of the settings you'll likely be changing often, such as white balance etc, are contained within the quick menu mentioned earlier. The other tab on the main menu is for altering non picture related settings, such as the date and time, the volume of the camera and so on.

Top of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

On the back of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS is a thumb rest, and on the side of this you'll find two more buttons. There's a direct video record button for quickly recording movies, and the exposure compensation button. When you've pressed this latter button, you can use the scrolling dial on the top of the camera to add in some positive or negative exposure compensation.

Around the shutter release button is the zoom switch. It's quite a fluid motion and takes you from the fully wide position to the full optical zoom satisfyingly quickly, pausing for just a split second before entering the digital zoom realm - useful if you want to keep an eye on only using optical zoom.

Although there's no zoom switch on the lens barrel as you find with some other cameras like this, there are a couple of useful buttons. The first is the Zoom Framing Assist button. If you're shooting a subject at the far reach of the zoom and it goes out of frame (such as a bird, for instance), you can hold this button down and the lens will quickly zoom back out until you've relocated the subject. Once you've found it, release the button and the zoom will return to its previous position. It's much quicker than doing it using the zoom switch and is very handy for wildlife and moving subjects. Just underneath this button is another which you can use for locking onto a moving subject - again useful for wildlife and sports photography.

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS In-hand

There's no viewfinder on the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS, if you think you're likely to want one of those, have a look at the higher specced Canon PowerShot SX60 HS. The screen meanwhile although fairly low resolution by some standards, at 461,000 dots, copes well in most situations except for very bright sunlight. It's also a fixed screen so not quite so useful for awkward angles, selfies and so on.

On the base of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS you'll find a screw for attaching a tripod, as well as the door which conceals the camera's battery and memory card. It's a touch annoying that you can't access the memory card when the camera is attached to a tripod, but it's only a minor complaint.

Autofocus is generally swift and accurate, locking onto the subject with ease. It's a shame that you can't change the autofocus point though - especially given that you can manually control all of the other settings on the camera. Macro focusing is pretty impressive, you can almost be touching the subject with the lens and it will still focus - particularly useful for frame filling flower shots and so on.

Image Quality

All of the sample images in this review were taken using the 16 megapixel SuperFine JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of around 6Mb.

Colours directly from the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS are bright and punchy, displaying a good level of saturation and warmth - something we’ve come to expect from Canon cameras.

There’s also a decent level of detail, especially if you’re just looking at images at normal viewing or printing sizes (A4 or below). If you look at 100%, it’s possible to see a little image smoothing (even at pretty low ISOs such as ISO 100 or ISO 200). The likelihood of most users of this camera examining at 100% is pretty low though, and there’s a great overall impression of detail in most shots.

As we’d expect, there’s more smudging and noise present at higher ISOs, but it only starts to become problematic or visible at around ISO 800 and above at normal printing sizes. If you’re mainly using this as your holiday or travel camera, and are unlikely to be shooting often in dark conditions, you shouldn’t encounter too many problems.

Generally speaking it’s not necessary to dial in positive or negative exposure compensation as the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS’s automatic metering system does a good job of evaluating the scene to produce accurate exposures. There will be times, such as high contrast, where this isn’t true, but no more than we’d otherwise expect to have to use it.

There are a couple of different options for taking creative shots. You have the Creative Shot mode which takes one normal picture and then applies five different filter effects or crops (or a combination thereof) to choose from later. Alternatively, you can choose from a different set of filters, such as fish eye, from the filters exposure mode. It’s fun to experiment with both ways, but whether you like the results will likely come down to personal preference.

Images taken at the furthest reach of the optical zoom display a good level of detail and clarity. We’d advise against using the digital zoom unless you’re particularly desperate - it seems unlikely that you’ll need more than 50x zoom, though. Images taken with the digital zoom applied are grainy and smudgy, and it’s also difficult to keep the camera still enough at the full reach to get a blur free image (even with image stabilisation applied).

Noise

There are 6 ISO settings available on the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS. Here are some 100% crops which show the noise levels for each ISO setting.

ISO 100 (100% Crop)	ISO 200 (100% Crop)
ISO 400 (100% Crop)	ISO 800 (100% Crop)
ISO 1600 (100% Crop)	ISO 3200 (100% Crop)

Sharpening

Here are two 100% crops which have been Saved as Web - Quality 50 in Photoshop. The right-hand image has had some sharpening applied in Photoshop. The out-of-the camera images are a little soft at the default sharpening setting. You can change the in-camera sharpening level if you don't like the default look.

Original (100% Crop)	Sharpened (100% Crop)

Focal Range

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS's 50x zoom lens has a massive focal range of 24-1200mm, as illustrated by these examples.

24mm	1200mm

Chromatic Aberrations

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS suffered from chromatic aberrations, with purple fringing present around the edges of objects in high-contrast situations, particularly at the edges of the frame, as shown in the examples below.

Chromatic Aberrations 1 (100% Crop)	Chromatic Aberrations 2 (100% Crop)

Macro

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS allows you to focus on a subject that is just 0cms away from the camera. The first image shows how close you can get to the subject (in this case a compact flash card). The second image is a 100% crop.

Macro	Macro (100% Crop)

Flash

The flash settings on the Canon Powershot SX530 HS are Auto, Manual Flash On / Off, and Slow Sync Speed, with Red-eye Reduction options available in the main menu. These shots of a white coloured wall were taken at a distance of 1.5m.

Flash Off - Wide Angle (24mm)	Flash On - Wide Angle (24mm)
Flash Off - Telephoto (1200mm)	Flash On - Telephoto (1200mm)

And here are some portrait shots.

Flash Off	Flash Off (100% Crop)
Flash On	Flash On (100% Crop)

Night

The Canon Powershot SX530 HS's maximum shutter speed is 15 seconds, which is great news if you're seriously interested in night photography. The shot below was taken using a shutter speed of 15 seconds at ISO 100.

Night	Night (100% Crop)

Sample Images

This is a selection of sample images from the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS camera, which were all taken using the 16 megapixel Fine JPEG setting. The thumbnails below link to the full-sized versions, which have not been altered in any way.

Sample Movie & Video

Product Images

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS / Flash Raised

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS / Turned On

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS / Image Displayed

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS / Main Menu

Rear of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS / Quick Menu

Top of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Bottom of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Side of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Front of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS

Memory Card Slot / Battery Compartment

Conclusion

The Canon PowerShot SX530 HS is by no means a revolutionary camera, but what it does, it does well.

A camera like this will generally always represent a compromise. While you have a 50x optical zoom range, the maximum aperture at the wide end is only f/3.5.

It’s good to have manual control, but it’s a shame there’s not a bit more of it - such as the ability to change autofocus point. It would also be nice to shoot in raw format, but it’s perhaps not surprising that this feature is missing when you consider the price point.

You could argue that for not much more you could pick up an entry-level DSLR and kit lens - while that’s true, you also won’t have the huge zoom range, so again it’s about compromise.

Image quality from the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS is generally pretty good, especially if you’re shooting in good light - which you may be doing for the majority of occasions if it’s to be your holiday or travel camera.

There are also a few quirky aspects of the camera, such as Creative Shot and Hybrid Auto. It would be nice if you could have more control over both of these aspects, but they’re still a fun feature regardless.

Canon hasn’t particularly pushed the boundaries with this camera, and it doesn’t represent too much of an upgrade from the 42x optical zoom SX520, but if you’re in the market for a relatively basic bridge camera, it’s certainly one to look at. If you require one which gives you more features - such as a viewfinder, raw format shooting and so on, then there are others on the market for you, such as the Canon PowerShot SX60 HS.

If zoom is your main concern, 50x is quite a lot, but again it’s by no means outstanding in the current market. Both Nikon and Panasonic offer cameras at a similar price point (or cheaper) with a 60x optical zoom, which is also something worth considering.

Ratings (out of 5)
Design	3.5
Features	3.5
Ease-of-use	4
Image quality	3.5
Value for money	4

Main Rivals

Listed below are some of the rivals of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS.

Review Roundup

Reviews of the Canon PowerShot SX530 HS from around the web.

Specifications

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