I got this Canon Sure Shot in a box of cameras that I picked up for $25. I found 5 cameras out of the box that I’ve enjoyed shooting. This is a pretty good one. It is auto exposure and auto focus, just point and shoot. It is very similar to the Canon Sure Shot Tele that I’ve already looked at, but it’s an earlier model, so you have to advance and rewind the film with a button instead of it happening automatically. Also you have to set the asa film speed manually, which you will see is something of an advantage.
It has a fast, semi-wide 38mm 2.8 lens. The lens is fairly sharp, but nothing amazing. It uses 2 AA batteries, instead of the expensive 2CR5 that the Tele uses. It is also smaller and lighter than the Tele. It auto advances the film between shots and does it in a pretty noisy fashion. The asa goes from 50 to 400 in 3rd of a stop increments and then jumps up to 1000 asa instead of 800 like a lot of other cameras. The Tele set the asa automatically using DX encoding up to 1600 asa.
The cool thing about having a manually set asa is that you can cheat a bit with some film. I wanted to try some Fuji Neopan 1600, but I didn’t really like the Fuji at the box speed of 1600, I wanted to try it a little slower. So I loaded it into the Sure Shot and rated it at 1000. I was very pleased with the results. Shot at 1600, the Fuji Neopan is too contrasty and doesn’t have enough mid-tones for my taste. Shooting at 1000, it still has good contrast, but the mid-tones are much more apparent and the grain is nice and not overwhelming.
This combo gave me a point and shoot with pretty decent low-light capabilities. So good in fact, that I never tested the flash. Unfortunately, Fuji has discontinued the Neopan 1600 film, so I only have 5 rolls left in the freezer and then it’s gone. I’m going to try shooting some Tri-X at 1000 and 1600 to see if I can use it as a replacement.
I took it to a New Year’s Eve party and took some snaps without a flash. It did a great job. Well exposed and in focus, easy to use, just the thing for a party camera.
The Sure Shot is a great, inexpensive way to take some snap shots, even in low-light with right film.