Canon autumn product launch: The compacts

The 8-megapixel PowerShot SX100 IS sidles into the superzoom category with a 10x optical zoom lens. That's a 35mm film equivalent focal length of 36-360mm, capable of impressive 10mm macro snapping. There's a 64mm (2.5-inch) LCD screen on the back. Canon's total anti-blur solution with optical image stabiliser does the hard work of avoiding camera shake, while auto ISO shift tries to keep blur down and hopefully doesn't bring in too much noise in the process.

A dedicated face selector button activates Canon's face select and track function, which does what it says on the tin: enables you to select a face and track it across the image. Impressively, face detection will pick out up to 35 faces detected in frame.

The SX100 IS is priced at £299 and will be available in September.