The S95 has only a few external controls, making it very menu-intensive in terms of its operation. With all of the main bases covered by external controls, almost all of the other key shooting settings which aren't covered are ranged within the S95's 'Fn' menu. This menu is where you'll find options like image quality, bracketing and continuous shooting, as well as ISO, aspect ratio and white balance. This leaves the S95's main menu system to take care of the rest of the camera's functionality, including customization options, AF modes and 'nuts and bolts' options like LCD screen brightness, date and time, and the like.
Menu navigation is made easier by the addition of a 'My Menu' tab which displays a maximum of 5 options. You can either let the S95 populate this list with the last 5 settings that you accessed, or after you've had some time to use the camera you can permanently assign the 5 menu settings that you most frequently adjust.
When shooting with the camera, you can toggle between of two display modes - basic shooting info, or basic shooting info plus rule of thirds gridlines and a live histogram.
In manual focus mode, with 'MF spot zoom' activated in the shooting menu, the central portion of the live view screen is magnified for more accurate manual focus. When movie shooting is selected the screen is cropped to 16:9 and the screen shows the amount of footage which can be captured on the inserted card. When shooting commences, this is replaced by a timer which counts upwards.
The basic screen in image review mode shows file information and date and time of capture. Pressing 'Disp' again shows more detailed information, including a luminance histogram and a detailed breakdown of key shooting settings.
When 'focus check' is selected against 'Review Info' in the menu, the area of the focusing point is shown in enlarged section, which aids to quickly check critical focus between similar shots. If more than one focus point was used, pressing 'FUNC/SET' toggles the enlarged area. There are ten levels of magnification possible in review mode - the most extreme gives a view roughly approximate to 100% (actual pixels).
The FUNC SET menu is the quickest way to access key shooting settings such as aspect ratio, image quality and metering mode, as well as Picture Styles and bracketing. The S95's triple-tabbed menu system is clear and concise, and comprises a shooting section, a setup tab, and a 'My Menu' where the last-used functions are automatically placed.
Inside the shooting menu you will find all the settings which pertain to everyday operation of the camera. And everything else can be found in the S95's setup menu. This is where you'll find the various customization options.
The 'S' button can be assigned to more than just direct printing. I think that the most useful setting to assign is AE Lock. The Control Ring can be customized to adjust a range of different functions. I like to use it to adjust ISO. Interestingly, your ISO selection is remembered in the P, Av and Tv modes, so if you set ISO 400 in P, this will stay set in Av and Tv only.
Shared from DPReview.
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