Camera-Accessories Reviews

I bought this battery to have as a backup for the identical one that came with my Canon Powershot G5. The battery is fabulous. I've always been very displeased with the shooting capacity of digital cameras in general - they would run out of battery in a very short time. This battery was one of the deciding factors for me buying a Canon Powershot G5. According to a test on dpreview, it's the best performing battery (when used in the G3) out there for any digital camera (at the time of testing).

I've taken a few thousand pictures with it so far, and I'm very pleased. When using the LCD display for a mix of movies and pictures (on my G5), I get around 600 pictures out of one fully charged battery. I've never completely "emptied" the battery with the LCD screen off (preview only), but based on my experience so far, I would think that you'll get somewhere between 600-1000 pictures out of one fully charged battery - maybe more - when the LCD is not on all the time. If you take a lot of pictures (I can easily take 500 on a weekend trip), I would still recommend buying an extra battery though. I'm panicked about ever running out of battery (or memory) while I'm shooting.

Should you buy a cheaper non-Canon brand equivalent battery? I've not tried an equivalent for the BP-511, but I've got a DigiPower equivalent for my Canon Powershot S200 (Elph II), and it's crap. I would never buy and equivalent for my G5 camera, because in my experience, it's quite apparent that you get what you pay for.

Pros:
* Extremely good capacity - 500-1000 pictures on one charge with normal use.
* Charges relatively quick in my G5 - about 90 minutes

Cons:
* Very heavy. It'll weigh down your camera, but for the capacity it provides, I personally think it's worth it.

Conclusion: It's a very good battery - capacity is fabulous. I've had no problems with it - it doesn't overheat, it doesn't stop working, and so far after about 6 months of operation, I've noticed no drop in capacity. I give it an unconditional 5 stars!!!

A little pity that it doesn't have a main dial and an AE lock on it. it gets really hard to use automatica exposure when you are shooting vertical. Otherwise a very nice accessory of ElanII.

If you have this camera and a functional lens for it, then buy this accessory before any other and begin to save money on batteries immediately. By using AA batteries you save enough money to pay for this thing quite soon, and if you use rechargeables, like I do, for nearly everything that uses AA batteries, you pay for it even quicker.
It adds a balance to these cameras which helps you feel comfortable taking photos from angles you would have hesitated from before. As a former full-time journalist I started carrying this type of camera because they were cheap enough to have several alike, you didn't get your heart broken if they got destroyed, and you can find plenty of affordable, useful accessories for them. This is not a luxury item, but a necessity. Buy it!

Can't think of anything bad to say about this little gadget. You'll save money and time by using the AA battery option, and when you attach this to your EOS body, people take notice. This is a very professional working and looking tool.

My reasons for finally buying this accessory were different than those of the first reviewer, though I have to agree that when I have it attached to my camera, it definitely makes it look cooler!

In my case, I was just sick and tired of having otherwise great shots become less than great because I couldn't keep the horizontal in the horizon. The final straw was a lovely mood shot taken last summer in our drought parched wetlands. Birds were congregating in the one or two scum covered spots with moisture, and I shot a lovely silhouette of a sandhill crane surrounded by soft green. Of course, wanting to accentuate the height of the bird, I shot vertically--and the resulting photo looked tipsy.

Perhaps others have a steadier hand when shooting with the camera shutter, but mine invariably tips to one side. I added the vertical grip to my arsenal after learning such a thing existed while reading Arthur Morris's book on bird photography. He considers it essential as well. He was right. My vertical shots are now truly vertical, not angled.

The other cool thing the battery pack offers is, well, battery options. It can use the batteries from the camera, or will adapt regular batteries to power the camera, which can be an advantage when your batteries die and you aren't able to replace the camera specific batteries.

The only downside for me? I wish I'd bought it sooner. My great photos of the clock tower on Parliament wouldn't have been tipsy if I had!

I picked up a Canon EOS Elan 7E (EOS 30 in Europe, EOS 7 in Japan) because I wanted something fully-featured to begin studying photography with. The Elan 7E can do anything the bigger cameras can do, just not as quickly and minus the weighty weatherproof construction, and I was very happy with it for a long time.

After a while, however, I started noticing problems. Being in Japan, I would encounter hordes of elderly ladies and young men, clearly enthusiasts but not professionals, sporting the top-of-the-line cameras with heavy L-series lenses. When I would go to take pictures of an event - say, a parade - the professionals would elbow me out of the way at all the best spots.

Clearly, my equipment did not look cool enough.

Needless to say, big equipment provides plenty of psychological benefits and assuages those feelings of envy. But also, when you carry around a lightweight camera with a consumer-grade zoom lens, the professional photojournalists instinctively know at a glance that you are an _amateur_ getting in the way of their _serious work_. When you try to gain access to a venue, you need to first overpower the guards with the appearance of professionalism, if nothing else, and this is difficult to do when everyone else's camera is bigger than yours. People make snap judgments, and are easily fooled by big tools.

The solution? Step 1a: Buy a heavy-duty professional lens. Anything bearing the red ring of Canon's 'L' line or the groovy finish of Sigma's 'EX' line are both fine, but for photojournalism a 70-200/2.8 is ideal. Step 1b: Bulk up your camera body with this battery pack/grip. Professionals may still realize there's something amiss, but you'll probably get past the first couple glances and be able to sneak in the door. Step 1a does more to help, but 1b is almost as important and a heck of a lot less expensive.

So the most important thing is that it looks cool, but it also has a couple other interesting features. It provides a little extra weight and a better center of gravity for when you start playing with the bigger lenses. It has shutter release and exposure lock buttons so you can take portrait (vertical) shots in a slightly more relaxed position. It accepts AA batteries (alkaline, NiMH or Ni-Cad) or the usual CR123As through an ingenious little flip spacer thing. Unfortunately, powerful, lightweight, durable lithium AA batteries are verboten - "The initial voltage is high and it can may [sic] damage the camera's electronic circuitry." Since alkaline batteries are much heavier than lithiums and fail in extreme cold, the extended battery life (115 rolls with eye-controlled focusing at 20 Celsius, 0 rolls at -20) isn't too much of an advantage over CR123As. You can use rechargeables to save money, but they bleed their charges relatively quickly even when not in use, and CR123As last all year anyway as long as you're not constantly taking extreme time exposures of the stars.

So, ultimately, it gets five stars almost entirely on the coolness of its looks alone. Get one, get out there and shove a photojournalist back.

The BP-200 adds functionality to my Rebel 2000, but admittedly I'm a bit disappointed. It definately has a cheap feel to it. It does help with the balance on the camera and is egonomically better than the standard grip. I just wish it felt more substantial.

I recently purchased the Canon BP-200 and would like to say that it compliments the camera nicely. If you own a rebel eos 300 series, then you know how light the camera is (Too light that is!). The battery pack adds a good weight to steady those camera shots and for those with tripods, there is a hole for a mount on the bottom of the battery pack! Also, to avoid circuit discharge, common sense tells you that you don't leave batteries in any mechanism when not in use. Canon has reasssured me that under proper use, the product is guaranteed to work with the EOS rebel 300/2000 and will not cause any malfunction. Two thumbs up for this accesory!

It helps!!
1) Camera looks more professional
2) Camera feels heavier
3) Gives a very good grip
4) Has an extra shutter release button, makes handling easier
5) Saves on costly batteries

OVERALL: Just buy it....