The best point-and-shoot just got better: Canon S100

We’ve been waiting for this one for a while now.

Your editor-in-chief, by his own admission, knows next to nothing about photography. But that hasn’t stopped him buying and – very occasionally when he was feeling particularly committed – carrying around and using a bulky Nikon DLSR. So, imagine his frustration when the dinky little point-and-shoot camera in Straight-Six’s pocket – the one he had at first dismissed as “girly” and frequently uttered “you’re embarrassing us with that thing, put it away” about – consistently produced results that were as good – and often better in low light – than his Nikon.

That’s right, Six’s little camera punched far above its weight, producing images of great depth and sharpness while its owner mocked The Fool for lugging around a huge great DSLR that struggled to focus in low light conditions without a flash.

The camera in question was the incredible S90 and for months now, having long since relegated his Nikon to a dusty draw at Prodigal Towers, The Fool has been considering purchasing its successor, the S95. The only thing stopping him (the S95 is universally acknowledged as one of the very best point-and-shoots on the market) was the persistent rumours that a new model was just around the corner. This fabled follow-up was – the pundits in forums guessed – going to tackle the only two low points of the S95: lack of grip on the body and video recording.

Today, that follow-up is real and it goes by the catchy name of S100. It uses Canon’s new DIGIC 5 image processor. Don’t worry about the tech, what you need to know is that this little piece of silicone enables high-speed burst shooting and – crucially – 1080p video. That’s one S95 complaint tackled. The other one? Yep, that’s right, they nailed it: there’s a little grip on the front and a thumb pad on the back which means – though it loses some of the S95′s slick looks – the S100 will be much better to hold one-handed.

Just in case the S95′s incredible low-light performance wasn’t enough for you, Canon has improved it in the S100 thanks to its f/2.0 lens and new, larger 12.1 megapixel CMOS censor.

The icing on the cake is its GPS receiver for embedding location data in your photos which means you can fire up iPhoto and have it map your photos for you. Nice.

The S100 hits shelves in November. We can’t wait.