It was a touch too cold to dunk this camera — and its operator! — in the surf, so I resorted to a dip in the pool. And, to my surprise, I found that not only did the camera perform successfully but I fell upon a magic way to create stunning new pictures.

But back to the aquatic Canon. Via Olympus.

The latter company has made much of its success with the Tough digicams, successfully operable down to 10 metres underwater. I recently had great fun with the Olympus Tough 8000 and felt it was ideally suited to the Australian lifestyle: outdoors, wet and wild.

Belatedly, Canon has picked up the scent of this success and launched its own go-anywhere digicam: PowerShot D10.

It’s all there: waterproof down to 10 meters, dust proof, shockproof to one meter and able to withstand temps down to minus 10 degrees Centigrade.

In picture terms it can shoot 12.1 megapixel images, sized up to a maximum 4000×3000 pixels, or 34×25cm in print terms. In movies, the camera disappoints: only 640×480 or 320×240 pixels at 30 fps. Surely, for a camera selling clo