Canon G16 camera v.s. Olympus TG-4

Personally I have not used a G15 or G16 but have played with the Olympus ruggedized ones.

In that price range I suggest you look at and consider the Lumix LX7. Compared to the Canon, it has a similar sized sensor but is somewhat smaller, a little lighter, but most importantly has an excellent lens, f/1.4 at wide angle to f/2.3 at 3x “telephoto”. Mine works so good I use it for aurora with great results. Video quality is also very good. I have taken thousands of photos with mine over the past few years.

The only downsides I can think of are that the LX7 is not weather resistant, cannot be charged via USB like the Olympus, and is not good for time lapse.

For myself, I don’t plan on taking low light photos, but wanting to “touch up” afterwards is important to me. As such, I went with the TG-4: I know that the Olympus “supposedly” uses a proprietary RAW format, but from what I had heard previously, they were supposed to make a more open format RAW that could easily be manipulated by programs such as Photoshop etc etc.

FWIW the TG4 is supported by Adobe Camera Raw.

https://helpx.adobe.com/camera-raw/kb/camera-raw-plug-supported-cameras.html

I have no experience with either camera. There are many many reviews on the B&H Photo site. I owned a PowerShot G2 and then upgraded to G11. With each new iteration of the G series I read the reviews and decide not to upgrade. They still have not improved the reach or the view finder.  The G15/16 are not ruggedized or pocketable. Someone said, the best camera is the one you will use. For backpacking, I would think the Olympus would be the one in your pocket to pull out and get the shot you need.

My next camera may be a waterproof phone that takes decent pics. I am looking at the Moto G.