Selecting a Digital Camera

Long gone are the days of carrying around a camera bag stuffed with those extra rolls of film and lenses as long as your arm. Gone are the days of worrying about whether or not the film’s really rewound before you risk opening the camera back in sunlight!

Digital photography simplifies photography in several ways:

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No film means no mess and less expense.
No lenses means less clutter
Once you get used to using a digital camera, digital photography can even help you take better photos by helping you select and time your shots with the proper lighting levels automatically chosen for you.
Take a photograph you don't’t like? A digital camera lets you review the shot on an LCD screen on the back of the camera right after you shoot it, and delete it if you don't like it.
Digital photography gives you photos that are extremely portable. You can download your shots to a computer to email or edit with programs like Adobe’s PhotoShop, print them out, or create slideshows – all without having to drop off film and pay for developing. Some digital cameras even let you shoot quick videos.

Choosing a digital camera is no easy task. There are so many new cameras introduced monthly with many more being introduced almost weekly. Just how do you make sense of all the choices? We’ll talk below about the fundamentals of how digital photography works and give you some basic information to help you narrow down your search.

Types of Digital Cameras

Point and Shoot Cameras
Prices for the 2 to 4 megapixel cameras range from about $100 to $200 and generally offer image quality high enough for small enlargements, some printed material, and for sending images electronically via email or the web. Stepping up to the 5 to 6 plus megapixel cameras will range from about $200 to less than $1,000. Some of these cameras can provide some amazing quality with enlargements up to 8 x 10 inch. At the upper level of the point and shoot category are cameras suitable for professional work such as catalogs or to drop into a Powerpoint presentation.
Digital SLR Cameras
Prices for 6 to 8 megapixel digital SLR cameras range start at under $1,000 to around $8,000 for the 16 megapixel models and generally resemble traditional professional SLR cameras in most ways. They will provide interchangeable lenses, higher shutter speeds and adjustable apertures giving maximum control over light, focus and depth of field, and have removable storage options. The resolution of these cameras are suitable for professional purposes such as photojournalism and pre-press applications up to 9x13 inches at 150 lpi..
Studio Cameras
The highest quality digital images are captured with digital studio cameras or a removable digital back for a medium format or view camera with resolustions reaching as high as 384 megapixels. Prices can run as high as $18,000 for these cameras capable of capturing images which can be output as large as 20 x 30 inches. Used for catalog and advertising work, these cameras are generally found only in professional photography studios.

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Profitable Photography in Digital Age
The rapid evolution of digital photography and the ease of distribution over the Internet has transformed the photo industry. Everything from marketing and sales to competitive pricing and job security has been affected. And now that the flood gates have come down, everyone from semi-pros to amateurs to the common consumer affects how business is done, whether it's pricing, assignments, or just getting your photos seen by potential buyers.

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Following are some terms you need to understand in selecting a digital camera and shooting digital photography.

Pixels:

A digital image, or photo, is made up of millions of tiny dots (or pixels). The number of these pixels determines the quality – also called the resolution – of the image. With digital photography, when you click the camera’s button, a computer chip called the “charge couple device” (CCD) inside the camera instantly records the location, color, and brightness of each pixel. Put all those pixels together and you have the photograph!

Resolution:

Resolution is an important factor when buying a camera. Higher resolutions cost more, but also result in images that can be enlarged digitally without losing quality. Although the ultimate digital image is still beyond the capabilities of most consumer-priced cameras, and picture quality is, to a great extent, a judgment call. You'll want to match your digital camera resolution to the output resolution you plan to use.

Resolution is the measure of fineness and detail in an electronic image. Digital camera sensors (CCDs) record a fixed number of image details, normally quoted in pixels or picture elements. The higher the resolution, the more detailed the image. Unlike photographs shot on film, digital photos are limited by the amount of memory in the camera, the optical resolution of the CCD, and the resolution of your output device. High-resolution cameras are smarter picks when the final output is on paper, since low-cost ink jet printers can now print images at resolutions of 1,200 to 1,400 dots per inch.

Your ultimate use of images will be a primary deciding factor in your choice of camera. When shopping for a ‘point and shoot’ digital camera to use for fun look for a camera with a resolution between three to five megapixels. That will let you print nice quality 4” x 6” up to 8” x 10” prints. You can probably get by with 640x480 resolution if you are going to use the digital images in a Powerpoint presentation or on a web page.

CCD sensors:
Digital cameras use charge-coupled device (CCD) sensors to register the various light intensities in a scene. CCDs are composed of thousands of minute elements, grouped in either a row (linear array) or a rectangular block (matrix or area array). CCD size is generally described by two numbers: the diagonal measure measure of the array chip - usually between 1/3 and 1/2 inch - and the number of CCD elements in the array, expressed in megapixels. Linear arrays are moved in steps across the image plane of the camera, recording or scanning successive lines of information. Matrix arrays grab the full scene, but may require more than one shot to register full color.

CMOS sensors:
Complementary metal oxide semiconductors are more power efficient and relatively inexpensive to make. However, they have lower light sensitivity and a high signal-to-noise ratio.

Bit depth:
This defines the maximum number of color that a digital camera can capture. The more bits equals more color. A bit depth of 1 can store just two colors: black and white. For example, a monitor with a bit depth of 4 can display 16 different colors. An 8-bit system can display 256 colors. A 24-bit system over 16.7 million colors. The number of colors a camera captures plays a major role in its pictures' richness and fidelity. Don't settle for less than 24 bits with a resulting possible combination of 16.7 million colors.

Optical vs. Digital Zoom
There are two different types of zoom features: optical and digital. Optical zoom makes the picture appear as if it was taken with the camera closer to the subject. Digital zoom works by processing the image within the camera. Digital zoom can enlarge an image many more times than optical zoom can, but the image quality of an optical zoom is much better.

LCD Screens:
The LCD screen lets you compose images as well as preview photos before downloading them to your computer. The LCD screen can be difficult to see in bright sunlight, so if you plan to shoot outdoors you will probably also want your camera to to have a viewfinder to compose your pictures.

Memory:
Another important consideration for digital photography is the size of the memory card in the camera. A digital camera's memory is equivalent to the film in the camera and is what stores your photo inside the camera – think of it as the camera’s hard drive. Digital images of high quality take up a lot of space. You can fit more low-resolution than high-resolution shots on to a single card. You can carry multiple memory cards, but who wants to line up that perfect shot and realize the camera has suddenly run out of room? If your camera shoots between three to five megapixels, a memory card with 128 MB to 512 MB should keep you shooting until your fingers get tired.

There are several kinds of memory cards most commonly used:

SmartMedia cards are small and thin, about the size of a CompactFlash card, but thin as a credit card. Found in older Fuji and Olympus digital cameras.
CompactFlash has been on the market longer and is supported by more manufacturers. These small and durable memory cards are a bit larger than other flash memory formats, yet remain the standard for professional cameras, as well as many consumer models.
SD Secure Disk memory cards are based on the older Multi Media Card (MMC) format with write-protection capabilities. Most digital camera manufacturers use SD cards in their consumer and pro-sumer cameras including Canon, Kodak, Konica Minolta, Nikon and Panasonic.
xD Picture Cards were jointly developed by Fuji and Olympus and used in their cameras. xD Picture Cards are smaller than the other memory card formats, about the size of a postage stamp.
Memory Stick is Sony’s proprietary flash memory technology that work in all Sony digital products.

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Selecting a Digital Camera

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