Adventures in choosing a camera

When deciding to buy a digital camera, there are three basic factors.

Cost - What is your budget? There is countless choices for "point and shoot" cameras under $300 (these days there are countless choices under $125). Above $300 you can get into the DSLR (digital single lens reflex) cameras, all the way up to the $10,000 and above range for Professionals (if your in that category, you are way past this blog)! All of the online buying websites allow you to sort by price. Start there with how much you can afford to spend, then use some of the information that follows to help you narrow down your choices.

Memory - Megapixels and Megabits are the two things to consider. First, lets talk Megapixels. Megapixels represent the resolution of the camera you choose. These days, 10 megapixel cameras are the norm. The higher the megapixels, the higher the resolution and the better the picture will look when enlarging. You can safely print a 10 megapixel image up to and over 8 inches by 10 inches and larger. Megabits are inportant on the computer that you plan on storing your pictures on. If you choose a 10 megapixel camera, your pictures will fill up a hard drive very quickly unless you have a very large hard drive (1 or 2 terabyte hard drives are inexpensive to add to your computer these days).

Camera features - Most point and shoot cameras have a slew of pre-set shot conditions from portrait, to macro, to outdoors, to action, to night, to sunny or cloudy settings. These settings are preset to shutter speed, aperature and Depth of Focus to help you get the best picture for a specified condition. Point and shoots allow you to get a good shot quickly. An important feature to consider is zoom. There are two types of zoom that you need to know about. The first, Mechanical zoom, is the most important. Mechanical zoom (also known as optical zoom) is performed using a series of lenses. Once you reach the maximum optical zoom limit, digital zoom kicks in. The problem with digital zoom is that it is the equivalent to using photo editing software to zoom into a picture and cropping it. Digital zoom will degrade the image you are capturing.