With prices of digital cameras falling while performance and features are rising, chances are many people will be on the giving or receiving end of a digital camera this Christmas! There are digital cameras of all sizes, shapes, pixel counts, features lists, and storage mediums. How to make sense of it all?

Digital cameras for the consumer and photography enthusiast generally fall into three categories – basic point and shoot, “pro-sumer” digicams, and digital single-lens reflexes (D-SLRs).

The point & shoots will have three to four mega pixels (mp), and may retail as low as $100 – perfect for a casual snap-shooter. The digicams offer four to eight megapixels and will cost roughly $400 to $1000. Many of these cameras offer “pro” features such as exposure compensation and manual exposure modes. They are light, versatile, and produce great images. D-SLRs offer the greatest flexibility, features, and image quality. Prices range from about $900 to $1500, but that may not include a lens. (If price is no object, pro models go for about $8000 – without lens.)

Here is a list of features and foibles of digital cameras you may want to consider, depending upon the type of photography you plan to do.

How many pixels do you need?

With even fairly basic digital cameras now sporting 3, 4, or even 5 million pixels, this is becoming almost a non-issue. However, the number of pixels is not necessarily a measure of image quality. Don’t buy a camera based on pixel count alone. While there are many variables, here is a general guide.

1. 2 Mega pixels – for email images. Should make decent 4x6 prints.

2. 3 Mega pixels – Should make good prints up to 5x7 and possibly 8x10.

4. 4 – 5 Mega pixels – Can make decent prints up to 11x14.

5. 6 – 8 Mega pixels – Prints up to and beyond 13x19.

Shutter lag and other wait-y factors

If you’re used to a 35mm camera, you may find digital camera shutter lag annoying. Shutter lag is the amount of time from when the shutter is pressed until the image is actually captured. With D-SLRs, there is almost no discernable shutter lag, but in point and shoots, lag can be bothersome. Also check out the burst rate, how many images the camera can record continuously, and the focus delay. You can find this valuable information in each camera review on www.dpreview.com.

Adjustable ISO

Being able to set the ISO – the sensitivity to light – in a digital camera by turning a dial is a huge advantage over film. Most digicams let you choose 50, 100, 200, 400 or possibly 800 ISO. Some D-SLRs go to ISO 3200! But you don’t get something for nothing. Turning up the ISO, like turning up the volume on a weak AM radio station, increases digital noise. Digital noise looks much like grain in film, and will be most apparent in the shadow areas of the image at higher ISO settings. Noise won’t be an issue unless you shoot in low, available light with a high ISO number. If you plan to do that, you should consider a D-SLR.

Memory Cards

Most digital cameras will come with a memory card, but this card never has enough capacity to be very useful. So plan to buy one or more larger-capacity cards with your camera. The manual for your camera will tell you how many of what size image will fit on a given memory card. A 256mb card will work fine for a digicam, but at least 512mb is recommended for a D-SLR.

Digital Zoom.

Don’t buy a digital camera because it advertises “digital zoom.” Digital zoom is nothing more than an in-camera cropping and enlargement of the image, to the detriment of image quality.

Interpolated Pixels.

I saw a $120 digital camera the other day that advertised “3 to 6 mega pixels.” This is really a 3mp camera that doubles the size of the image through the magic of interpolation – an algorithm that creates new pixels in the image. Interpolation can be done – probably better – in most photo editing programs.

Do it in the RAW

All digital cameras create images in the jpeg format. For most photographers, jpeg will be all you need. However, if you’re serious about digital photography, you might want to look for a camera that records in RAW format. As the name implies RAW is the data directly from the camera’s sensor. While a jpeg file is processed in a number of ways in the camera, RAW files are not. RAW files are larger than jpegs, so storage space may be an issue. Finally, RAW files must be converted to some other format (jpeg or tiff) before they can be edited in a photo editing program. While RAW images are more labor-intensive, they give the photographer more creative control and greater dynamic range.

Resources

This article has barely scratched the surface. For the best and most exhaustive camera reviews around, check out www.dpreview.com. They also have tutorials that go much deeper into the topics covered here. Another very good site is www.photo.net. Not only does this forum have good “hands-on” reviews, but you can search the archives for answers to any imaginable photographic question. You can also research reliable vendors, and you won’t go wrong buying from their advertisers.

Digital is revolutionizing photography much like the jet engine revolutionized air travel. You now have more choices, more capability, and more freedom to take photos than ever before. It’s a wonderful time to be a photographer.

By Phil Winter

www.philwinterphotography.com