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The Beginner Buyer’s Guide To Digital Cameras

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Selecting and buying a digital camera is much easier if you understand some basic facts about them. This article will give you some of the basics of digital cameras to help you select the best camera for your needs.

The Beginner Buyer’s Guide To Digital Cameras
by Warren Lynch

The most important part of buying a digital camera is making sure that the one you select meets all of your needs.

Digital Camera 101

Better digital cameras uses a chip called a “Charged Coupled Device” (CCD) instead of film. Light enters the camera, through the open shutter, and strikes the CCD where it is converted to digital data before being stored in the camera’s memory.

While that is the simple description, things can get pretty complicated from there.

Megapixels & Resolution

Resolution is a measure of how many pixels are used to make a digital copy of an image. Pixels are tiny dots of light that make up a digital image. The quality of a digital camera’s image is usually measured in ‘Megapixels’ where each megapixel represents one million pixels.

Here’s how to determine how many megapixels you’ll need depending upon the type of photos you will be taking and what you intend to do with them.

1 megapixel

Almost obsolete, you might still find these in cell phones, PDAs, and desktop “web” cameras. They’re OK if you only intend to email pictures to other people and those people aren’t going to be printing them.

1.1 to 2 megapixels

Only slightly better than the 1.0, this resolution is OK for an average 4×6 snapshot, but it isn’t going to be a production quality image.

2.1 to 3 megapixels

This is the beginning of the decent camera range. You get very good 4×6 images and reasonably good 5×7 images. These cameras are low cost and provide a good platform for beginners.

3.1 to 4 megapixels

You are qualified to say that you have a “pretty good” camera. You get professional quality 4×6 images, real good 5×7 and 6×9 shots, and somewhat decent, but not great 8×10 images.

4.1 to 5 megapixels and up

People will be saying “Hey, great pictures!”. You can count on professional images all the way up to 8×10’s. Of course, as the megapixel count goes up, so does the price.

If you are only going to be viewing your pictures online, such as posting them at a photo site or using them on your web pages, keep your money in your pocket and pick yourself up something in the 1.5 megapixel range.

If you will be shooting pictures that will be printed at a print house, such as for brochures, postcards, etc, then you will need at least a 5 megapixel camera if not higher. Of course, you’ll also need to have a fat wallet or a lot of open to buy on your credit card because, even thought prices are steadily falling, these puppies aren’t cheap!

Once you’ve solved the megapixel puzzle, the rest of a digital camera’s features, such as lens types, storage capacity and shutter speed are pretty routine and easy to understand. You shouldn’t have a problem deciding on those features.

Join Photopheed’s Daily Digital Dose and see Warren’s Tips. Warren Lynch has been shooting commercial photography since 1979 in Louisville, Kentucky. Clients include Makers Mark Bourbon, Heaven Hill, Yum Brands, GE, Fruit of The Loom and many more highly recognizable brands. Have him make your product more recognizable too. Visit his website at www.wlynch.com or just him a call at 1-502-587-7722.

Warren Lynch http://www.wlynch.com
Sign-up for Photopheed’s Daily Syndicated Newsletter, the Daily Digital Dose and also receive Bi-Weekly Digital Photography Tips and Techniques from Warren Lynch an award-winning commercial photographer . http://www.wlynch.com

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