Factors to Consider When Choosing a Digital Camera

Only you can determine the exact camera that meets your particular needs.  These pages have been designed to describe various features that are frequently offered so that you can select those ones that are MOST important to you and then select a camera model that offers those things.   The final section contains a summary of the factors that would be most useful to students in photography classes, along with links to web sites that describe specific camera models that offer those features. (Click here to go directly to the final section.)

 (After you have made a list of the features that you would like to have,  you can click here to go to a web site that will give you a way  to find current camera models that offer those features, to read product reviews of those cameras and also to compare prices.)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I.          Size / convenience

·         Camera size is a personal choice.  Only you can decide how large a camera you are willing to carry!  
Very small cameras may require special battery sizes or types.

·         Battery / Power Source - Different camera models use different power sources.  Some are more convenient than others.

a.    Alkaline batteries

• cheap, available in many sizes

• PROBLEM:  does not hold enough energy to take many digital photos

b.    NiCad (Nickel Cadmium)  batteries

• cheap, available in many sizes, rechargers readily available

• holds enough energy to take many more photos than alkaline

• recycles (gets ready for the next photo) fairly quickly

• PROBLEM:  “memory effect”  - If you re-charge a NiCad battery before it has been completely drained of power you are only “topping off” the energy.  From that time on, each time you attempt to recharge the battery only that amount of energy will be added!!!

c.    NiMH  (Nickel Metal Hydroxide) batteries

• cheap, available in many sizes, rechargers readily available

• holds enough energy to take many more photos than alkaline

• recycles (gets ready for the next photo) fairly quickly

•  no “memory effect” problem

d.    LithIon (Lithium Ion) batteries

•  holds enough energy to take many more photos than alkaline

•  recycles (gets ready for the next photo) fairly quickly

• no “memory effect” problem

• NOT as cheap as other kinds of batteries,

• Usually battery size format must be purchased in a particular size for a particular model camera

• Usually must be purchased from the camera manufacturer

•  rechargers usually only available either packaged with the camera or to be purchased directly from the camera manufacturer

e.    AC power cord –

• Number of photos that can be taken is limited only by the amount of memory on the camera’s memory card

• PROBLEM:   Not very portable -  you have to have a place to plug it in

·         Software (Image Editing, Fun Image Software, Image Sharing) – Different software “packages” are offered by each camera manufacturer, but some of these can add significantly to the purchase price.  Try to find out what the software does to see if it meets your needs.

·         Accessories (Lenses, Filters, Matched Printers, Docking Stations, etc.)  Only you can decide what accessories are necessary at the time of purchase, but it is nice to know ahead of time what accessories are available.  Add-on lenses, for instance, are a nice way to extend the zoom range of your camera’s built-in lens; so, if your camera’s manufacturer offers add-on lenses for the camera model you are interested in purchasing that would be a definite “plus.”

II.         Viewing System

·         LCD Screen – You should consider the LCD screen only as a way of playing back your pictures to check them, because LCD screens use up a lot of battery power.  Other than that the only real factor to consider is that some screens are larger &/or more flexible than others.

·         EVF - Electronic Viewfinder ( “eye-level”  type viewfinder) uses much less battery power than LCD screens and is easier to see in very bright &/or very low light situations.  Sometimes they even come with a “diopter” adjustment so that you can set the lens to your own vision needs!

III.       Zoom Range

·    “Optical Zoom”

1. the lens of the camera is a compound lens that physically changes to make distant objects appear closer / larger in the tele position, and near objects to appear farther / smaller in the the wide-angle position (so that, for instance, you could take a photo of a large group of people in a small room).

2. Optical zoom lenses are most desirable because picture quality does not change with image changes

·    “Digital Zoom”

1. the lens does not change to create the new view; instead, the camera’s “brain” magnifies the central area of the picture coming through the lens

2. because the image is only being magnified the picture quality IS affected as the image changes. 

3. The greater the magnification, the greater the reduction in image quality

IV.       Megapixels

More useful than the term “megapixel” is the description regarding the actual distribution of the light sensor array / “pixels”  Example:  2560 x 1920 pixels

·         While the phrase ‘5 megapixels’ doesn’t tell us much, but 2560 x 1920 does give us VERY useful information

·         the 5 available mega pixels (picture elements) are arrayed as 2560 horizontal rows of pixels  (picture elements) x 1920 vertical columns of pixels (picture elements)

·         (2560 pixels per column x 1920 columns = 4,915,200 pixels = 5 “megapixels”)

(There now, wasn’t that easy?!)

·         The largest high quality PRINT SIZE that can be made from an image with that many pixels may be obtained by dividing the horizontal & vertical pixel numbers by 266 (because most commercial printers such as the ones used to print magazines use 266 lpi -lines per inch)

o        Lines per inch is a print resolution setting comparable to DPI (dots per inch)

o        Dots Per Inch – is how screen resolution is indicated

·         If we divide 2560 by 266 we get 9.62

·         If we divide 1920 by 266 we get 7.21

·         This means that the largest size, highest “photo quality,” print we can get from this image file setting would be 9.6 x 7.2 inches.

·         (Actually, we can also print very high quality enlargements of about twice this size in each direction- just a little smaller than 16 x 20 at this setting!)

·         The actual print quality depends on the original image quality setting, the type of lens setting used (digital or optical zoom), the printer quality, the ink quality, and the paper quality. 

·         For best print results, use the printer manufacturer’s recommended ink & paper

V.        File Settings

– Most digital cameras can record images at various “quality settings.”  You will be able to produce the best high quality PRINTS with mages recorded at high quality settings but these files will also use up more space on your memory card.

– Most digital cameras can record some pictures at one quality setting and others at other quality settings on the same memory card.

·         RAW –extra image data is recorded along with the actual image itself

·         largest file size (uses the most memory space of all the file formats)

·         Records the most color detail & other exposure information

·         Super Fine / High Quality  (usually recorded as a TIFF file – with little or no compression)

·         second largest file size (uses less memory space than “raw” but more than “jpeg”)

·         Records color detail & other exposure information in “uncompressed” form

·         Extra Fine (usually recorded as a JPEG* file – with minimal compression)

·         Fine / Quality  (usually recorded as a JPEG file – with  more compression than the Extra Fine setting)

·         Standard (usually recorded as a JPEG* file – with  average compression)

·         Economy (usually recorded as a JPEG* file but with a high amount of compression.  This type of file is generally not used for printed images, but is perfect for pictures that you only intend to use for e-mail or for images intended to be viewed on a screen in a program like MS PowerPoint.)

*JPEG format:

1.    smaller file size than “raw” or “tiff”

2.    Amount of information recorded depends on the amount of “compression”

3.    The more the compression the less memory space needed, but the greater the effect upon color detail & other exposure information.

·         Examples of  rough numeric equivalents for # of pixels being recorded, space that size file takes up on a memory card  & resultant print size.

 (Note:  The actual numbers may be different on different camera models

– check your camera’s manual)

RAW – 2560 x 1920 (approx 10 MB memory needed) a 9.6 x 7.2 inch print

Super Fine/Extra Fine- 2560 x 1920 (12 - 15 MB memory needed) a 9.6 x 7.2 inch print

Fine / Standard – 1600 x 1200 (2 - 6 MB memory needed) a  6 x 4.5 inch print

Economy – 640 x 480 (200 KB memory needed) a  2.4 x 1.8 inch print

VI........ Memory Cards / Memory Storage Media – each type storage cards come in different capacities, price increases with storage capability and recording speed.

a.       Varieties include:  3 ½ inch floppy disk (Sony Mavica cameras), Mini – CD Rom disk (Sony CD camera models), Compact Flash Card (types I & II), Smart Media, SD (Secure Digital), Multi Media Cards, XD – very tiny!, Micro-drives (can hold gigabytes of memory!)

b.       Some cameras accept more than one media type, but most use only one type

c.       A great add-on accessory is a media card reader.  These card readers plug into your computer.  You take the card out of your camera, put it into the card reader slot, and your computer can ‘read’ the information recorded on the card.

d.       Some printers now also have the ability to read some media card types directly

VII. Shutter Lag:  The features listed on the following pages may or may not be particularly important to you, but the ability to manually adjust these settings could potentially reduce one of the most frustrating problems of digital photography – that of  “Shutter Lag.”  Shutter Lag is the slight delay that happens between the time that you press the shutter and the time the picture is actually taken.  Any factor that the camera has set automatically it has to compute or “think about” & this adds to the lag time.  If you can manually pre-set that factor you can reduce the camera’s “think” task list and, thus, reduce the shutter lag time.

a.       Factors that add to lag time include auto focus, auto exposure, auto white balance, etc.

b.       You can reduce lag time by setting any of these factors manually instead of waiting for the camera to compute the correct setting.

VIII..... Exposure Settings / Shooting Modes

Below is a list of other “shooting modes” frequently found on contemporary digital cameras and typical icons used to indicate those modes.  The camera you are interested in purchasing may include any, all, or none of these modes.

    MACRO Mode  - Used for close-up pictures that make relatively small objects appear larger

Portrait Mode – Causes the camera to select a wide open (low number) aperture so that the image of the person is sharp, but potentially distracting background elements become blurry.

Sports Action Mode – Causes the camera to select the fastest possible shutter speed under current lighting conditions in order to ‘freeze’ fast action

Night Portrait Mode – When used with flash, the camera attempts to slow down the shutter speed and delay the flash in order to balance the light on the subject with the lights in the night skyline behind the subject.

Sunset Mode – optimizes camera settings to record the rich colors of twilight / sunset.

  Landscape Mode – Optimizes camera settings for scenic landscapes.– usually the aperture is set to the smallest one possible (high number) to make the depth-of-field as large as possible.

Text Mode – the camera attempts to adjust settings to obtain sharp edge detail & crisp contrast of black text on a white background.

Trashcan / Delete – used to delete a single image

Locked File – prevents images from being accidentally deleted

    “Camera Shake” – On some camera models this symbol will appear if the shutter speed currently selected is too slow.  (At shutter speeds slower than 1/60^th second there is a possibility that the picture will become blurry due to the slight “camera shake” that happens when you press  the shutter button.)

      Single Frame Advance Mode  - records one image each time the shutter button is pressed.

      Auto Bracket Mode – Takes a series of photos with different exposure/ contrast settings

     Continuous Advance Mode – Takes multiple images, continuing as long as the shutter button is held down

      Self Timer – Delays the time the photo is actually taken – The photo usually begins to be recorded about ten seconds after the shutter button is pressed.

      Interval Mode – Takes a series of photos over an extended period of time (like time lapse photography)

IX.       White Balance – This is a setting that allows the camera to correct the overall color shift that happens in a photo when the light source is something other that “pure white’’ / daylight type.

. Auto White Balance – The camera evaluates the kind of lighting present and implements internal filters to cause white objects to appear white in images recorded with that kind of light.

             Daylight White Balance - The camera implements internal filters to cause white objects to appear white in images recorded under bright daylight.

            Tungsten White Balance - The camera implements internal filters to cause white objects to appear white in images recorded under tungsten lighting (average household light bulbs).

             Fluorescent White Balance The camera implements internal filters to cause white objects to appear white in images recorded under average fluorescent lighting.

   Cloudy Day White Balance The camera implements internal filters to cause white objects to appear white in images recorded under cloudy daylight conditions.

X.         Flash Settings: 

(Note:  On some camera models the flash unit must be physically lifted into position to turn it on.)

Auto Flash – The camera determines whether flash is needed or not & automatically turns it on or off

Flash Every Time / Fill Flash – (Flash on even when the camera would not automatically turn it on under the current lighting conditions) – Fill flash can be used either as the main light or as an added light.  In low light situations the flash will overpower the ambient light and become the main light on the scene.  In sunlight or other bright light, fill flash can be used to fill in / soften harsh shadows.

Slow Sync – The camera uses a slower than average shutter speed in order to record some of the ambient light as well as the light produced by the flash unit.  If you choose this setting, hold the camera as steady as you can or put it on a solid support in order to avoid a blurred photo due to ‘camera shake.’

  Rear Flash Sync – Rear flash sync is used with long camera exposures.  The camera triggers the flash unit at the end of the exposure instead of at the beginning in order to deliberately produce an action blur that seems to follow the main subject.

. Flash Off  (On some camera models the flash unit must be physically closed to turn it off.)

......... Red Eye Reduction – This setting causes the flash unit to be fired a few times before the actual picture is recorded.  This causes the pupils of the subject’s eyes to contract, which tends to lessen the red-eye problem.

XI. ISO Settings:  (Typical choices: ISO 100 , ISO 200, ISO 400, ISO 800)

At higher number ISO values a photographer will be able to use faster shutter speeds with low light levels than with lower number  ISO settings but, just as with film cameras grain increases with higher  ISO settings, so with digital cameras “noise” (white speckles like snow or static on a TV set  that appear in areas that are supposed to be dark) increases at higher ISO settings. 

ISO also generally affects the flash range.  At higher number ISO settings the flash will be effective for a longer range.

XII.      Focus Modes – Manual, Auto are basic. There are also varieties in the Auto focus mode.

         Center Weighted Focusing – The camera attempts to automatically focus on whatever appears in or near the center area of the viewfinder.

          Spot Focus  - The camera attempts to automatically focus on whatever appears in or near the spot in the center of the viewfinder.  In most cameras the focus spot can be moved so that you can focus on something NOT in the center of your camera’s viewfinder.  Useful, for instance when you are focusing on an animal in a zoo so that the camera focuses on the animal & not the bars or the cage.

XIII.      Camera types – 

1. Fixed (non-removable) lens.

• less than $100 - compact / "Point and Shoot" - good for parties, family gatherings, etc.  This type of camera does not usually offer direct control of aperture and shutter speed settings.  The lens is a fixed lens type, offering a limited zoom range (sometimes only a digital zoom, sometimes no zoom range at all).  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually 2 or less.

• $100 - $250 - compact / "Point and Shoot" - While the options are still limited, in this price range manufacturers begin to offer 2x - 3x optical zoom lenses as well as digital zoom options.  Many manufacturers offer cameras in this range with "scene modes" that automatically control camera settings for specific situations or lighting conditions.  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually around 2 -3.

• $250 - $350 - In this price range manufacturers begin to offer even more options.  3x optical zoom lenses are fairly standard along with various digital zoom options.  In addition, many of these models come with front threads on the lenses so that add-on lenses can be used to further increase the zoom range.  Most manufacturers offer cameras in this range with "scene modes" that automatically control camera settings for specific situations or lighting conditions.  Some manufacturers also begin to include P-A-S-M controls at this level.  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually around 3 -4.

• $350 - $500 - In this price range manufacturers begin to offer still more options.  3x optical zoom lenses are still fairly standard along with various digital zoom options, but some camera models are available with longer optical zoom ranges (5x - 10x ranges).  In addition, many of these models come with front threads on the lenses so that add-on lenses can be used to further increase the zoom range.  Most manufacturers offer cameras in this range with "scene modes" that automatically control camera settings for specific situations or lighting conditions.  Most manufacturers also include P-A-S-M controls at this level.  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually around 4 -5.

• $500 - $999 - This begins the "pro-sumer" (professional camera consumer) model range.  In order to accommodate the extra features being offered, these cameras tend to be larger, bulkier, and heavier than the more compact models discussed above.  While 3x optical zoom lenses are still fairly standard along with various digital zoom options, many camera models offer extended optical zoom ranges (5x - 10x ranges).  In addition, many of these models come with front threads on the lenses so that add-on lenses can be used to further increase the zoom range &/or so that filters can be used to create special effects.  Most manufacturers offer cameras in this range with "scene modes" that automatically control camera settings for specific situations or lighting conditions.  Almost all manufacturers also include P-A-S-M controls at this level.  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually around 5 - 8.

2.  Super compact models -  Several camera manufacturers are offering a new line of digital camera - the super compact model.  These are about 1 1/2  the size of a credit card and less than 1" thick (about the size of a small cell phone).  The price range varies from below $200 to a little over $500 depending on specific features and the number of megapixels offered.  

3.  Digital SLRs (interchangeable lens)

• $899 - $1500 & up (for the camera body alone) - These cameras and lenses are sold separately, so that you can purchase specific lenses that work best for the kind of photography you love to do.  These cameras tend to be quite a bit larger, bulkier, and heavier than the more compact models discussed above.  Whole systems of lenses are available so that you can choose the ones that work best for your type of photography.  For convenience, most manufacturers still offer cameras in this range with "scene modes" that automatically control camera settings for specific situations or lighting conditions.  All manufacturers also include P-A-S-M controls at this level.  Automatic functions are available, of course, but manual zoom, manual focus, and manual camera settings are also all included so that the photographer has maximum control over the image-making process.  The number of megapixels available for recording the image is usually around 6 - 14.

  • If you love your 35mm SLR, but are ready for the switch to digital, it is well worth investigating these models.  The prices are still much higher than other digital camera types, but are beginning to fall into the same range as the "pro-sumer" models.  

 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For students in my photography classes I recommend looking for cameras that offer the following features:

• Power source:   Try to get a camera that uses AA size batteries.  Other types are ok., especially if you get a good price on a camera that uses another type.  It is just that you can purchase rechargeable AA NiMH batteries and chargers at very reasonable prices very easily.

• The camera you select should have both an LCD and an EVF type viewing screens

• OPTICAL zoom range of at least 3x (4x or higher zoom range is even better, 10x zoom range is great!) forget about the digital zoom range - the picture quality decreases at large digital zoom settings

• Try to get a camera that records at least 3 megapixels, 4 meg. is even better, & higher numbers, of course are wonderful.  If you have to choose between optical zoom range and # of  megapixels in order to find a camera within your price range, my strictly personal opinion is that a 4 megapixel camera with a 10x optical zoom range is a slightly better bargain than a 5 megapixel camera with a 3x zoom range because it will carry you through a wider variety of photographic situations.  (Of course you can always magnify your 3x image in an image editing program like PhotoShop later, but there will be a little trade-off in quality.)  

• Memory card / storage media:  You should check the price and general availability of extra memory storage media cards before you purchase your camera.  You should keep extra memory cards on hand.  Cameras often come with a 16 or 32 meg card standard.  You really need at least a 128 meg card or higher if you want to be able to take more than a few pictures at a time before downloading them to your computer.  These cards are re-useable, but it is nice to have two or three ready to use

• Easy to use - A camera that has dials or buttons with most of the settings you need to use  clearly labeled is easier to use than one in which you have to scroll through "menus" to find the setting you need.  If possible, ask a sales person to demonstrate that model for you.

• P A S M - these symbols represent adjustments you can make to your camera settings to control how it takes pictures.  They stand for "program" or automatic, Shutter priority, Aperture priority, and full manual settings.  For general "snapshots" these are not really necessary, but I strongly recommend that you look for a camera that offers these settings so that when you are ready to take more specialized photos you will be able to do so.  

• Shutter speeds - A camera that has very slow shutter speeds (8 seconds or slower) will allow you to take nice night skyline photos.  A camera that has very fast shutter speeds will allow you to "freeze" action.

• ISO settings - you should have at least ISO settings of 100 and 400, if the camera you are interested in has additional settings that is even better.

• Shutter Lag - Some cameras are advertised to have almost no shutter lag.  That is a good thing.

• Noise ("noise" is the appearance of white sandy grains in the black or dark areas of photographs taken at night or in places where there is very little light).  Some cameras are advertised to have almost no "noise".  That is a good thing.

 (You can click here to go to a web site that will give you a way  to find current camera models that offer these features, to read product reviews of those cameras and also to compare prices.)