It can be quite daunting when we want to shop for digital cameras. There are many digital cameras to choose from and we could have little knowledge on what models to choose. So, it is important for us to make the whole thing easier. Whatever we do, we know that we get what we pay for. There are many affordable cameras that provide decent results; but it is a good idea to bring it to the next level by choosing models that could offer us greater photography capability. There are two camera factors that we need to consider:
Resolution: The resolution of camera is often specified as megapixels. It indicates the number of small dots that form an image. In this case, one dot or pixel represents one small dot of color. So, if we have a 12Mp camera, it means that at highest detail level; one image that our camera produces contains 12 millions of tiny dots or pixels. So, it’s clear that by having more dots in our image, it will become more detailed and sharper.
By having larger resolution, it is possible for us to print the image on a larger paper, so we can hang them on the wall. One big concern is that if our laptop screen only has 1366×768 resolution; why it is necessary to have very large image resolution. By having pictures with larger resolution, we can zoom on them and we could see objects more clearly.
Some small parts of the image can be enlarged or can even be cropped to create a new image. With high resolution images, we can have so much more flexibility and we are able to more things with the image. So as a quick note, higher megapixels equal to better ability to edit and crop, due to sharper photos.
Zoom: Zoom is a feature that is commonly found in many digital cameras. There are two types of zoom; optical zoom and digital zoom. Optical zoom should be quite straightforward and in high-end DSLR cameras, it can be a powerful feature, allowing us to see objects from far away. When the optical zoom is enabled, the lenses inside the camera are adjusted, so objects can look bigger. On the other hand digital is a less useful feature and literally useless in low-end digital cameras.
When the optical zoom has reached its limit, the digital zoom is enabled. It simply digitally enlarges the picture, which will cause quality degradation. The only scenario where digital zoom is useful is when we use a good DSLR camera and we have reached the limit of the optical zoom capability. We could use the digital zoom, because we don’t really want to crop the image on the computer and we can do this by enabling the feature.
When used properly, both optical and digital zoom are very useful; although the later has much limited usefulness. With high magnification capability, we don’t have to move closer to the object.