What To Look For When Buying A Digital Camera

So, you're out shopping for the holidays and you've decided to buy a digital camera for a good friend. There are literally hundreds of different models and types of cameras to choose from. Should you trust the salesman? He's only there to help urge you to buy one. You need to know what you want before going to a store. Don't get discouraged, just read on. First, you'll need to decide on what type of camera to buy. What types of things will the person you're buying it for use the camera for?

The most basic type of camera is called a point-and-shoot. These are the typical type of compact camera with built in lens and flash most people have. They're great because they're extremely portable, but if you don't know what to look for, they might not always produce the best results. Buy a point-and-shoot for someone who just wants to take pictures for fun.

Next up on the list are SLRs (which stands for single lens reflex). These cameras feature interchangeable lenses, the ability to add an external flash, some even support wireless connectivity to your computer. These are typically used by professionals, but in recent years, the cost of a decent SLR has dropped drastically and more people are starting to use them. SLRs typically produce very good photographs, but the learning curve can be quite steep, so they aren't for everyone.

Back to point-and-shoots (because this is what the majority of you are probably going to buy), the main determining quality is their sensor. Even cellphones with built-in cameras that have plastic lenses are able to produce some pretty decent results in bright sunlight, but they will almost never work well in any low light condition. This is because they have a very small sensor and sensors work by letting in light. The bigger the sensor, the better the image quality, which is most noticeable in night photography. Camera companies very rarely list the size of their sensor, so the best and easier thing to do is simply to look for a point-and-shoot that works well in low light, and it will no doubt shine in every other aspect.

Megapixels are actually very irrelevant nowadays. Most salesmen will lure into buying a camera that has the most megapixels, but don't be fooled. The more pixels, the larger your prints can be, but if your sensor is the same size, those prints are going to turn out grainy. As long as you don't need to print anything larger than an 8x10, look for a camera in the 3-6 megapixel range. Anything more or less and you'll be disappointed.

But what about camera features? That's right, many of you want the red eye reduction, facial recognition, auto exposure, and color correction tools built right into your camera. There are actually very few cameras that offer both good image quality and a good feature set. Really, it all comes down to letting the camera do the work for you. You can either learn to use a slightly more complicated camera for better results or let the camera do everyone on its own for somewhat less spectacular results.

Source: Lane Smith, Digital Camera