Choosing and Using a Digital Camera Kevin Amboe Surrey School District 2006

Film vs Digital Low Priced Very High Resolution Lots of Accessories Better Exposure Control Easy to make prints True Point and Click success Prices are coming down Resolutions are increasing Post Processing Can control exposure Can print your own Point and click not always successful

Types of Cameras Low End / Integrated –1 - 3 megapixels –Cell phone –Palm pilot Mid Range –3 to 5 megapixels –Zoom Lens –Removable storage High End –Better Optics –5 or higher megapixels –Advanced controls –Advanced file saving

Lenses Glass vs. Plastic Optical Zoom is critical Digital Zoom decreases quality Progressive Zoom Filter / Protective Adapter Removable Lenses

Features Manual Controls Program Modes Ease of Use Ergonomics Size Flash - off body Batteries Movies and Sound

Manual Controls Aperature –Fstop - how much light gets in –Lower works better in low light –High provides better focal range Shutter Speed –Seconds to 1/30 to 1/2000th of a second –Slower allows blurring - Faster for high action

Program Control Portrait Sport Scenery Macro Snow Backlight

Ease of Use / Ergonomics Charging / Changing Batteries Hand Position Downloading Changing Settings Choose size for type of use –Larger for sturdy –Smaller for easy carrying

Flash Must synchronize with shutter speed Usually good 10 to 20 feet only Away from camera body is better Red Eye reduction

Batteries Double AA Alkaline (1.5V) Double AA rechargable( 1.35 V) NiMH LiOH

More Features Digital Storage Image Resolution File Type

Digital Storage Floppy, CD, DVD Compact Flash Smart Media Secure Digital / xD Memory Stick Ideally want 2 x 512 MB File Type - JPEG - RAW - TIFF

Image Resolution 3 Megapixel images will print clearly an 8 x 10 photo 3 Megapixel image is about 1 Megabyte For screen/ web projects use lower resolution 1 Megapixel image is about 150 Kilobytes

Resolution 100% 200%3200% 400 % 800% If you increase size of decrease resolution, you will get pixelization.

Resolution Needs Use Web page / On-Screen Ink - Jet 3 x 5 snapshots Photo quality Enlargements PPI

What is PPI Pixels Per Inch (PPI) relates to the Dots per Inch(DPI) that the printer can print To determine PPI, divide the pixels by the inches. 17 inch monitor is usually 11x13”. A 1200 x 1600 image (1.2MB at 3 Megapixels) would be 1200/11 - thus 109 ppi

Onscreen Resolution Onscreen is only 72 ppi so a 15” screen (9x12) only needs (72x9) by (72x12) 648 by 864 Or … Just over 1/2 a megapixel We can’t set cameras for onscreen projects to low resolution. If printing a full 8 x 10 photo, then could use 3 megapixel mode.

File Types JPEG - Joint Photographic Experts Group. Stores files compressed - loses some informationJPEG TIFF - Tagged Image File FormatTIFF RAW - stores the actual numbers for each pixel - 100% quality - increased file sizes - must be converted to be viewedRAW

Kevin’s Pick 3 Megapixel Secure Digital Memory 2 x 512 MB Storage(extra cost) USB / Firewire transfer 10X Optical Zoom Around $300

Sample Websites _ html?tag=dirhttp://reviews.cnet.com/Digital_cameras/ _ html?tag=dir Kodak Support – q-path=2/3/38&pq-locale=en_UShttp:// q-path=2/3/38&pq-locale=en_US Digital Camera Comparisons –

References Cnet Pics4Learning.com Wikipedia.org