Understanding Digital Cameras:
Choosing a digital camera that fits into your budget and as well as meet your photo capturing needs is the most confusing thing. But if we can understand some key differences between currently available models, the choice can be somewhat clarified. Considerably, this will also narrow the range of models that will fulfill your requirements. Before going to shopping it will be useful exercise to prepare “MUST HAVE” list and considering various features that digital cameras do or do not offer.
I think a better way to get out of this confusion is to understand various terms of digital photography.
- Megapixels:
Technically speaking, pixel is smallest part of digital image that can be controlled or edited on the screen of display device. The number of pixels in an image is called the resolution. In digital photography resolution is expressed with a single number. 5 Megapixels camera means, a camera which can take images containing 5 million pixels.
For most of the people the first thing to ‘consider’ is megapixels. For images of size double-page spreads in magazines 12 to 14 megapixels is great…this will also enable to create large exhibition prints. (However many high quality 8-megapixel cameras can also meet these requirement.)
22 megapixels sometimes sounds like everyone would like to own. This can be the best option for commercial photographers. But amateur photographers must consider the size of photographs or digital files. 22 megapixels’ camera will generate images with large size (about 6Mb to 7Mb) which in turn increase the burden on the hardware and sometimes on software also.
- Optical Zoom:
This consideration comes into picture only while considering prosumer digicams. Optical zoom is power to go closer to the image object without moving physically closer. Optical zoom basically empowers to capture objects from long distance. While choosing camera model, first one needs to identify imaging needs and then to choose optical zoom accordingly. For indoor photo shoot like in family functions, parties 6X to 10X optical zoom can work great. For outdoor shoots, (here a lot differentiation exists dew to various situations) it will not be possible to stop at a certain range. For e.g. in case of wildlife photo shoot, capturing snake from distance of 15 feet will be possible with 20X to 25X optical zoom. But in this case stability of hands must be considered. Because doing with this much zoom even slender movement of hands will reflect into massive blurs in image. However this can be avoided by making use of tripods in some cases.
- Shutter speed and Aperture:
Shutter speed and aperture are responsible for controlling the amount and speed of light reaching to sensor of the camera. Aperture is flexible hole over camera lances that controls amount of light reflected through lances. Shutter speed is time for which shutter of camera lance remains open. Programmable modes of both prosumer and SLR cameras allow setting values of shutter speed and aperture. Setting shutter speed 1/100s will capture image within 1/100 second.
My Camera : Kodak Z-981
Product Specifications
| |
Standard features
| |
Sensor type
|
1 / 2.33 type
|
Effective pixels
|
14 MP (4368 × 3256)
|
Lens
| |
Zoom
|
26X optical, 5X digital, total zoom range 130X
|
Image stabilizer
|
optical
|
Shutter speed
|
auto, 16-1/2000 sec. (S/M modes)
|
Viewfinder
|
high-resolution (230K pixels) electronic, 100% field of view
|
Display
|
3.0 in. (approx. 230K dots), Smart Display, 2 level brightness adjustments
|
Storage
|
64 MB internal memory[1]available, SDHC/SD card expansion slot
|
Auto focus
| |
Focus Type
|
TTL imager AF system
|
Modes
|
normal, macro, super macro, infinity, manual
|
Focus range
|
· normal: 0.7 m (wide)/2.5 m (tele)–infinity
· macro: 0.1–1.0 m (wide)/1.7–3.0 m (tele)
· super macro: 0.01–0.3 m (f=52 mm, 35 mm equiv.)
|
Auto focus control
|
single, continuous
|
Auto focus zones
|
TTL multi-zone, center zone AF, selectable zone AF (25 zones)
|
Face Recognition
|
yes
|
Face Detection
|
yes
|
Face-priority AF
|
yes
|
AF (Auto Focus) assist light
|
yes
|
Exposure control
| |
ISO sensitivity
|
auto, 64, 100, 200, 400, 800, 1600, 3200, 6400[2]
|
Metering modes
|
multi-pattern, center-weighted, spot
|
Compensation
|
±2.0 EV with 1/3 EV steps
|
Bracketing
|
±1.0 EV with 1/3 EV steps, 3 images
|
White balance
|
auto, daylight, tungsten, fluorescent, open shade
|
Flash
| |
Range
|
· 6.2 m (@ wide, ISO 400)
· 3.5 m (@ tele, ISO 400)
|
Modes
|
auto, red-eye reduction, fill, off
|
Compensation
|
±1.0 EV in 1/3 steps
|
Shooting specifications
| |
Drive modes
|
single shot, burst (0.9 fps up to 3 frames), high-speed burst, self-timer (10 sec.), delay shutter (2 sec.), 2-shot self-timer
|
Shooting modes
|
Smart Capture, sport, portrait, P (programmed AE), A (aperture priority AE), S (shutter priority AE), M (manual exposure), portrait, panorama (left–right, right–left), video, SCN (scene modes)
|
Scene modes
|
high ISO, night portrait, landscape, night landscape, flower, sunset, backlight, candlelight, manner/museum, text, beach, snow, fireworks, children, self-portrait, stage
|
Click to capture
|
< 0.2 sec.
|
Shot to shot
|
< 1.6 sec
|
Still capture
| |
Still format
|
JPEG/EXIF v2.21, KDC RAW image file format
|
Picture size
|
· 14 MP (4288 × 3216)—4:3
· 12 MP (4288 × 2848)—3:2
· 10 MP (4288 × 2416)—16:9
· 6 MP (2832 × 2128)—4:3
· 3 MP (2048 × 1536)—4:3
· 2 MP (1920 × 1080)—16:9
· 1 MP (1280 × 960)—4:3
|
Compression level
|
· PASM: fine standard, basic, RAW[3]
· Smart Capture: standard
|
Color modes
|
high, natural, low, sepia, black and white
|
Sharpness
|
high, normal, low
|
Review options
|
single, magnification with navigation box, multi-up, multimedia slideshow, histogram, view by, face recognition
|
Editing
|
on-camera crop, KODAK PERFECT TOUCH Technology, voice annotation, RAW[4]file development
|
File management
|
delete, undo delete, copy, protect, text tagging, one-button upload, favorite tagging
|
Video capture
| |
Format
|
QUICKTIME MOV h.264 (video) & AAC LC (audio)
|
Quality
|
· HDV (1280 × 720) at 30 fps
· VGA (640 × 480) at 30 fps
· QVGA (320 × 240) at 30 fps
|
Microphone
|
yes (monoaural)
|
Speaker
|
yes (monoaural)
|
Length
|
· HDV: continuous up to 29 min. based on memory card capacity
· VGA/QVGA: continuous up to 80 min. based on memory card capacity
|
Review options
|
play, rewind, pause, fast-forward and rewind, forward and rewind by frame, multi-up, multimedia slideshow, bookmarks, smart finder
|
Editing
|
make a picture from video, action print (4, 9, 16-up), trim, bookmark
|
File management
|
delete, undo delete, copy, protect, text tagging, favorite tagging, multi-select, Share
|
Share
| |
Share menu
|
YouTube, FACEBOOK, FLICKR and KODAK Gallery sites, e-mail
|
Customization
| |
Custom settings
|
LCD brightness (5 levels), image storage, capture frame grid (on/off), image stabilizer control, red-eye preflash (on/off), quick view (on/off), advanced digital zoom, orientation sensor, sound, volume, date & time, auto power off, video out, language, reset camera, favorite, set tag, format, about
|
