Apogee Photo Magazine: Starting From Square One with Digital Cameras

If you make it a point to avoid an electronics superstore unless you’re in desperate need of a vacuum cleaner, you may not know that film is becoming passé in some circles. In fact, what some are calling "film" isn’t really film at all, but banks of microchips smaller than a credit card and almost as thin. There's a revolution in photography going on--no film, no lab, no high-priced color enlargements. You can do it all sitting at your computer. The age of digital photography has arrived.

The digital camera market has rapidly moved from a few devices--appealing almost exclusively to gadget-freaks with unlimited budgets--to a broad range of feature-laden equipment. The products available run the gamut from inexpensive units with low image quality and no flexibility to robust models priced close to a mid-sized sedan. The former is best suited for popping snapshots onto the family website (the digital age equivalent of the Instamatic), while the latter provides an excellent addition to the most sophisticated professional studio. But, where do your needs fit?

If you do your initial reconnaissance in the pages of a mail-order catalog, you may soon be overwhelmed by the impressive selection of options, features, and gadgets available with each model of camera. Indeed, it’s possible to find two cameras from the same manufacturer with almost identical features selling for different prices. Some catalogs offer last year’s model as the newest and greatest, while their competitors feature this year's update for about the same price. Starting your camera hunt on the Internet may present a similar flood of conflicting information. In addition, isolating fact from marketing hype can be a tall order.

Your best place to begin may be the local consumer electronics superstore or a national computer warehouse chain, although you shouldn’t make your final buying decision without a thorough review of the mail-order alternatives. In a store, you’ll see higher price tags, but you can pare down your choices significantly, plus you’ll get some hands-on experience to discover what you like and don’t like in digital cameras. There’s more to a camera than what it records on film. How is the heft of the camera? Refinement in the digital electronics at the core of the camera and the lack of moving parts allow the manufacturer to produce a light-weight, durable device. But are you at ease with a camera that weighs almost nothing? Does the camera fit your hand comfortably? Is it too large to be held securely in one hand? It’s easy to succumb to feature frenzy and skip the less glamorous consideration of form, but if you’re going to use the camera a lot, you must be comfortable with it.

While you're standing there caressing each camera, making the sales person nervous, you need to ask yourself what you expect from the device. For all the talk of convenience and expanded capabilities, digital cameras can be more restricting than their traditional counterparts. A skilled photographer can coax stunning results from what might be considered a mundane model in an economy line of 35mm cameras. However, in the world of digital cameras, there are limits imposed by the technology that no amount of know-how or creative tweaking will overcome. If you find yourself constantly playing with variables on your traditional 35mm camera, you'll likely be disappointed with the limited or nonexistent manual adjustments available on a digital model. You should assess your needs carefully before making cost/performance trade-offs.

Using cable and software your digital image can be loaded directly into your computer for placement in a web page. Photographed with Kodak DC40 digital camera at maximum resolution (756x504). Copyright W. Sanford May.

You can still join the digital revolution using your existing equipment. Your print or film needs to be digitized first. The Kodak CD is a popular way to get you images in a computer usable form or scan your prints using a desktop flatbed scanner. Photographed with traditional media and equipment. Body: Minolta Maxxum 7000. Lens: Minolta Maxxum AF Lens/50 . Stock: Fujicolor SuperHQ 200. Digitized with Umax Astra 1220S scanner at 72 dpi. Copyright W. Sanford May.

Before you start building your list of uses, you should understand a few basics in digital photography. Since digital cameras don’t use film, you don’t have to worry about selecting a small, medium or large format camera. However, be aware of a similar concept that is just as important: resolution. "Resolution" refers to the number of vertical and horizontal lines of pixels that make up the photograph. The resolution is represented by two numbers written as you would the size of a two-dimensional object (i.e. 320x240; 640x480). The larger the numbers, the higher the resolution, the better the image quality--especially at larger sizes. Lower resolutions are fine for snapshots or candids you plan to print or display in small sizes. But, if you’re planning to publish your digital photographs as full-page images, or if you’re building a library of high-quality stock art, you want the highest resolution you can afford.

No matter how fantastic the photographs created by a digital camera, those images are of limited use while stored in the device. Although a wide range of cameras now include a small LCD display for previewing photographs, you’re going to want to move those images to your laptop or desktop computer for editing, display, and printing. This brings up a strictly technical, but all-important concern: the options available for image transfer. Almost all cameras feature a cable/software combination for moving data. On a Windows-compatible PC, the cable connects to the serial, parallel or, more recently, USB port. The quality of the software varies. Some packages are fast, easy to learn, and packed with a wealth of useful features and transfer options. Other software is much less sophisticated. If you can’t get a hands-on demonstration of the image transfer process while you're camera shopping, look for a money-back guarantee.

Higher-end units usually include a removable, reusable memory card for storing additional images--the digital equivalent of film. This feature permits storing a large number of images, limited only by your budget for memory cards. External readers are available for some types of memory cards. These readers connect to your computer and allow you to transfer image data directly from the memory card.

Macintosh users should be aware that while many camera manufacturers provide a connectivity solution for Macs, some provide the cable and software only as an option at additional cost. If you’re planning on using a Mac as your digital photography lab, you may need to narrow your search using compatibility and price before you get your heart set on a camera that just won’t work with either your computer or your budget.

Now that you know what to look for in a camera, you should decide how you’ll be using it. A significant catalyst in the proliferation of digital cameras has been the rousing success of the World Wide Web at all levels of technical ability. Novice to expert computer users are looking for an easy way to create photographic content for their web pages. They’ve found it in digital cameras. On the web, the digital camera eliminates the middle man. The cameras take photographs in the format computers around the globe are already using. It’s just a matter of using the right software to make a few file type conversions, and brand new photos are on the web in moments. Due to the speed limitations of devices that many people use to connect to the Internet, smaller is better. Low resolution images take less time to download and are popular with web designers. If your foray into digital photography is primarily for web publishing, low-resolution cameras are a great way to generate images. And with low resolution frequently comes low price. If your needs can bear limited resolution, you're likely to find a good camera for a few hundred dollars.

More ambitious plans for your digital camera can send equipment costs up in a hurry. If you’re creating professional images for publication and/or significantly enlarging digital photos, you’ll want the highest resolution you can afford. Even if you plan to send some of your photographs to service bureaus to be imaged onto transparencies or photographic paper, you may be disappointed with the quality of photographs taken with low resolution cameras. Most cameras support switching between high and low resolution modes, so you’ll be able to snap smaller images when it’s acceptable. But there’s no substitute for high resolution when you really need it.

Although high-priced cameras may include lots of nifty features, image quality should carry the most weight in your decision. Many consumer electronics and computer peripheral manufacturers are jumping into the digital photography arena. But digital cameras are often the first cameras they’ve ever manufactured. It’s worth your while to look at digital devices developed by companies with a solid reputation in the photographic industry for attention to both image resolution and color accuracy.

Fortunately for computer professionals and photographers alike, the cost of technology is falling. Bare-bones cameras can be had for around $300, and many models suitable for some professional work are coming in under $1000. Be advised that the digital camera market, like any new technology, changes rapidly. I define the personal computer honeymoon period as the period of time after you make a major purchase and before the manufacturer releases a much better machine for less money. I’ve never counted more than four months. The camera you buy today may be selling for less than two-thirds of your cost within a year. If you don’t have a pressing need and can wait before adding a digital camera to your equipment list, it won’t hurt to hold out for a better deal. While you’re waiting, don’t count yourself out of the digital media craze altogether. For an additional charge, many labs will produce your photos in digital format on compact disc or floppy diskette when they return your slides or prints. The CD is reusable and can be read by almost any CD-ROM drive. Image files are often recorded in a variety of resolutions, suitable for a broad range of applications.

While not an absolute must-have for your camera bag, digital cameras provide a pleasant marriage of computer technology and photography. The combination of instant photos, unlimited reprints, and permanent archival storage without media degradation can’t be beat. If you’re careful to buy what you need without draining your bank account, your digital camera will provide a convenient alternative to traditional media, hopefully reminding you why you picked up a camera in the first place.