Expert: John Oliverio - 1/5/2004

Question
Hi John,

  I'm on the site (Allexperts) on secondary education.  Anyway, I want to get my first digital camera, and wondered if you would have any recommendations as to # of megapixels, features,etc.
  
  We travel a lot and like to take photos of our vacations, and email them to friends.  We've been using an Olympus 35mm, but would like to step up to digital for easier use with the computer.

   Any ideas?

Thanks, Steve

Answer
Steve,

Hello. Thanks for the question.  Sorry I didn't get right back to you.  We are getting a lot of snow, and it appears to be causing outages on the net.

What I think you really want to know is how to "shop" for a camera.  Asking someone for recommendations as to pixels and features just means you'll get the camera that they want.  

So, start with pixels (resolution):  For the most part, pixels determine how big you can print.  There are a lot of factors involved here, or can be if you are really into it.  But for the family user it can be simplified.  2mp will make a good 5x7.  3mp an 8x10.  Anything larger than 3 would mean you could do more cropping in your editing software while maintaining a larger print size.  

Next you need to choose a class of camera.  I would imagine you want a point and shoot.  But there are a lot of options out there.  So you need to decide what you want the camera to do as far as manual control and zoom length.  Also you have to choose from different body designs if you have portability issues.  If you don't care about manual control, and just want a regular zoom, then you are indeed just shopping for a basic point and shoot model.  But don't be turned off by cameras that do have manual control because they will still go into auto.  

 The last thing I would consider is the type of accessories that are available.  For example: Canon makes point and shoot cameras that will connect to a portable, battery operated "dye-sub" printer.  There are also different companies that offer a "docking station" that lets you recharge and download from one device.  

Hope this helps.  If you like, once you've narrowed down your picks, I'll give opinions of specific cameras.

John