Digital Cameras for the Non-Techie

There are many different digital camera's out on the market now, and so many different styles to choose from. But what if you have never owned a digital camera? And are you interested in maybe purchasing one soon to replace your regular 35mm film camera? Making the choice to switch over to digital is something many people choose to do every day. Main reasons come from all the benefits involved in digital over film. Professional photographers may prefer to stay with film cameras, however, because of their unique ability to capture a specific color or an amazing way to portray an object in such a way as to bring out the significance of it. But we aren't talking about something as difficult to photograph as the Mona Lisa was to paint. This is about taking pictures of loved ones with the family, or your child's soccer game. If this is something you've had on your mind, then it's time to start thinking about the advantages.

Many digital cameras in our present day almost always take SD cards. These are also known as Secure Digital cards (SD) and can hold anywhere from 4mb to 4Gigs. The term MB stands for Megabyte, and the term Gig stands for Gigabyte. If you are not sure how big these things are, then take this for example:

Most digital cameras take snap shots at 3.0 Mega Pixels or higher (The explanation to this will come later.) and to take the picture, it needs an average of 1 MB to take the picture. So if you were to have a 4 MB SD card, you would only be able to take about 3 pictures. But to think if you had a 4 Gig SD card, you would have thousands more pictures. A gig is 1000 MB's, so a 4 Gig SD card would hold about 4,000 pictures on one small card.

Now a Mega Pixel is the image quality that is produced from the camera. Your typical Digital camera is about 3.0 MP's to 8MP's. The higher Mega Pixel cameras don't use too much more room on the memory card, but you may want to go with a higher memory stick. The recommended one for 3-5 mega pixel camera users is 256mb if you are just a mom or pop who takes pictures of your kids at the games, or family reunions.

Personally, I love to take pictures. I carry with myself two 512MB memory cards but rarely use more than one of them. With the resolutions starting to come up higher and higher these days, its recommended now that you run out and buy a 512MB card.

Going back to the memory cards, there is more than one style besides the SD. There is also Compact, MS, XD, Pro Duo, and a few others. Other than SD, not many cameras take the other style of memory stick seeing as SD is the most widely used.

Now thinking about pricing, you really have to think about what the camera will be used for. Is this something you will be taking out of the case every other week, or every other day? If you are one who likes to take pictures to capture all these certain special moments, then you may want to get a nice quality camera, but with not as many mega pixels to save space on your memory card. The higher the MP, the higher the price. Today's high-end models with 5 mega pixels are on sale at Fry's Electronics for an expensive $199. But think if you really need all the mega pixels, or if you could do without them like most people can. It really is just a waste of space on the camera, and the only thing that can come out of it is a better picture quality if you were to zoom in a lot. A 3 Mega Pixel camera could do that just as easily, just as my own personal camera. I have a Canon Powershot A510. I originally had a Canon Powershot A410, however I also like to take short clips of video, and the A410 did not have a microphone, so I upgraded to one that did. Personally, I'd never shoot for anything more than 4 Mega Pixels, and no more than $120. That's exactly how much I paid for my A510, and it has served me well.

One last thing to be completely aware of is the battery. Seek a camera that can last with a decent battery. I notice a lot that the Canon's and some Sony brand cameras have battery savers, and are great quality with barely using any juice. Also think about the purchase of rechargable batteries with more than 2000Mh as they last almost 4x as long as regular batteries. I have been able to take over 1000 pictures with my camera and haven't needed to replace the rechargable batteries I got once!

All in all, try to keep your mind open to places to buy, what your looking for, ease of camera usage, prices, and battery life, and you will be doing fine. Here are some following recommendations for places to buy, camera preferences, and many other things:

Buying
www.ebay.com - I know, it's an auction site, but the prices are almost unbeatable.
Best Buy usually has camera's out for display and with pretty good pricing. Try out the camera's to see which one fits you!
Office Max also allows people to try out the cameras in their store front.

Great Battery Life cameras:
When it comes right down to it, you should read up the reviews for the camera you have been thinking about getting to see what kind of battery life it has. I wouldn't shoot for anything that only can shoot about 100 photos per pair of AA's. Try www.epinions.com for their unbiased reviews and also battery life reviews!

Memory Cards:
SD
256MB - Good size, allows for family's to take about 200 photos. Plenty for family reunions or just around the house
512MB - Great size! About 550 photos on a 3 MP camera. This is the one most people would shoot for with high-end camera's!
1+ Gig - This is one of the biggest sizes out there, and at a fairly affordable price, it is recommended for those who just can't stop shooting! Be aware of the time to save to the card as it will be pretty big, and to access it may take a bit longer on the computer.

All in all, the one place I highly recommened to check up on for all cameras you may consider purchasing, go to
www.epinions.com first. You will be thankful you did, and greatful for having read up on digital camera's before going off and purchasing one. Good luck with your hunt for the perfect camera for your family or life!