Which camera to choose?

Which camera to choose?

In my last post we discussed about what is digital photography and how it differs from traditional film photography. Now we shall focus on which camera you can select to purchase and won't get disappointed for your choice later.

These days there are so many options for digital cameras available in market. They are of various brands like Nikon, Olympus, Sony, Panasonic, Cannon etc. Also each brand provides various models like Nikon provides S-series, L-series; Panasonic comes in Lumix DMC series, Olympus avails E-series, stylus series etc. All the models these brands provide keep on changing time to time. Each brand emerge with new advance models each year.

Typically when you go to buy a camera in market you have heard about certain model from your friends as how good it is and how beautiful snaps he could take from it. And you get impress with it and purchase same model investing few thousand bucks. But when you start shooting with the model you somewhere feel not satisfied with the pictures it produced and you get disappointed with your choice of camera. Actually the camera your friend suggested was good for his requirements and not yours. You may need something very different than your friend.

Here main thing you need to keep in mind is cameras are manufactured keeping certain specific shooting purposes in target. Like amateur photography or professional photography. There is huge difference in these two approaches. Considering these two aspects, cameras can be divided in main two categories; TLRs (Automatic, Semi-automatic cameras) and SLRs.

First thing to understand is what is the meaning of automatic in the context of cameras. As you may have heard people talking about White-Balance (WB), Aperture, Point-Of-View (POV), shutter speed or f-stop etc. All these terms are nothing but the setting you can make in a camera to suit the photography needs. Now if these settings are handled by your camera on its own without your interference then you have an automatic camera. If few of these setting can be managed by you then you own a semi-automatic camera and if you can fully control these settings without having the camera override them on its own calculations then you have a manual camera.

Generally all cameras available in market are semi-automatic where you can manage the settings for WB, Exposure or flash etc. and shutter speed, aperture etc. are managed by the camera on its own by calculating the lighting conditions or presence of flash etc. Typically when we talk about SLR cameras, those cameras you can put on either settings i.e. manual or automatic.

When companies manufacture semi-automatic or manual cameras the costs are definitely going to be extremely different. If you go for a Nokia S-series camera it will cost you from 7-8 thousand rupees to 12-14 thousand rupees. Whereas if you opt for SLRs like D-80 or D-60 etc it will cost you upto 30 thousand rupees that to only the body and default lenses which is upto 10x optical lens. We shall see what is meant by optical lens in later post.

If we focus on semi-automatic cameras for now, then too you will surely be confused about which camera or model to choose? The answer is simple "purchase a camera to suit your needs."

First you need to identify your shooting needs. For this you can ask few questions to yourself...

1. What exactly you mean by taking a snap or shooting a picture?
2. Where you think you will be shooting the most, outside or inside?
3. How many times in a year you generally need to take pictures?
4. Finally the most important, how much money you wish to invest in a camera?

Taking above question in mind let's discuss on them and sort out the myths or misleading thoughts.

1. What exactly you mean by taking a snap or shooting a picture?

• Generally most of the people want a camera to shoot at a family function like wedding/reception or on a trip. These guys don't wish to try on multiple modes of shooting and even don't see themselves shooting like a professional or wish to turn or take interest in professional photography. All they want is just clicking the camera button and capture the moment for later reviews. These people can go for a basic semi-automatic camera with minimum of the optical lens range like 3x or so. Which will cost them upto 7-8 thousand rupees only. Don't waste too many bucks for the features that you don't need at all like a manual mode or so.

2. Where you think you will be shooting the most, outside or inside?

• Cameras need to have different settings for indoor and outdoor shooting. Generally these days all cameras provide different modes inbuilt in the camera for indoor and outdoor shooting. But if you think about taking pictures like a pro take for instance a beach photo shoot or event photo shoot like reception; it will require different and more advance accessories like external flash and extended lenses etc. So if you are not going to shoot like a pro as mentioned you need not to choose a camera which provides a facility to add and external flash or extended lenses. Which will again save a lot many bucks for you.
• Shooting indoor won't require you to have a higher range of optical lens as you hardly need to zoom in inside a party hall or at reception. For this a 3x optical zoom is more than sufficient.
• For outdoor shoots like on a trek or so, you may need to have higher range of optical zoom capability or need a wide angle lens to take a picture from a distance or take larger width picture than normal.

3. How many times in a year you generally need to take pictures?

• Check the frequency of your shoots. Based on it you can think about your investment in camera. Many a times people decide to purchase a camera when they have some events like marriage, reception or while going out on a trip. They purchase a good camera investing hefty amount in it and once they are done with their event their camera stays restored for a year or so. Remember every instrument has a specific life after which it starts requesting for maintenance. So if you are wasting your camera's life on shelf you will be ending investing so much in the purchase and maintenance than you got repaid by actually using it.

4. How much money you wish to invest in camera?

• Always keep your figure in mind when dealing with the vendor. Normally I have seen people decide to purchase a camera in the range of 7-10 thousand and when they visit a shop they come out purchasing one with 12-14 thousand or so. Remember the more the price of a camera the more features it provide. So when you are adding 2-4 thousand more on a camera check for the features it is adding and also see whether it is suiting to your shooting needs or not.

• Typically the features adding extra bucks are...

1. Optical lens capacity. Normally it is measured as 3x, 5x, 10x and so on. Where 'x' stands for 'times'. So when your camera has a 3x optical capacity, it means you can capture something thrice closer than normally it appears. So if you want a camera for general shooting purpose you might not need one with higher optical ranges.
2. Megapixels. As discussed in previous post it signifies how big picture you can capture without affecting the quality. So if you are going to view your pictures on a PC screen you might be satisfied with 6-10 MP and not more than that.
3. Number of features your camera provide.

• Vibration Reduction (VR): This feature tries to reduce vibrations caused by shaking of hand while taking pictures. The previous models of Nikon were not VR embedded. The first camera introduced by Nikon with VR was Nikon Zoom 700VR QD in 1994.
• AF Assistance: Auto-Focus assistance allows to focus properly on focus area in poor lighting conditions as well.
• Auto face detection: Detects faces and focuses on them. This feature is helpful when taking group photos to get all the faces clearer.
• Smile detection: This is a newly added feature. It releases the shutter when you smile.
• Self timer: Delayed shutter release. You can mention the delay in seconds so that you can join the rest of the team in a group photo. This is helpful in lower ISO settings and poor light conditions, where you want to introduce blur due to shaking of your hands.

There are enormous number of features being provided by camera manufacturer. You need to select the required feature and find a camera which provide your required features and go for it instead wasting thousands of rupees in non required features.

Finally you really need to search the market for compatibility among your needs and available features in model. For that the best thing is to

• Search and compare your model based on user reviews on internet. You can visit the manufacturers sites to get most reliable feature knowledge.
• Visit the user reviews to get trusted reviews and finally search a place to purchase a camera.
• Don't go for a remote or foreign retailer because if you are not willing to pay for company warranty or international warranty (which costs another 10 thousand rupees or so than the camera cost) you may need to visit the retailer personally with the camera in case of faulty piece or repair.

So choose wisely and go for a happy shooting.......

We have seen about how to choose a camera today, in the next post we shall think on various camera features in detail. Till then keep clicking......