Bleusky left me a comment asking for recommendations on purchasing a digital camera. I actually get this question quite often, and this is what I usually tell people:
Choosing a digital camera is a very personal experience, because no one other than yourself knows exactly how you will use it. That being said, most people also don't really know what features they want out of a digital camera until you start asking them questions about how they plan on using the camera.
- How will you use this camera?
Will you be taking a lot of still subject photographs? Or will you be planning on taking a lot of candid shots? Are you taking a lot of night/low-light shots or shots in broad daylight? Do you intend on taking video/audio with this camera?
Cameras these days have a dazzling array of features to fit a variety of lifestyles and purposes. Your goal should be to find one that fits your needs and has the feature set you want.
- Where would you like your camera to fit?
This question determines the size of the digital camera. There are quite a few that will fit comfortably in a purse or backpack, versus one that will require a camera bag.
- How much resolution do you want?
Resolution of the camera is measured in megapixels. The more megapixels, the higher the resolution, and also the more space it takes up on the memory card. Resolution matters only for dealing with enlargements. For most people who never make prints larger than 4x6 or 5x7, 2 - 3 megapixels is fine. For people who are making 20x30 prints to display, they will want a higher megapixel resolution.
- How much zoom do you want?
How close up or far away do you plan on being from the subject? Zoom is usually given in two sets of numbers, one for optical zoom, and another for digital zoom. Optical zoom is the real capability of the camera, digital zoom is basically pixel-doubling, and should be ignored.
- What is your budget for a digital camera?
This tells you the price range of where you should be looking. The more features and settings you want, typically the more expensive the camera becomes. General price figures are as follows:
Consumer-quality price range: $200-$500
Prosumer-quality price range: $600-1500
Professional-quality: $5000+
After you answer these questions, it's relatively easy to find a camera that fits your budget and your needs, and you can check Digital Photography Reviews' gallery for what you can expect out of the camera.
For bleusky's situation, I think it's fairly easy to find a good point and shoot camera, the most difficult part will be in finding one that does nighttime well. I don't know what you plan on capturing in low light situations, a flash usually works well for most things, unless you're really close up(overexposure) or far away (too dim). Most cameras also have a nightime function that works moderately well (if people remember to use it). Canon also just released the EOS-20Da, a digital SLR camera with specialized astronomy functions, but I think the price is out of the range of most consumers.
A list of cameras I've used is in the extended entry.
I've owned and played with a variety of digital cameras, and these are my observations regarding them.
- Sony Mavica CD-1000
The Sony Mavica line of digital cameras was based on an interesting idea. Instead of saving images to on-board memory on the camera, save the images to floppy disk. The CD-1000 saved images to small format CD-R's instead of floppies. This 2 megapixel camera was light (made up of mostly plastic) but bulky and featured a 10x optical zoom through a Carl Zeiss lens. I discontinued using it mainly because it was slow to shoot with, and because Sony refused to release MacOS X drivers for it (which made getting photos off the CD-Rs a painful process). It did very poorly on action shots. - Canon S200 Digital Elph
This is another 2.0 Megapixel camera I own. It's small and easily fits in the pockets of my jeans. It is a bit on the heavy side, but it is a solid camera. It only has 3x optical zoom, and I actually found the quality of the shots to pale in comparisson to that of the Sony. It uses CompactFlash cards to store images. - Canon EOS-20D
This is my prosumer digital SLR camera. I wanted a camera with interchangable lenses, and better resolution than my two previous cameras. It also has the ability to take a burst of photographs. - Canon Powershot A400
My sister's camera. A 3.2 megapixel camera, the pictures came out quite nicely, though it was a bit bulkier than the Digital Elph. She would routinely carry this in her purse. - Pentax Optio S
My sister bought this camera for my youngest sister. It's a very small point-and-shoot camera and it fits inside an Altoid Tin. My only gripe is that the viewfinder doesn't reflect the true framing of the subjects, the LCD screen on the back, however does. - Sony Cyber-Shot U20
This little camera is about as large as an iPod shuffle and twice as thick. It takes 2.0 Megapixel pictures and the picture quality isn't great. It also lacks any type of zoom, and uses Memory Sticks as the media.
first time i've seen the term "prosumer"...i looked it up therefore on wikipedia. very interesting. thanks for the post. i'll continue to do some research.
the pentax optio cameras, i've read, have issues with color representation too. the colors aren't as vivid, and the range of hues is off, from the original.
also, do you happen to have the pictures from betina's wedding still? if you have a chance, could i get a copy of those? i don't think mine turned out well.