Buying Guide - Digital Point and Shoot Cameras

We’ve all used mobile phones and it’s easy to say that the cameras on the smartphones don’t provide the same kind of performance and functionality as a digital camera would. This is the very reason people like to go out and buy a decent point and shoot camera. Digital cameras, like mobile phones and notebooks are a very hot topic and there are plenty of players in the market. Each brand releases a new range of camera once or twice a year, so there are plenty of choices. And when there’s plenty of choice, there’s also plenty of confusion all thanks to the marketing gimmicks that each one uses. This quick guide should hopefully demystify most of the claims of the companies and you should end up with the best deal possible.

Megapixel is not everything!
Many of us might assume a camera to be good if they have a high resolution. It’s not the case. Point and shoot cameras have tiny sensor size and beyond a certain sweet point, you aren’t getting any more detail from it.

Small sensors with large resolutions offer little performance improvement

These days any camera with a resolution of 10 to 12 MP is more than sufficient. It’s enough resolution and detail for you to be able to take printouts and enough to fit any display. Don’t go out hunting for a 14 MP point and shoot camera.

Zoom capability
What is more interesting than the sensor resolution is the optical zoom lens on a camera. It allows you to zoom further. Look for a larger optical zoom lens on a camera. The cheapest of cameras today come with a 3x or 4x optical zoom lens. Something in the range of 6x is optimum for both indoor photography and outdoors.

A large optical zoom lens is more useful than a large image resolution

If you like taking wildlife photographs, then even a larger zoom lens camera is recommended. Ultrazoom cameras or Superzoom cameras, as some people like to call them have optical zooms anywhere between 12x and 30x. The quality of zoom lens may not be excellent, but at least you have the capability. Ignore everything to do with digital zoom as it only helps deteriorate the quality of the image, rendering it useless.

Manual focus
Focus, on all point and shoot cameras and all digital cameras, in general for that matter is automated. All DSLR cameras and the recently introduced micro four-third cameras come with a manual focus feature. If you’re a slightly more serious photographer and want to experiment with your camera, look for cameras that have a manual focus option.

Aperture and shutter priority features
Just like manual focus, there are some other controls that are handy while shooting in different situations. The aperture and shutter priority mode are two such features. While camera manufacturers very proudly display all sorts of colour profiles and shooting modes, very little emphasis is given to the aperture and shutter priority modes. These two modes allow some control over the camera and it’s handy when you’re clicking fast action shots or shooting in low-light areas.