Digital Cameras Essay, Research Paper

Digital cameras allow computer users to take pictures and store the photographed images

digitally instead of on traditional film. With some digital cameras, a user downloads the stored

pictures from the digital camera to a computer using special software included with the camera.

With others, the camera stores the pictures directly on a floppy disk or on a PC Card. A user then

copies the pictures to a computer by inserting the floppy disk into a disk drive or a PC Card into

a PC Card slot (Chambers and Norton 134). Once stored on a computer, the pictures can be

edited with photo-editing software, printed, faxed, sent via electronic mail, included in another

document, or posted to a Web site for everyone to see.

Three basic types of digital cameras are studio cameras, field cameras, and point-and-

shoot cameras (Shelly Cashman Series Microsoft Word 2000 Project 2). The most expensive

and highest quality of the three, a studio camera, is a stationary camera used for professional

studio work. Photojournalists frequently use field cameras because they are portable and have a

variety of lenses and other attachments. As with the studio camera, a field camera can be quite

expensive.

Reliable and lightweight, the point-and-shoot camera provides acceptable quality

photographic images for the home or small business user. A point-and-shoot camera enables

these users to add pictures to personalized greeting cards, a computerized photo album, a family

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Newsletter, certificates, awards, or a personal Web site. Because of its functionality, it is an ideal

camera for mobile users such as real estate agents, insurance agents, and general contractors.

The image quality produced by a digital camera is measured by the number of bits it

stores in a dot and the resolution, or number of dots per inch. The higher each number, the better

the quality, but the more expensive the camera. Most of today’s point-and-shoot digital cameras

are at least 24-bit with a resolution ranging from 640 x 480 to 1024 x 960 (Walker 57-89) Home

and small business users can find an affordable camera with a resolution in this range that

delivers excellent detail for less than $400.