How many megapixels do I need?
The more pixels the better the quality and the more you will need to pay - sometimes!
A megapixel is a million pixels - for example a square picture measuring 1000 x 1000 pixels.
If you are surfing the web this would be a huge picture probably bigger than your computer monitor. If however you wanted to print this picture it would only be twice the size of a business card.
So depending on what you want to do with your camera will depend on how many pixels you will need. If you just want to email your friends a 1 or 2 megapixel camera will be fine. If you want to keep small photographic prints then most 3 megapixel cameras will suit the purpose. All of these cameras are very competitively priced and available anywhere.
If you need better quality photographs or the ability to enlarge the photographs, there are other considerations to think about. Not all cameras with the same number of megapixels will give you the same quality photo. It is dependent on the quality of the lense, the sensor which records the picture and of course the software. Photographs are very personal and colours vary wildly - choose one where you like the tones of the sample pictures.
Currently we use a 5 megapixel compact to capture instant pictures for our web pages and also for the smallest of our range of calendars. For the larger calendars we have a number of SLR Nikon cameras with inter changeable dedicated specialist lenses.
For the purists who prefer film, I can confirm that our new Nikon D2X with 8 megapixels will compete with film until you want to take panoramic landscape and seascape photographs. However,we have our medium format camera back which has 16 megapixels to take these type of photographs. Unless you have just won the lottery, I wouldn't go down this route.
So my advice if you are looking for good average photos of normal everyday subjects look for one of the main brands with 3-5 megapixels. Make sure you have seen some sample pictures and you are happy with the total package.
I'll talk about storage next time
Enjoy taking your pictures
Gordon Flavell
www.flavell.com
A megapixel is a million pixels - for example a square picture measuring 1000 x 1000 pixels.
If you are surfing the web this would be a huge picture probably bigger than your computer monitor. If however you wanted to print this picture it would only be twice the size of a business card.
So depending on what you want to do with your camera will depend on how many pixels you will need. If you just want to email your friends a 1 or 2 megapixel camera will be fine. If you want to keep small photographic prints then most 3 megapixel cameras will suit the purpose. All of these cameras are very competitively priced and available anywhere.
If you need better quality photographs or the ability to enlarge the photographs, there are other considerations to think about. Not all cameras with the same number of megapixels will give you the same quality photo. It is dependent on the quality of the lense, the sensor which records the picture and of course the software. Photographs are very personal and colours vary wildly - choose one where you like the tones of the sample pictures.
Currently we use a 5 megapixel compact to capture instant pictures for our web pages and also for the smallest of our range of calendars. For the larger calendars we have a number of SLR Nikon cameras with inter changeable dedicated specialist lenses.
For the purists who prefer film, I can confirm that our new Nikon D2X with 8 megapixels will compete with film until you want to take panoramic landscape and seascape photographs. However,we have our medium format camera back which has 16 megapixels to take these type of photographs. Unless you have just won the lottery, I wouldn't go down this route.
So my advice if you are looking for good average photos of normal everyday subjects look for one of the main brands with 3-5 megapixels. Make sure you have seen some sample pictures and you are happy with the total package.
I'll talk about storage next time
Enjoy taking your pictures
Gordon Flavell
www.flavell.com
posted by Gordon Flavell at 6:03 pm
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