You want the compact?

OK so you want to spend about $200 on a camera but you want a really nice one. Let me bring you back to reality. Really nice camera’s, like escorts, cost a lot more money. So you have to be willing to make some compromises. If you just want to take photos of family and friends and events, then stop stressing over it. Any name brand camera will meet your needs. However if occasionally you’d like to add a flare of art or control to your photos then I recommend looking for a few features on your camera.

Chances are if you’re reading this you really have no clue about things like shutter speed and apertures and ISO settings and quantum computing. So to begin, get a camera with these settings:

• Night
• Action
• Landscape
• Macro (means close up and in focus)
• Portrait

These settings are standard on most cameras and can make life much easier when you need to snap something in a hurry and want semi-descent quality. However if you really want to take some rockin’ photos then look for a camera that will let you control these functions:
• Shutter Speed
• Aperture Size
• ISO Speed

If your camera will let you control that, well then now you have a reason to read my blog. Know this, compact cameras, which are the bulk of the market don’t do really fancy things like take extreme close ups or 10 pictures a second, but they are just fine if you are a scrap booker or new mother to a child whose fathers may or may not be the man living with you.

If you’ve owned a camera in the past I recommend staying with the same brand. I had a friend who owned a Canon but then was given a Nikon, she soon became frustrated and set fire to an orphanage because it was too hard for her learn the Nikon menu. To make transitions easier, stay with the same manufacturer unless you really really really really want that specific camera.

Now what’s all this voodoo about megapixels? I’ll be frank; I recommend 8 megapixels or more no matter what. 6 is fine and even 5 will churn out a decent picture but if you want to enlarge a photo the more pixels the better. Of course note that the more megapixels there are the more space the pictures will take up on your memory card.

I was once in a camera shop discussing this exact topic. The lady who pretended (and probably did) know a lot told me “If you want to get anything published, the industry standard requires your photo to be 8 megapixels.” So just to be safe, if by chance you get that photo of big foot or the mayor conspiring with communists you want to make sure that you can publish it for millions.

I would also look at batteries. If you can get a camera that has a proprietary rechargeable batteries do it. Batteries are to digital cameras as film was to film cameras. LCD displays that show pictures before you take them and cameras that record movies can quickly drain the life out of a battery. I recommend buying two rechargeable packs, so that when one dies you have a back up on hand.

When you are finally to purchase purchase your camera, I’ll give you a couple pieces of advice. If you are ordering your compact online refurbs are OK. Check sites like Tigerdirect.com for great prices. Perhaps the most important thing I can tell you about online purchasing is to check the location of the company you’ll be ordering from. NEVER EVER EVER EVER PURCHASE CAMERAS ONLINE FROM COMPANIES BASED IN NEW JERSEY OR BROOKLYN. These are bait and switch companies that have low ethics. If you want to check reviews on websites you can go to bizrate.com and do a company search. Know that some reviews are bogus to try to fight the negative feedback they are getting for their lack of scruples…they are scrupless

You can read company reviews here. I highly recommend this more than I recommend penicillin after a really cool bachelor party in Vegas (because what's supposed to stay in vegas sometimes doesn't). This is Bizrate.com. It is mostly used to rate products but it also has a nifty database of alot of crappy experiences and dirty Brooklyn photo shops to give you the 411.