If you are a new compact digital camera user you may be confused about a number of aspects of digital camera equipment and terminology. We have written this guide to make it easier to sort out the confusion so that you can begin to grasp the subject much better. We also hope that we can help in buying your new digital camera. A number of the important expressions you will need to comprehend include ppi, white balance, sensitivity and pixel and we will endeavor to explain each of them in this article.

Pixels or Picture Elements

The name derives from picture element and each photo is made up of several million of these tiny pixels. Taken all together the overall effect is of a continuous and smooth photograph. One way to describe digital camers is by their pixel count, which is the pixels present in a photograph. The number of pixels per inch is the ppi. The number of pixels is directly related to the image quality and the image can be blown up more. The pixel count in modern digital cameras is generally between 1 million and 14 million. Cameras are described as 2 Mp or 5 Mp (Mp =million pixels) for example. Most of the most popular digital cameras have around 2 and 5 million pixels for each photograph.

Very good prints of four by six inches could be made from a 3MP digital camera whereas large five by seven inch prints would be slightly lower in quality. If you want to produce larger 8″ by 10″ prints a 4Mp or 5Mp digital camera would be more suitable. For even bigger prints choose a camera with more pixels. Sometimes total pixels and effective pixels are described for a digital camera. The number to consider is the effective pixels as this is what you will see in the image.

Sensitivity Settings

The sensitivity settings on a digital camera are comparable to the ISO ratings for film. Most cameras will have settings equivalent to the ISO 100 and 200 ratings of film. A number have settings equivalent to ISO 400. SLR digital cameras often have setting even higher, even up to ISO 6400. Most cameras can automatically choose the most suitable sensitivity setting for the lighting and the mode.

Digital or Optical Zooms

Most digital cameras have the choose of optical or digital zoom. Digital zoom will result in lower picture quality because it works by cropping the image and enlarging the picture to the size required. This is the same method a program to edit images on your computer uses. Optical zooms work in a similar way to a film camera zoom by varying the magnification and focal length. The quality of the image is unaffected so than using a digital zoom.

The White Balance

The white balance is adjustable depending on the light source. This means that you can make sure, under various lights, that white really looks white, not blue or yellow. Most digital cameras adjust automatically depending on the source of light but you can usually manually set this if you wish. You can set the white balance for fluorescent or tungsten lighting, shade or sunlight.

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