I hear people saying, "This camera is 14 megapixels, so it must be better than my old one because it is only 10 megapixels." In fact, there is a new camera coming to the market that takes 36 megapixel photographs and I am sure there are some folks that will drop everything to buy this camera just for that big number. But is megapixel size the best way to choose a camera?
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| Pixels |
To answer that question, you first must understand what a megapixel is. Digital cameras have a sensor in them that records the light that you allow to hit it. The sensor is made up of millions of little squares or pixels in a grid. If you multiply the number of pixels on the horizontal row by the number of pixels in the vertical row you will get the total number of pixels on the sensor. For example, a 3 MP camera has 2,048 (horizontal) x 1,536 (vertical) pixels for a total of 3,145,728 pixels or 3 MP (mega indicating million). By contrast, most computer screens only display 1,074 x 768 or 0.8 MP and a 4" x 6" print only requires 640 x 480 or 0.3 MP resolution to look good and 1600 x 1200 or 2 MP for best quality.
So why do the camera manufacturers shout about the MP of their latest, greatest camera so much? Mostly to get you to buy a new one. If you remain perfectly content with your current camera, and only replace it when you have tripped the shutter so much that it dies, they would go out of business. So instead they have found a feature that is relatively easy to upgrade and re-release the camera with minimal improvements other than the size of the sensor. And they only need to increase the sensor size by 40% to double the number of MPs!
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| Camera Sensor |
Why then would anyone want a camera with 36 MP? If you believe what I have written so far, then you can buy an old 2 MP camera cheap and be good to go. That is true. You would really only want more MPs for two reasons. One, if you want to make ginormous prints and two, if you plan on doing much editing of your photos. Every edit you make in your photo editing software actually degrades the photo slightly. If a photo requires heavy editing you may degrade the pixels so much that it looks like it was shot on a camera with a small sensor. The best solution for that is to shoot a good quality photo in camera rather than to edit something into a good photo, which is what we strive to teach you in The Dive Shack's Digital Underwater Photography classes.
What should you look for when shopping for a camera? Sensor quality is much more important than sensor size. You can find reviews on cameras at http://www.uwphotographyguide.com/ or http://www.popphoto.com/ to name a couple of sites. Once you have narrowed your choices down based on the reviews and your budget, you want to handle the camera and housing if possible. Shoot the camera changing the ISO, shutter speed and aperture. Are the controls easy to change? Are they within easy reach? Can you comfortably hold the housing or is it too big/small? Do you have full manual and creative control of your photos with this camera or does it just allow you to change one of the three major controls? Talk to photographers who shoot the models you are considering and ask their opinion on the set up. You can even rent cameras and underwater housings to try them out for a few days before you buy them. So do your research, and find a camera you love!
Photos courtesy of www.digicamhelp.com
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