The digital camera revolution is now in full swing -- film cameras, while not obsolete, are steadily losing ground to the digital camera. Digital camera prices continue to fall -- 3 mega pixel cameras can now be purchased for around $200. A rule-of-thumb for considering what kind of digital camera to buy is:
| 1 mega pixel | Suitable for taking pictures strictly for sending on the Internet -- not suitable for printing quality pictures, even of 5" x 7" size. |
| 2 mega pixel | For printing quality pictures on 5" x 7" photographic paper. |
| 3 mega pixel | For printing quality pictures up to 8" x 10" on photographic paper |
| 4 mega pixel | For taking pictures approaching film camera quality |
| 5 mega pixel | |
| NOTE: To achieve maximum quality when printing photographs, one must have a quality photographic printer, not just the normal run-of-the-mill inkjet printer. The best of these printers have 5, 6, or even 8 ink chambers vice the normal 4 (magenta, yellow, cyan, and black) in standard color ink jet printers. |
Most people are generally unaware of the time it takes to transmit graphic images using a dial-up modem, or how to optimize the pictures they take for transmission over the Internet. By far, the majority of Email/Internet users still use a 56k modem, standard fare in most computers. Digital cameras with 2 mega pixel resolution or better, typically will (depending on the default mode/resolution) capture the image as a 1600 pixel x 1200 pixel file. If saved as a BMP or TIFF, the file size could be 4 Mb or more. Most graphics on the Internet are optimized (compressed) so the total file size of any image rarely exceed 50 kb -- they typically are in the range of 20 kb - 40 kb. Assuming a more or less normal download speed of 4 kb/sec, this would translate to a download time of about 12 seconds for a 50 kb graphic. Under the same conditions, a 4 Mb graphic file would take about 16 minutes to download into your computer, assuming that someone sent you a picture file of that size. The maximum resolution on my camera, for example, would occupy a file size of 8 Mb/picture (TIFF format -- 1600 pixels x 1200 pixels) and I would therefore be able to take only 8 pictures before my 64 Mb camera memory card would be full. Using the VGA format and resolution (640 pixels x 480 pixels), I can take 364 pictures before the 64 Mb memory card is full.
The point being made here is that one should minimize (optimize) the size of the picture being taken by a digital camera if one intends to send it to a friend or family via the Internet.
[Return]