I've always traveled with a camera... I've used both 35mm and APS film in the past with good results. I could have set out on my Boston to Oregon trek last year with a film camera, but I was really ready to join the digital camera world.
I take pictures in an attempt to capture some memories, to remind myself of the things that I've seen, and to share my wonder with friends and family. I also enjoy surrounding myself with images of beautiful places - I often have pictures from my vacations blown up and framed, and placed on my walls. That habit at least partially dictated the type of camera I'd want to own.
There are an unbelieveable number of cameras available. In the hopes of narrowing my search, I started with a few requirements. I'm sure that your requirements will be different - but maybe seeing my requirements will help you come up with your own.
My desired camera:
- The camera resolution should be 4 megapixels. Some people told me that I'd be happy with a 2 megapixel camera, and if my goal was only to post photos on the web, that would have been fine. But since I figured I'd also want to enlarge some of the pictures, I knew I'd be happier with a 3 or 4 megapixel camera. Both were readily available when I was doing my search - but I figured I'd be happier for a longer period of time with a higher resolution, so that became part of my criteria.
Update in August, 2006: Keep in mind that this requirement was from my initial camera search in 2002. At that time the megapixel choices were somewhat limited, and came no where near the number of options available as of now.
- Size matters to me when I'm touring - so I looked for a compact or ultra-compact camera. If I'm going to take pictures, I need to have my camera close at hand. I don't use a handlebar bag, so I usually carry my camera in a very small fanny pack. My new digital camera needed to comfortably fit in my Caribou Mountaineering Maui fanny pack, which measures 13 x 5 x 3 (inches). A friend of mine has a similar requirement - but he likes to carry his camera in his jersey pocket. That makes size important to him too.
- When the camera is off - with the lens closed - the front of the camera should be flat. I wanted to be able to easily slip the camera into small places - again making it easy to carry in my Maui fanny pack.
- My preferred digital media is the Compact Flash. This was for a couple of reasons. I thought that Compact Flash was a more widely used media (probably not true...), and I knew that the handheld computer that I planned to use has a slot for a Compact Flash card. It turns out that the second reason wasn't really valid either because my handheld also takes a PCMCIA card, which means I could put any of the available digital media in the handheld as long as I bought a PCMCIA adapter for the appropriate media. My other reasons for wanting Compact Flash as media were that you can purchase large cards - up to a gig of space, and that the media is not fragile. A friend of mine started in this digital camera world with a camera that used SmartMedia, and he was quite unhappy with it. Not only was the media very fragile, the largest card available is 128 meg. Compact Flash was definitely my first choice!
Update in October 2006: I am still very happy with my choice of CompactFlash as media, doubly so since my digital SLR also uses this media. However, if I was buying a camera in 2006 and I wasn't considering the possible addition of an SLR in the future, I would probably also consider SD (SecureDigital) cards.
- My preferred power source is a standard battery. I didn't want to have to deal with the charging issue, and I hoped to find a camera where I could use either a standard or a rechargeable battery.
- I wanted a camera with at least a 2x and probably a 3x optical zoom. A digital zoom in addition to an optical zoom is acceptable - but a digital zoom instead of an optical zoom is not.
Of course I didn't get everything that I wanted... I really wanted a Canon Digital Elph, but at the time it only came in a 2 megapixel version. That didn't match my first requirement, so I moved on... So how did I decide? I was able to get my list of cameras down to a reasonable number based simply on size. I knew that I wouldn't be happy with a large camera, so I figured that was a good place to start. I began by looking at cameras classified as compact or ultra-compact, and I only kept cameras in the list that supported a resolution of 3 megapixels or larger. My serious "look at camera" list came down to 3 cameras - the Canon S40, the Pentax Optio 430, and the Olympus D-40. I looked at detailed reviews of all three cameras at the Digital Photography Review web site. Then I went to a camera shop and looked at the cameras in person. I just needed to hold them in my hands, look at the controls, and look through the cameras - and I needed to compare them side-by-side. It turned out that the shop I visited only had the Canon and the Olympus in stock. I was kind of on the fence about the Pentax anyhow after reading the review, and I didn't want to go rambling around until I found a shop with all three cameras in stock. While I liked the look and feel of the Olympus, the full review plus comments from users stated that the camera had severe chromatic aberations - meaning that pictures often had purple fringing around things, especially when the pictures were backlit or were taken in bright sunlight. That's not a good feature for a camera to be taken on tour. I liked the feel of the Canon S40, and I liked the features of the camera (with the exception of it requiring a proprietary rechargeable battery), and I had been very happy with the optics of my Canon film camera. I left the shop wanting to do some more reading and thinking, but ultimately the Canon S40 was my camera of choice!
I have to admit that I was one of those bad shoppers though - I looked at the cameras at a shop, but I bought it on the Internet. If the price had been close, I would have happy to give the shop my business, but the price wasn't close. Around the time that I was looking at cameras, there was a $100 price drop for the Canon S40 at web outlets, but no corresponding price drop at brick & mortar stores. In addition, Dell Computers was (as usual) offering a 10% disount and free shipping on software and peripherals (including cameras). I couldn't beat that price, so I bought the camera from Dell.
Some things to think about as you wander through all of your camera selections...
- Do you have a target price range?
- Do you want the ability to override settings (exposure, etc.)?
- What do you plan to do with your pictures? The answer to this question can help identify what resolution you need. Remember that generally cameras with higher resolutions (megapixels) are more expensive than those with lower resolutions.
- Will you primarily be printing snapshots (4x6 or 5x7) and posting pictures on a web site? Or do you plan to enlarge your photos?
- Do you care about size? The answers to the following questions might help with the camera size decision.
- Where do you carry your camera when you bike?
- Do you use a handlebar bag?
- Do you use a small fanny pack like I do?
- Do you stash your camera in your jersey pocket?
- Where do you carry your camera when you bike?
- Do you want to be able to use filters on your camera?
- Do you want to be able to use different lenses?
- Do you want a camera that is water-resistant? Or one that has a case that can be used to make your camera water-resistant or water-proof? Jamie Noble was looking for a camera that was water-proof without an additional case. He bought a Pentax Optio 33WR - check in with him if this is something that interests you!
- Do you have a preference as to media type (CompactFlash, SecureDigital, etc.)?
- Do you prefer a rechargeable (proprietary) battery or do you want to be able to use "off the shelf" batteries?
- Do you care whether your camera has an optical viewfinder in addition to the electronic LCD panel? While the LCDs have improved over the years, there are still some lighting conditions where I find the optical viewfinder to be useful.
