Choosing a Digital Camera
One of the most common questions we are asked
is "Which digital camera should I get?"
The answer
is always "It depends"
Choose your camera for your situation.
Who will use the camera and how will the images be used?
Consider the difference needs for:
- Professional/Artistic
- Whole School
- Single Teacher
- Classroom
- Student Use
- Grade Level
What you need to look for is a camera with features that will meet your
needs. If you need to take professional quality pictures then you will
need to find a camera with the ability to make proper control adjustments
(e.g. f-stop, aperture, shutter speed, etc.), the ability to have lens
attachments, and will also take high quality (large mega pixel)
images. A camera appropriate for the whole school would be used
by a variety of teachers, staff, and maybe students so it would need to be
easy to use, require very little in the way of software and not have too
many cables or parts to get lost. The classroom only camera would be
chosen to meet your technical needs and abilities, if you were planning on
taking a lot of pictures at a time you might need a camera with a large
memory (or the ability to expand). Student use cameras should be among
the easiest to use with few control, few moving parts and rugged in
ability. A camera that might be appropriate for a young child, such as
one with a peep site and will hold only a few images, might not be suitable
for an older child who needs more controls, more images, and better quality.
Below are some of the standards that as a teacher I feel are important in
my digital camera choice. I have found that over the years one of the
most used features on my camera have become the video out feature, bypassing
the computer totally. Many a time in my class have we taken images and
then connected the digital camera to the television to share the images with
the class. Also a common battery format can make your life much
easier. All the digital cameras that I get now run off of AA alkaline
batteries (or Nickel Metal Hydrides), because no matter where you are when
your batteries go dead, you are most likely not too far away from being able
to buy some AA batteries.
Some suggested minimum standards
- Active LCD screen
- Good amount of internal image storage
- Video out
- Flash (controllable)
- Good battery life
- Common battery format
- Simple controls
Nice extras
- AA batteries
- View finder
- Able to take movies
- Able to take panoramas
- Live video out
- Show format (slide show)
- Two way transfer
- USB (or other high speed equivalent)