A decision for life? need a digi camera!

guess it is similar to computers.
you think you are deciding for your life time and in 5 years you reach for a newer model.

anyway i am going to buy a digital camera just to take photos.
but i am a bit confused.
what do i need? what is necessary? what just playing around?

my computer equipment is a power mac g4 .- with a cd-drive
usb and firewire connection

i am confused about 8 or 10 mb pixel!
what size of the memory card

i don.t want to spent to much money on it

so what would you recommend? which details are important? which are forgetable?

i need mild technical advise please

thanks for your help

I have Kodak Easy Share C713 and it takes great pics, and the price is really good. The camera can go up to 7.0 MP, however I selected 6.2 because that many MP is unnecessary. Unless you want to blow up the image to be huge.

I have a 1 gig SD memory card, and when the MP is turned down to 6.2, the card can hold 1,000 pictures. The Easy Share has a lot of great features. Such as face recognition and other auto selections that support a person in taking great pics.

in fact, right now you can get a 10 MP Easy Share for around $150.00 at Best Buy. It has a bigger LCD viewing screen than the one I have. My only gripe with my digital camera is that the LCD screen tends to get a glare on it, which makes it hard to see what I am taking a picture of. Some digital cameras have the LCD that can be swiveled, so perhaps that feature allows to best the nasty glare.

As an example, here are a few photos I took with my camera using 6.2 MP setting.

thanks for the advice

now i am very convinced that a high amount of MBpixel is not really neccessary.
your pix look great - love them

my plan so far: i will go to a shop and look around for some cams and touch them
look at the display / screen
a friend just recomended to have a wide screen.

it should have some weight but not so much- means i want to feel something in my hand but don.t want to carry to much when it is in my bag.

and i guess the pix are good enough to be printed as well when one photographs with 6 or 7 mb pixel? i can.t check it from your pix, coz internet is never printable - question is due to my profession

It depends on how big you want the prints to be. I worked for a company that sold software for large format printing. This guy there told me that even 5 MP shot can be blown up rather large before it starts to look like crap.

usually papers are not bigger than 210 mm x 297 mm (different format than in the US)
that would be the maximum
print resolution 300 ppi and cmyk

just checked it at the web 5 MB would be completely ok for that

site i found is only in german - so it is useless to post it

sometimes you have to blow them up but i don.t like to do it, coz you always loose data.

I have two digital SLR's, a G6 medium size camera and a very small camera.
None of them are above 6 megapixle and i get perfect A3 prints from them all. this just shows that "bigger is not allways better".

What determins which camera i use is what the subject matter is.

Macro, sport and wedding shots are taken with the SLR's.

For a walk around with the intent of taking a few snaps i take my canon G6.

For just going out with no real intention of doing any photography i just slip the small one in my back pocket when i leave the house.

So really, it depends on what type of photography you want to do. different cameras have different uses. yes they will all take a picture but how good will it be.

check out my sig to see the tyupes of shots that i take.

the problem is i really don.t know about the photos
i guess i am looking for a cam for all purpose

• to take photos of the stuff i am going to sell at ebay
  
• of nature
  
• my son
  
• my cats
  
• pictures of a city walk
  
• sightseeings
  
• of a gig
  
• if a customer demands certain pix
  

and i am not sure what will come across
and surely i am buying one cam now and maybe later a high tech cam mirror reflex filter cam

and for the printing
i am not refering to prints i need from my pix maybe to get a poster
talking about prints needed for magazins etc.

edit:
just took a look at your site
really great stuff
love the landscape pix
and the one with the fence and the snow

great

[edit on 29-9-2008 by orange-light]

[edit on 29-9-2008 by orange-light]