All About Point-and-Shoot Cameras

Point-and-shoot (P&S) or ‘compact’ digital cameras are massively popular, and represent the bulk of cameras sold and used. This is because they are the cheapest camera, they are small and hence easy to carry around, and they can still produce great results.

When choosing a P&S camera, remember that camera manufacturers are in the business of selling cameras, and it’s not in their interests to sell you something that only meets your requirements, rather than grossly exceeding them. A case in point here is megapixel count. The vast majority of people won’t require a camera that takes photos of more than 6-7 megapixels, as something in this range would allow for 11” x 14” (this is large) prints at a very detailed 200 dpi, but the camera industry will make you think more megapixels are always necessary and better.

Some of the truly important considerations when choosing a P&S camera are: ergonomics; ease of manually altering settings; presence or absence of stabilization technology; zoom range (how wide at the wide end and how long at the tele end); ease of one-handed operation; type of batteries used (AA or a proprietary battery with its own charger), and size. Any new camera will have sufficient megapixels for almost anyone, so don’t worry about this.

It’s beyond the scope of this lesson to go through each of the above considerations one-by-one, but they’re all fairly self-explanatory. Also, you can research all of them for the models you are considering on the internet. There are plenty of photography sites where you’ll be able to find knowledgeable and helpful people if you want to ask any questions and all have search functions. If you have a question about a particular feature or camera model, it’s likely that it has been asked and answered before already.

The best thing about P&S cameras is their size. A P&S camera can be kept in a handbag or pocket, ready to be brought out and used at a moment’s notice. There’s no way a larger camera would ever be feasible in some of the situations where you could take a compact, for example: on a night out with friends; at a concert; walking to work, or in your lunch break. If you want to take up photography as a hobby, it’s worth investing in a P&S even if you already have an SLR, just so that you can carry a camera everywhere you go.

One unavoidable downside to P&S cameras is that they contain small sensors, which means that they produce very noisy photos at higher ISO settings. For most applications this means that they quickly become unusable in darker conditions without the use of flash (which, particularly for people photography, often looks ugly).