You may have heard a lot of talk about Digital Imaging
lately. While digital still cameras and digital camcorders are certainly
not new, recent advances in resolution, storage, output, and affordability
mean the choices available to the consumer have never been better.
Digital Cameras allow you to share images on your PC or easily get high-quality prints |
Quick connection to a PC is one of the many advantages of Digital Camcorders |
Shoot, Share, and Store
At American, we believe that digital imaging can change how you use
photographs and video in your daily life. We realize that most cameras
and camcorders are purchased to enable people to share special moments
in their lives with family, friends, and loved ones. With digital, that
process just got a whole lot easier.
Shoot
You can simply shoot the still photos or video you want. In many cases
this is even easier than with non-digital equipment, since the large
LCD screens of digital cameras and camcorders make getting the perfect
shot or scene a breeze. And, digital allows you to instantly view your
work, so you'll know if your shots turned out or if you should erase
them and try again.
Share
After you have captured the images you want, you can transfer them directly
to your computer. This can be done directly using your USB cable or
firewire cable, or via removable storage media such as Secure Digital,
Compact Flash, Memory Stick, XD Photo Card, or small CD-R discs.
Once you have the files on your computer, you're ready
to begin sharing them with the world. Digital pictures and short digital
movies make great email attachments! You can also publish these files
on your own website or integrate them into multi-media presentations.
If you prefer to share your photos as prints, that's
no problem for digital! American features many affordable
photo-quality
printers that will allow you to turn out great looking prints
from your digital photos. There are also excellent options for ordering
traditional prints from your
digital photos
online. Online vendors offer fast turnaround times and convenient
delivery in the mail. Most traditional film processing outlets have
now made the conversion to digital print processing.
Store
With digital Imaging, your options for storing your photos and videos
are almost limitless. Many people choose to archive their images directly
on their computer. With recent price drops in external hard drives and
storage devices, this option has become as affordable as it is convenient.
Removable storage media, such as, CD-R, CD-RW, and DVD-RW discs also
make an excellent storage media.
What's New in Digital Cameras
Advances in resolution and image processing have improved the quality
of digital photos to be truly comparable to 35mm film photography, while
new features and printing options mean that digital photography is more
convenient than ever.
Resolution
Today's digital cameras take pictures at 3.0 to over 10 Mega Pixels
of resolution. A Mega Pixel is 1 million total pixels in a file. For
example, a 1.3 Mega Pixel camera produces a file with 1,310,720 total
pixels, that fills an area on your screen 1280 pixels wide and 1024
pixels high.
The higher your pixel count the higher overall resolution of your picture.
Greater resolution on your original picture gives your more and better
printing options, giving you the ability to make larger prints or to
crop and adjust your photos.
Storage
As files gain more pixels, they also become larger, necessitating larger
storage media. Most popular removable digital camera media, including
Secure Digital, are 1GB to 4GB in memory size. This capacity will let
you shoot all day without ever having to worry about running out of
memory.
Features
Today's digital cameras offer many new features, such as limited video
and audio capabilities and pro-quality optional lenses. Combined with
new output options, including portable printers which interface directly
to the camera (no computer needed), digital cameras can serve a wide
variety of needs and fit well into almost any lifestyle.
The Digital Camcorder Advantage
Consumers are quickly discovering that digital camcorders have many
important advantages over analog camcorders, including better picture
and sound quality, smaller, more convenient size, a fast and easy computer
interface, and the ability to easily edit and copy videos on your computer
without any quality loss.
Higher Picture and Sound Quality
Digital video maximizes picture and sound quality. This translates into
videos that are incredibly rich and vibrant, with less shake and more
accurate color reproduction.
Convenient Editing
Most of the time, you won't want to share everything you shoot. Digital
video makes it quick and easy to transfer your raw footage directly
to a PC or editing deck to cut, add effects, and produce high quality
videos to share with your family and friends. And because with digital
there is no data loss during digital editing or copying, every video
you produce can be a first generation copy with no quality loss.
Multi-Media Features
With the addition of compressed MPEG format video and digital still
photo capabilities, digital camcorders offer you many options for sharing
your files. MPEG movies, which are compressed enough to easily fit in
an email or be posted on a website and be viewable in any web browser,
can be downloaded from your digital camcorder to your computer, where
they are ready to use. Digital still pictures are a great feature for
people who don't need ultra high resolution still photos! This makes
it possible to replace a video camera and still camera with one convenient
unit - your camcorder.
