Digital Camera Question

[dylan's alias]

Definitely look at shutter lag. This is the biggest problem with digital cameras. It takes much longer to "take" the picture from the time you press the button than a film camera. You can compensate by half-pressing the button to focus and then fully pressing when the subject is ready, but if you are photographing anything in motion (like kids) shutter lag is a nightmare.

Also - quality of lens is much more important than a more megapixels. I have an excellent Sony 3.2 MP camera that is 5 years old. It takes great pictures and blows up to 8x10 nicely. Anything more than 5 or 6 is not really useful unless you intend to heavily crop and enlarge.

- 4High - second the question above. If you really want to get into photography, a point and shoot isn't going to get you very far. The difference between a new one and an old one probably isn't that great. I'd save up for a more serious camera. If there isn't anything wrong with what you've got, I'd keep it until there was a missing feature that I really needed.