Getting Good Pictures

Fingers crossed, I will be getting a digital camera soon! I really want one before the little one arrives because lord knows I'm going to want to share too many pictures of him/her with everybody in my address book! I have pictures of Whisper and Molly on my cell phone, but they are poor quality and I don't have internet or picture messaging on the phone, so they don't do me any good

I really want to get some good pictures of the kitties once we get the camera. Does anybody have any tips for getting good-quality digital camera shots of cats? I don't expect the dog or the baby to give me much challenge, but the cats move around a lot more!

do you want a P&S point and shoot? or a DSLR digital SLR? DSLR allows you greater flexibility with things like shutter speed, aperture size. They are also much bigger in size and price point. I love my DSLR camera I have. Any photo I have put on this site has been taken with a DSLR. I will go into more detail if you want. Most people who get dslr cameras are upgrading from a 35mm slr or from a P&S and are ready for the upgrade.

P&S camera are smaller, less costly and features vary from model to model. They are also the first type of digital camera someone will buy if it is their first camera. If you are looking for a camera to take pics of critters, you want a camera that you can change the shutter speed. You might also want the feature of taking multiple frames with one depression on the shutter release. Some P&S are around 2-3 FPS (frames per second) others can go up to 15 FPS. You really dont need one that fast. look for one with 3x to 10x optical zoom. That way you can sit back and take candid photos of the subject(s). Also before you decide on any camera, touch it, play with it, take a few frames with it.

Do not get caught into the megapixel hype. Almost every P&S and even DSLR camera have the same size sensor for the pixels to reside on. A 7 MP camera has the same size sensor as say 10 or 12 MP camera. The larger the pixel count just gives you a larger picture for the most part due to the fact of the same size sensor. With the larger amount of pixels crammed into the same space, you usually lose some quality. Hope this is not too confusing.

The biggest tip I gave people when I sold cameras was 'when taking a photo, hold the shutter release down half way to let the camera focus and then all the way down to take the shot.' if you dont let the camera focus first it will take 2-3 seconds for the camera to focus and you miss the photo.

goto dpreview.com for reviews on cameras.
Hope this helps.

Thanks! I'm not looking to spend a ton of money, with a baby on the way. For right now I want to get pictures that are clear and in focus, well-framed, and suitable for posting on the internet. I'm not the best of photographers, and I'd like to test the waters with a less expensive camera before I upgrade to something better, because what's the point in having a great camera and a lousy photographer? Does that make sense?

Originally Posted by ghosthunterbeck

I don't expect the dog or the baby to give me much challenge, but the cats move around a lot more!

Click to expand...

I have lots of sleeping shots

When they're playing I take LOTS of pics, more chance that at least one won't be blurry that way.