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Written by CH Cheah
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Sunday, 07 September 2008 12:25 |
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 The camera must be one of those things that people simply must bring along in his or her travels. A picture tells a thousand words and what better way to tell the story of your travel than with photography.
A good camera will faithfully record your journey with quality photographs that convey the mood and spirit of the places that you travel to. Off course the photographer (that is you) plays a crucial role, but without the proper tools, you still would not get the results that you really wanted.
What are the criteria that you should be looking for when shopping for a camera to tot along for your travel? Aside from megapixels count (which the sales people will tell you that the higher is better, which is not altogether true, but we will discuss that in another article), there are several things that you might want to consider.
Digital or Film
Unless you are going for some pro results that can only be achieved by films and you have a bundle to spend in your processing later, for most of us, the resounding answer to this question is - get a digital camera. You can shoot more (shots) with less space and also save lots of cost later with the investment in a digital camera. Some flexibility that you get with a digital camera simply can't be beat (like ISO adjustment, excellent depth of field with a compact, face detection, flexible focus point etc).
 Size Matters, Compact or DSLR
If you are planning to really travel, meaning that you will be walking most of the time and on your feet, then size and weight of the camera you select matter. The first choice is probably between a compact camera or a digital SLR. This is a bit of a personal thing. But if you don't like the idea of lugging a heavy and obtrusive camera with you on your neck, then don't choose a SLR. I found a small compact camera is ideal for me for a travel camera. When not in use, I can easily shove it into my pockets, belt pouch or other convenient places. It is protected and also ready to be used in an instant. Off course a SLR hanging from your neck gives you real instant reflex when picture opportunities arises, but a camera in the pocket or belt pouch comes close. In terms of picture quality, a photograph from a good compact is normally good enough even for professional prints. They can't quite beat an DSLR yet, but they are close for most purposes.
 Large LCD Screen
Get a model with as large an lcd screen as you can get. A large lcd can let you know in enough detail whether 'you have got the shot' or not. I have also found a large lcd helps me to compose better pictures because I can see in greater clarity what is in the frame during composition. Try it for yourself and you will see what I mean. Also in the moments when you want to review the pictures that you have taken or show them to friends, a large lcd screen is a real asset. Go large, you won't regret it.
Battery Life (and type)
Most cameras comes powered with Li-Ion batteries these days. These are compact and lightweight and you can charge them as often as you like with little detrimental effect (no memory effect). The problem would be that they are proprietary. If you want a as small camera as possible, the Li-Ion is the only way to go. However if you don't mind a little bit of weight, then perhaps a camera that is powered from the standard AA batteries would be the way to go. If you go for an AA battery powered camera, the get some NiMh types of rechargables and don't use alkalines - they (NiMH) simply last much longer. Get something with the capacity of 2200mAh or more so that you can shoot without constantly changing batteries. One little known fact for cameras powered with AA batteries is that the flash cycling time (how long do you need to wait before you can shoot another picture with flash on after the last one) are much better with models running on 4 pieces of AA compared to those running on 2 pieces of AA only. You might want to check this out before making up your mind. Also, with AA, you can get some alkalines in an emergency - but they won't last quite as long as your 2000mAh rechargables (but at least you can continue shooting).
Whatever your choice may be, make sure that you can at least shoot at least a hundred or more pictures before you need to be worried about changing the batteries.
 Wide Angle is More Important than Long Zoom
In general, I would go for a camera that offers wider angle coverage rather than a longer zoom. A wide angle camera is a boon in travel shots to capture the scenic vista and taking shots from cramped quarters. So unless you are going for a wildlife safari or something in that fashion, I would advocate a wider angle zoom lens. When looking at the lens angle (or zoom) always look at the 35mm equivalent specifications as these are more standardized to tell the actual angle of the lens. Something in the effect of 28mm on the wide angle end would be excellent. Make sure that you get an F-stop of F2.8 at least in the wide angle setting. The F-stop of the lens is a measure of low light capability of the lens (or speed of the lens, the smaller the number the 'faster' the lens and can take pictures in lower lighting conditions)
Important Features
Most digital cameras comes laden with features these days. Some are important, some are good to have and some are outright marketing gimmick. Here is the features that I think should be on your travel digital camera.
- Image Stabilizer - allows you to take steady and sharp pictures without a tripod in low light conditions and generally sharp pictures if you have unsteady hands. Make sure you get those with optical stabilizer, those with 'digital stabilizer' are not nearly as effective.
- Exposure Compensation - The ability to 'brighten' or 'darken' the picture taken. Basically an override the automatic exposure of the camera. Sometimes the auto-exposure system of the camera gives you overly bright or dark pictures, with exposure compensation, this can be corrected.
- Flash Compensation - Allows you to correct for the automatically calculated the power output of your flash.
- Red Eye Correction - Allows the camera to fire a pre-flash to prevent shots of red-colored bloodshot eyes of your subject.
- Exposure and Focus Lock - The ability to lock you focus as you recompose the picture and the ability to lock the exposure as you change your composition. We will discuss this further in a future article.
- Optical Viewfinder - This little hole you traditionally peer through when taking pictures with the ole film camera is still useful to have in a digital camera. When your battery is dying fast (happens when temperature is cold too), turn off your LCD and you can still continue shooting through this optical finder.
- ISO is Adjustable Manually - the ISO is a measurement of the sensitivity of the camera - higher is more sensitive and you can take pictures in darker conditions. But higher ISO means noisier pictures. You want to be able to lock the ISO manually to a low value as possible and not let the camera choose it's own and crank it all the way up. Also make sure that the noise level at ISO800 or so is acceptable to you. When checking ISO noise, you need to take a picture and view it larger on the computer screen. Don't trust the small LCD screen which tends to hide most of the ISO sensor noise.
- Face Detection - After a while you are bound to need to take those 'you are there' photos or photos of your friends and people that you've met along the way. Face detection allows the camera to automatically focus on the face of the persons in the composition. This will reduce the number of 'blurry face' pictures that you take, especially if you hand the camera to some stranger to take a picture of yourself.
- Flexible Focus Point - I like the capability to move the 'point' where I want the camera to focus around and not just always in the dead center. Subjects in the dead center of the picture usually don't make interesting photographs.
- Grid Overlay on LCD - Some cross grids overlayed on the LCD so that you don't end up with 'crooked' horizons, 'leaning' buildings etc.
- Manual Exposure - The ability to manually adjust the shutter speed and f-stop of your camera. This is useful in difficult and high contrast lighting conditions when only you know (and not the camera) what picture element in the composition is important to you.
- Manual Focus - Sometimes, autofocus will fail to lock on low contrast object or some compositions where the subject is behind bars or a cage. This allows you to manually focus on the subject.
- Manual White Balance - A fully automatic only white balance is a no no. You are eventually going to get greenish, yellowish and blueish cast on your pictures and they will look horrible. The camera is not like the human eye and is very senstive to color casts in the scene. You camera should be at least able to adjust the white balance manually by the selection of some presets (like cloudy, fluorescent lighting, sunny, tungsten lighting, shade etc) and better still if you camera allows you to calibrate the white balance by shooting on a piece of white or grey paper before taking the shot.
- Video Capability - some video shooting capability is always good to have. Not everything can be captured in still photograph. Look for at least capabilities of 25 frames per second (fps) at a resolution of 680 x 480. Check if the output is a compressed AVI (which will yield much smaller files) or not. Some cameras also disable zoom when shooting for video, this is not too good. At a minimal, digital zoom should still be available when shooting video. Make sure the camera records audio as well, silent movies are a bit outdated!
- Panaromic or 'Stich' Capability - This allows you to pan the camera to capture large scenic vistas and later 'stick' them together digitally to form a wide panaromic picture.
The above serves as a guide to making your choice of your travel camera. Based on my own experience, if you have most of the features above, you will end up with a good camera which will be able to capture most of the memories and spirit of your travel. Given there will always be moments that you cannot capture with your camera, these are moments meant for you to capture for yourself only in your mind's eye.
Happy (camera) hunting!
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What to Look For in Choosing A Digital Camera for Travelling - Hints and Tips
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