The first question to ask yourself is why you need to consider camera tripods in the first place. The most common uses are for low-light photography where you need a slower shutter speed, night time photography of stars or the moon, to take self-portraits with a timer, and to hold heavy gear. There are other uses but these are the most common. If you can’t think of a good reason why your photography would benefit from the stability of DSLR tripods, save your money and come back in three months.

Be clear, the benefit of a tripod is a sharper, clearer photo, perhaps with better composition. Of course, that’s only true if you face some of the challenges mentioned above, which make a sharp photo more difficult. So you have to consider your needs and constraints.

How portable do you want it to be? What kind of photography do you want to use it for. How much can you afford? These answers help you sort between all the available specifications to find the right tripod for you.

Material

The most common options are carbon fiber and aluminum. The former costs about twice as much, is much lighter and stronger, and offers faster vibration stabilization. If you can afford carbon fiber, you should opt for that option, unless weight and portability are incredibly unimportant to you and saving money is a priority.

Height

Typically, you want a tripod that can telescope to within six inches of your height. The attachment and camera make up the last six inches so you can shoot comfortably. However, if you plan on doing a lot of macro or ground-level photography, you want a tripod that allows you the remove the centerpost easily so you can stabilize the camera much lower to the ground.

Legs and Feet

Telescoping legs are the order of the day, and your primary choice is between three and four segments. Typically, fewer segments (and fewer joints) make for a stabler, lighter, more durable tripod that is easier to use and will last longer. Just be sure you find a tripod that has easy-to-use locks that still provide a strong, secure hold.

The feet that come with most tripods include rubber feet for indoors that can screw back to expose metal spikes for outdoors. These are fine for most people, although more expensive options allow you to change the feet.

Centerpost and Head

The centerpost is the telescoping element that lets you customize the height of most tripods. However, this advantage comes at the cost of decreased portability, increased weight, and potentially more problematic vibrations.

The head is the most important piece of the tripod for a lot of people. You have to decide if you want a level bubble, a good quick release mount, and how much control over panning and the angle you want. Better tripods also actually come without a head, expecting you to buy several interchangeable options.

With all of these aspects of camera tripods, you should think about what you want to do with your tripod and the go experiment with some options in the store to get a feel for what you like. Rely on review to determine how portable they are, and then compare your preferences with your budget to find the right option for you. Be sure to plan ahead so that you don’t need to replace your tripod in six months when your kit grows heavier or your needs change.

When you pick up the OM-D E-M1, you notice it is more compact and feels a bit more like old SLR camera housings than the typical modern DSLR. This is the benefit of MFT cameras. It has the sturdiness and intuitive, flexible button configuration of most Olympus digital cameras. Combined with this slimmer, less modern profile compared other new cameras, this makes the OM-D E-M1 one of the most easily carried Olympus cameras, ideal as a backup for a pro and comfortable to carry around your neck all day.

Several obvious aspects of this camera mean it make it have a strong first impression on focused amateurs and part-time pros. The ergonomic controls give you the use of multiple digits, and the variable function dials and wheels ensure that you always have quick access to the settings you want, whether shooting in full manual or the new art mode. It does take some time to learn what all the controls do, although they are fairly intuitive, because there are so many buttons, knobs, and dials.

The size, weight, and new grip make it comfortable to carry and shoot with for most people except those with especially large hands whose pinky might drop off the bottom of the smaller body. Furthermore, the durable housing is rugged – waterproof, dustproof, and freezeproof – and it looks tough.

The range of controls give the user quite a bit of customization control to make for quicker settings changes, if switching button functions is appealing to you. The mode rotator is comfortably weighted so you won’t bump it into the wrong mode, and has a unique locking button just to be safe.

The incredibly high-resolution, articulated electronic view finder is another source of praise. The LCD angles possible make overhead and ground level shooting easy and comfortable, while the quick response of the drivers powering the LCD mean you can quickly pan to take advantage of the E-M1’s very high FPS without any stutter. Of course, most pros will prefer an optical view finder to an EVF for higher integrity on contrast and composition, but as far as electric VF’s go, this is one of the best.

Lastly, for an MFT, the image quality and crispness leaves nothing to be desired. It used to be that the smaller sensors on MFTs meant you were sacrificing quality for portability when compared to DSLR options. Not so with the E-M1, which offers incredible crispness up to 3200 ISO, and serviceable clarity that can be improved with a bit of work up to its top ISOs. In other words, unless you want photos that you can print larger than 13” x 9”, you have no reason to need better quality than this.

With its combination of powerful features and settings, on-board image stabilization, compatibility with over 50 Olympus lenses as well as several Panasonic options, comfortable shape and convenient size and weight, and impressive EVF and LCD, the OM-D E-M1is one of the great new Olympus digital cameras, perfect for those who want a reliable, portable backup or who are ready to take a step up to a better digital but don’t want to burden themselves with giant lenses.

Find a full hands on review of the Olympus OM-D E-M1 here!

Digital SLR cameras are not as delicate and temperamental as they used to be, but you still need to know how to properly care for and use, clean, and store your cameras, DSLR lenses, and other gear to maximize their life and effectiveness. Follow these suggestions to protect your camera while using it, storing it, and conduct a basic cleaning of cleaning DSLR cameras and their components. This guide uses the phrase “camera” to mean everything from the body to the sensor to the lens as a whole unit.

Protect Your Camera from Dangerous Elements While Shooting

Everything from humidity to heat to salt, moisture, sand, dust, and water can sneak into a camera. Whether they just get dust on the sensor, put small scratches on internal piece of your lens, or fry electronic components of the DSLR, they are bad news. So it’s important to exercise care when shooting in any environment where these are a risk, and this requires planning ahead.

For environments where dust, sand, salt, or precipitation are likely, bring a good cloth for drying, several microfiber cloths for wiping dust and dirt off the lens, and a plastic bag or rain hood to keep water off. You may also want a cleaning kit with an air blower to get dust and sand off the lens before you wipe it down. You should also inspect and wipe your camera clean after shooting in conditions like these, to be sure nothing on the outside finds its way in or gets ground in through use.

Humidity and temperature change present their own set of obstacles, and dealing with entering and exiting buildings that are significantly warmer or cooler, and thus more or less humid than outside is an entire separate subject for camera care. In a nutshell, you either want to make the temperature shift very gradual when moving from cold to warm, or find a way to keep your camera from ever getting cold.

If you’re worried about dropping your camera in water, just be sure to have a good neck or hand strap. Some people have had success drying their cameras off by dropping them in a bag of rice to remove all the moisture, but don’t count on this as a reason to be careless.

Lastly, be mindful of your camera itself. Bumps can crack the lens or other internal mirrors and ruin the hardware. Be cautious at first until you are comfortable and familiar with how having a carrying a camera changes the way you should move.

Store Your Camera Intelligently When You Aren’t Using It

Heat, dust, and moisture are the big threats. Store your camera in a good camera case that pads it to prevent physical trauma and locks out dust, and be sure there are some silica gel packs in the bag or case to control the moisture. As for heat, just don’t store it in a place that gets below 40 degrees or above 80 or 90. That means don’t leave your camera in your car on a hot day nor in your unventilated closet.

If you’re going to be storing it for longer, pros advice removing the battery and memory card. This prevents the battery from doing anything to your camera in the heat and ensures no moving parts get jammed. You should also take off the DSLR lens and replace all the caps on both sides of the lens and on the camera body. This is to keep any moving parts from sticking. Also consider turning your camera on and using it at least once a month so the mechanics stay in proper working order.

Clean Your Camera Every Once in a While and After Exposing It to Moisture and Dust

Cleaning cameras well is an art, but any novice can at least wipe down the body. Even before you opt for a professional-quality cleaning kit and the difficult task of cleaning the sensor, you should get a high-quality microfiber cloth and use it to clean the exterior and cracks of your camera body every time you get back from a shoot. Once you have removed all the dust and dirt you can see, you should also carefully remove the lens, ensuring any dust still in the cracks doesn’t fall into the back of the lens nor inside the camera onto the sensor. Carefully clean the grooves and cracks. This is also a good idea before you put the camera away for storage.

Most people also suggest reading up on professional cleaning, which you can actually do yourself with a digital SLR camera cleaning kit. You have to be very careful to avoid damaging internal components, but there are a number of detailed guides that walk you through using air blowers and clothes to remove dust from inside your lens, on your imaging sensor, and in other sensitive locations. Any dust that doesn’t come off with the air blower should be left alone, and if it really bothers you, you can take your camera to a camera cleaning technician.

The majority of good care for digital SLR cameras is preventative. Keep harmful elements out, remove them from the housing, and protect your camera from heat and humidity. Keeping this in mind when you use and store you camera helps you prolong its life without difficult or expensive cleaning. A bit of maintenance cleaning is usually enough to compliment this protective behavior and keep your camera in proper working order.

Halloween and all the incredible, creative costumes people put together are the perfect opportunity to put digital cameras to use, but unless you have access to special low-light cameras and hardware, you need to learn how to use your digital point-and-shoot or SLR in the low light conditions of All Hallow’s Eve. Because the holiday is only fun after the sun goes down, but that certainly doesn’t make for easy, beautiful photographs.

This guide assumes you are not going to purchase special low light tools and don’t have a camera that is especially effective at capturing photos in low light.

The basic challenge of low-light photography is getting enough light to hit the sensor so that you can see the subject of the photo. Even with an 800ISO or 1600ISO setting and a very wide aperture open as wide as it gets, you typically have to slow down the shutter speed to accomplish this, and that’s why night photos often come out dark or blurry. And if you have typical digital cameras, you don’t have those more powerful ISO and aperture settings.

If you don’t understand this vocabulary, go spend a few minutes reading about three digital camera settings and how they impact photos: aperture and f/stop, film speed (ISO), and shutter speed.

So assuming you can’t just switch out your lens for a wider angle with a bigger aperture and you don’t want to carry around an extra flash, there are a few things you can do. Also, if you care about taking good photos and you’re stuck with the kit lens on your DSLR, you should start saving to buy a better lens. It will help a lot.

1. Fix the aperture and film speed to the best low-light settings. This means increase the ISO as high as it will go up to about 1000, and set the aperture or f/stop number as low as it will go, typically f/3.5 or f/5.6. This lets way more light in onto the sensor so you will be able to see your subjects.

2. Play with shutter speed, but set it manually. Most people can’t avoid image blur with a shutter speed of slower than 1/60 of a second, even if that’s what the camera’s full-auto or aperture-priority setting would select. Manually try a few settings around that range and see how low you can push it while still getting crisp details. Again, the purpose it more light.

3. Find a natural light source. This seems obvious, but if you’re shooting full-body costume shots at a party, position your subjects near some light that isn’t directly behind them. They’ll be more illuminated than the average person at the party, and all it takes is a bit of patience and a request that they move a few feet. If you don’t have the option of positioning your subject, scope out light sources that could make for good photos and then be ready to snap the shot when a subject approaches the light.

4. Test your flash. Flashes typically wash out a photo and destroy a lot of interesting details around the main subject. But sometimes you can get the shot you want, especially if you have a crude diffuser like a paper napkin. You won’t know until you try.

5. Shoot in burst mode. If you can put your camera into burst mode so it snaps several shots with one depress of the shutter button, you increase your chances of getting that one perfect shot with crisp lines and beautiful lighting. This is especially helpful for Halloween shots in which people are almost always moving.

6. Use Single-point Autofocus. New cameras often can set multiple focus points. This averages the lighting and color needs of multiple faces in the shot, for example, to get the exposure right. But in the dark, you need to be able to choose the focus point based on lighting, and single-point AF makes your cameras focus on just that one thing so the computer doesn’t over-think it and ruin your exposure as a result.

7. If you have the opportunity, try long exposures with a tripod. Slower shutter speeds not only make sure you get enough light, but also give you more flexibility with your other settings. The tradeoff is that you need a stabilizer like a monopod. But you can take some beautiful nighttime shots of settings and decorations, or even parties if you want the moving light to show the energy of the scene, with a longer exposure.

Digital cameras can struggle to produce the photos you see in your mind when you’re shooting in low-light settings, but you have to figure out a strategy for these conditions if you want to capture Halloween and get the perfect spooky photo.

If you aren’t careful, you can find yourself caught up in one little number as you shop for digital SLR cameras: megapixels. But digital cameras have come far enough that the megapixel isn’t the most important feature to maximize within your budget, not by a long shot. So what’s in a megapixel and how many do you need? Understanding megapixel and photography basics will make it easier for you to choose the right camera for your goals and budget. Put simply, you don’t need more than five or six megapixels.

Unless you are printing photos at mammoth sizes of more than 11×14 inches – you’re probably a pro and already know how many megapixels your uses demand – you won’t be able to see any difference in image quality or crispness in your prints or on a monitor if you go above that threshold. However, even budget point-and-shoot digital cameras for a few hundred dollars feature sensors with more than 12 megapixels, and 20 is easy to find. So the first point is to realize that as an amateur photographer of almost any level, you don’t need to concern yourself with finding a camera with enough megapixels for your need.

Just for the sake of completeness, take a look at a few options and the rough megapixels-price ratio as of Fall 2013. At under $150, you can get a simple hand-held with minimal features and 16 MP. Move up to around $350 and you have access to the range of Canon Powershot cameras and their Nikon competitors, which have between 12 and 15 MP and a host of other features.  The most popular introductory DSLR cameras, like the Canon EOS Rebel SL1 cost between $600 and $800. About that same price gets you an intro-level digital SLR camera kit with somewhere around 18 to 20 MP. The same rough number of MP, 18-20, is present in the next tier of DSLR cameras priced around $1,000. Then at the top of the range, you find housings priced anywhere from $4,000 to $6,000 and up for just the body, offering anywhere from 18 to 22MP with little correlation between price and pixels.

So not only do you find not much correlation between price and megapixels except at the very top and very bottom of the price range, but if you’re like most amateurs you really don’t care about these differences. Most people will never do anything with their photos that would allow them to see the difference between 16 and 22MP.

But for the sake of argument, consider what you get if you do spend the thousands necessary for something like the Nikon D800, which boasts a whopping 36.3MP. On the one hand, you do gain a bunch of flexibility. This digital SLR camera captures shots that you can crop for days without sacrificing resolution. If they can blow up to multiple feet in dimension, it means you can crop down to a very small space, expand it to the desired print dimensions, and get a crisp photo.

However, there is a tradeoff at the top of the range. Sensor sizes on non-full-frame housings haven’t gotten larger, which means that to squeeze 36.6 million pixels on the same space each one must be much smaller, and thus captures less light. This can give pictures a grainy appearance due to higher image noise, especially with higher ISO settings.

In summary, megapixels are important for the quality of photos taken with digital SLR cameras, but you probably shouldn’t use them as a metric when shopping for a new camera. Nearly every camera on the market has enough pixels to meet all your needs, and you can end up paying a lot more to achieve top-of-market numbers while maintaining the overall quality of the camera.

Last weekend Focus Camera sponsored the 3rd Annual Championship Bike Ride to support St. Jude Hospital for cancer Research. A team of five employees representing Focus Camera joined over 300 riders in completing the 33 mile ride crossing multiple bridges and hills through the beautiful fall countryside

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Focus was happy to join the community and support such a meaningful event. Esty, a buyer at Focus, said of her experience: “The bridge was the hardest part for me, but everyone was so nice and encouraging. The spirit on the ride was amazing, and that made it easier.” Another employee who works in the IT department said: “I would like to thank all of the riders for coming out, and to the law enforcement agents for providing a safe ride.” The Champion Ride raised funds to keep St Jude’s Hospital for cancer research open, and each supporter of the Champion Ride walked away with a Focus Camera gift bag filled with a $25 dollar gift card and other photography goodies. We had a wonderful time at the ride, and are looking forward to sponsoring future events in the community!

Inclement weather isn’t the enemy of digital cameras and photography, or at least it doesn’t have to be if you have the right gear in your camera bags. In fact, intense weather creates opportunities to capture a number of uncommon shots and take advantage of especially dramatic lighting. But you need the right equipment and strategies to protect your camera and get those shots so you don’t come back with a ruined camera and no photos to show for it.

Precipitation – Rain or Snow

The first thing to do with precipitation might seem obvious, but an oversized, waterproof jacket makes keeping digital cameras and DSLR lenses dry easier, so you can protect them against your body until the moment when you see the perfect shot. A clean, lens-safe cloth to wipe off your lens element is another easy accessory so water droplets don’t mar a perfect shot. And most photographers carry several spare plastic bags in case a deluge threatens to soak through everything.

You can opt for a rain sleeve if you have a larger lens or are using a tripod that prevents you from keeping the camera close to your body. If it’s just a light drizzle without much wind, your lens shade may be enough to keep the element dry, but you still need something to keep water off the housing. The most important thing to do is be sure you dry everything off thoroughly once you’re done shooting and go inside.

Cold

Cold weather and temperature changes create a host of threats to your camera and challenges for shooting good photos. Whenever moving from somewhere cold to somewhere warmer, whether it’s exiting an air-conditioned building or coming inside from the winter, keep the camera in a bag that won’t let a lot of moisture in during the transition from cold to warm. Wrapping in a plastic bag is effective, and keeps condensation out while the camera warms up.

Cold weather also saps battery life incredibly fast, so you need to carry spare batteries in pockets close to your body and minimize energy use on your camera. There aren’t any tricks or special equipment for this problem, although again keeping your camera close to your body and in a coat so it stays warmer can help. You may also want to have special garments for cold weather to keep your hands and face warm and nimble, and especially so using the viewfinder isn’t so uncomfortably cold it discourages you from shooting.

Wind

Wind might seem innocuous, but it can be a killer. First, choose your lens (or lenses) carefully. Strong wind means lots of motion, so you have to think about the best lens for your camera’s ability to perform. Think about questions such as: How much light will there be; what type of subjects will you shoot and how far away will they be; and how high can you set your camera’s ISO before shots get grainy? Shooting people where a blurry background is fine requires less performance than shooting animals or events far from the camera, when you’ll need super fast shutter speeds even in low light.

Next, consider protective gear for the camera. If there may be any dust or sand in the air, such as at the beach, you want an inexpensive natural light filter to protect the lens element at the very least. Probably, you also want to wrap the entire camera in a plastic bag or plastic cooking wrap to seal out dust and moisture. Rain sleeves are OK for this as well. Lastly, an umbrella can be incredibly helpful if you have someone to hold it for you. Whether there is precipitation, fog, or dust, the ability to block some of it and protect you and the camera while you shoot increases your chances of getting the photo you want and keeping the camera safe.

Shooting great photos with digital cameras requires the right tools and tricks. If you buy the few necessary accessories and take the right steps, you can capture stunning photos and protect your equipment from damage, turning inclement weather into an advantage instead of an adversary.

After you get familiar with a DSLR, you will start to wonder how to get those incredible shots that you see plastered across the Internet on amateur blogs. There are a few essential “cheater” accessories that can take your photographic awaking to the next level and help you achieve superior quality in your shots. From DSLR lenses to camera lens filters to a host of other tools, the right equipment makes a huge difference from what you can produce with the starter kit.

1. 50mm Prime Lens

This is the first piece of “cheater” equipment everyone who knows anything recommends to a budding amateur photographer. The most popular Canon option, for example, is lovingly referred to as the “Nifty Fifty” and it is only an affordable $125. This lens has a fixed focal length of 50mm, meaning it can’t zoom in or out, and boasts a very wide maximum aperture or f.1/8, enabling it to function at very fast shutter speeds even in low light conditions. This makes it ideal for a lot of casual indoor photography and stills, as well as for shooting normal life like children playing.

The wide aperture offers a shallow depth of field, making it great for artistic shots of a subject with a blurred background. Many photographers also feel that this type of lens adds a slightly ethereal quality to the light in outdoor shots, which is desirable. With just a bit of practice with the king of beginner DSLR lenses, you’ll find your shots turning out beautifully, full of rich, natural colors and vibrant details that almost feel like you’re cheating.

2. Polarizing Filter

Lens filters are already a must, ranging in price from $15 to hundreds depending on quality. A mild UV filter costs $35 and protects the actual glass on a $250 lens so scratches don’t ruin your investment. But a polarizing filter adds a desirable effect to your shots beyond just protecting the lens. Polarizers serve two purposes. They reduce glare and reflections on glass, water, and metal objects, which helps keep the focus on your subject and lets you control the lighting and composition of outdoor shots better. Second and more relevant, they pump up the color saturation so blues in the sky, natural greens, and the warm yellows and oranges in skin come through with more power. This adds an energy and vibrancy to shots.

3. A Tripod

If you want those beautiful, artistic night shots of low-light subjects like the moon or which show streaming city lights, you need a tripod. Professional-looking landscapes and even macro stills are all about crisp details and perfect composition, and a tripod helps you achieve that. You can get all these shots holding your camera in your hand, but you will know the difference when you look at a group of shots taken with a tripod compared to those you took without. The crispness and details of the stable shots will have people wondering where you got your awesome camera and when you got so good at photography.

Upgrading your equipment and DSLR lenses is far from cheating. But for how affordable they are and how easy improving your shots is with these accessories, you just might feel like you’re cheating compared to friends who put in the hours in classes and walking around trying to “get to know” their camera and gain “a feel” for light.

When you take the plunge and decide to purchase your first digital SLR kits, the number of options can be overwhelming. Most people will tell you to either choose Nikon or Canon DSLR cameras and go from there. There are a number of other reasonable brands as well, such as Pentax and Olympus, but it’s important to understand why people emphasize the magnitude of this decision. Once you buy a kit, all your future purchases will be from that brand as well because otherwise they won’t work together. So you’re stuck with your starting brand unless you’re willing to jump ship, sell off all your old gear, and start from square one.

When you buy a body and all the other basics that come in a digital SLR kit – usually a basic 18-55mm lens, a memory card, a battery and charger, a carrying case, and maybe a UV filter to protect the lens – you’re buying into that brand, because any lenses, flashes, or other accessories you buy in the future have to be of the same brand to work together. Combined, Canon and Nikon sell roughly 80% of all DSLR cameras purchased and they have huge support communities online, speaking to the fact that either brand can be great for an entry-level photographer. But they do have a few specific strengths and weaknesses you should know about before you make this personal decision.

The biggest difference is the range of lenses available and the cost of upgrading to certain types of lenses. Canon offers a much larger range of lenses, making them more appealing to some who anticipate ending up doing highly specialized types of photography where they need the best lens possible regardless of price. However, many of them cost more than their slightly less specialized Nikon parallels.

With Nikon, you get slightly more affordably options for great, entry-level expansion lenses that you are most likely to purchase when you’re ready to upgrade your kit, such as a 50mm prime f/1.8 and a telephoto zoom. But their big advantage is a much longer range of backwards compatibility with older lenses. Nikon has used basically the same mounting system since the 1950s, so you can purchase a new, entry-level housing and have access to a huge selection of artistic effects from these older options if that interests you.

The other thing to consider is upgraded housings. You might outgrow your camera body if you do a lot of photography and start with an entry model. If that’s the case, your preferences impact which brand works better for you. The top-end DSLR cameras that aren’t full-frame do diverge a bit. Nikon’s most expensive aren’t quite as aggressive with integrating new technology, instead focusing on refining established tech to maximize the quality of the images their sensors capture, getting very close to pro-quality without breaking into that price range. Canon pushes into WiFi, new imaging technologies, and versatility in shooting movies.

Realistically, the most important thing that differentiates the two brands for most new photographers is the dial layout and how the camera feels in your hand. And this can be a good reason to try other brands with smaller market shares but respected names. Each brand’s housing has a different shape, but most models within the same brand feel very similar, and you will certainly have a preference for one or the other. So it’s important to go play with them at a shop and get a feel for which brand suits you. This will influence how much you enjoy using all the fun components in new digital SLR kits, one of the most important factors in determining which brand is the best for you.

You want control and the chance to learn how to take beautiful photos, and you’re ready to dive into DSLR cameras. Buying your first DSLR and understanding what makes digital SLR cameras worth the extra expense and effort is half the fun, and it’s a massive topic, but the basics are essential. For out infographic about the different types of cameras click here.

The Basics

The primary elements of a camera that influence your photos, and which DSLRs improve are exposure, white balance, and the quality of the sensor that captures the actual image. For our infographic about the basics of camera settings click here.

Exposure is affected by shutter speed – how long the iris of the camera stays open – and the aperture – how wide the iris opens to let in light. If the lens is open for longer with a shower shutter speed and if the aperture opens wider, more light gets in. Shutter speed also determines how long you have to hold the camera and the subject steady to avoid a blurry image. The aperture, measured in f-stops – the smaller the f-stop number the bigger the opening – also influences the depth of field, meaning how much of the shot is in focus in terms of distance from the camera.

White balance refers to the fact that “white” light has a number of different potential hues, called color temperature. For example, sunset can appear red, while Tungsten lights are an orange color, and some Halogen lights are bluer. White balance is how you or your camera adjusts for these temperatures so the colors in the picture are accurate.

Relevance

DSLR cameras offer two advantages that make more sense in light of how all these settings impact your photo. First, the components of the body and lens tend to offer a wider range of higher quality settings for each of these elements. You can even change lenses to get more specific ranges of settings to achieve a desired effect. Second, you get as much or as little control over them as you want. Some digital cameras and point-and-shoot cameras offer manual controls, but many of these still rely at least partially on the camera’s sensors and don’t give you the ability to completely control everything.

Leaving behind your reliance on full-automatic mode allows you to specify how much light you want, what you want in focus, and what color and mood should infuse the light of the shot. This is important for shots in which the camera’s chip can’t correctly adjust settings to get the best outcome.

DLSR cameras also have better sensors as a general rule. They are larger, with more, better  pixels, and thus take higher quality photos with better, crisper lines and details – improvements you can see. Also, with SLR (single lens reflex) cameras the viewfinder shows exactly what hits the sensor through the lens because there is only one lens, as opposed to most compact cameras that have a separate lens for the viewfinder

Choosing Your DSLR

That’s a lot to digest but you should have an idea of the increased power and customizability you’re getting in exchange for a larger, heavier, more complicated camera. So how do you find the right one? Pros and scores of people who have become enthusiastic amateurs all say the same thing; choose an affordable body that you like when you hold it, get a starter kit with a basic lens, memory card, lens protector, charger, and case, and save your money for your first lens upgrade.

The most important thing about your camera is that you like taking pictures with it. Finding it comfortable in your hand as you shoot goes a long way to making you carry it around. Go to a store to see what cameras you like before you order online. With lower and mid-range DSLRs, the lens has a much larger impact on the outcome of your shot than the body in terms of more expensive models. So saving on an average housing to enable you to purchase another lens in the future when you have a clear idea of what you want to do is the best way to grow your hobby affordably.