Photography 101 for Realtors - Part 2

- Introduction to the Digital Camera - by Chas. Campbell

1) What to Buy?

With so much to choose from, and so many "parameters," it's hard to buy your first digital! I could do a who month of "freebies" on this alone, so I'm going to make it easy and short... If you need more detail, feel free to e-mail me.

2 Basic kinds - the ones that save the pictures on floppies, and the ones that same pictures on little cards.

If you want the camera primarily for working with buyers and/or just shoot one or two shots at a time, etc - I would recommend the SONY MAVICA. This type uses a regular floppy disk to store the pictures. They make several models ranging in price. Get the cheapest one if you don't do lots of fancy flyers and web stuff. Get the middle one for best all-around quality and features. The expensive one has sound and many higher-level features - get this one only if that is appealing to you. The Mavica is good quality, easy to use, but is bigger and heavier than most because of the floppy drive.

If you do more shooting, take the camera on personal vacations, use a laptop, and do more listing-oriented brochures - then I recommend the "card-type" cameras. The Kodak DC210+ is a solid performer with a perfect set of features for good Real Estate shooting and since it's "last year's model" it is very affordable - around $350 on-line. The next step up from there would be to get more features and pixels - The Kodak DC260 and 265 have sound and mini-movie capabilities (but not too much more "camera" than the 210+) Much more $. My own camera is the Nikon Coolpix 900S - I bought this model for it's supurb optics and more professional manual-operation features, but it costs about the same as the more expensive Kodaks!

Either way, get a camera with a ZOOM lens. It's more important to get the widest angle instead of the longest telephoto. Again, the 210+ has one of the wider zooms.

• If you have a newer computer, make sure the camera you buy has "USB"
• Get special NiMh rechargeable batteries and charger! They cost more and are worth it! I paid $90 for a special "double capacity" set of batteries/charger and it was the best choice I made on digitals!
• If you are serious about interior photos, you will want a camera that can have a "screw-on" wide-angle lens (about $100) Often, this lens gets in the way of the flash so you also have to look into auxiliary flash units. (Or shoot natural light)
• Small, lightweight tripod if you don't already have one.
• "Adapters" for the card cameras that let you plug the memory card into a floppy, laptop, or desktop computer (different ones for diff. cameras)
• Extra memory cards. If you have a 8MB or bigger card to start, you really don't need a bunch of extras unless you plan on shooting 100+ pics a day.... Since memory is cheap right now, you might "upgrade" the card at purchase or later to a bigger size (Example: 16MB+ instead of 8MB) so that you have a very large capacity in the camera and you could keep alot of images on the card without any problem.

2) How to Set-up and Use right away.

First, charge the batteries and install the software and cable.

Settings on all the cameras vary, but most have some common basic features. here are some tips:

• Quality Settings: usually you have "basic," "good," "best" or something like that. Set the camera at it's LOWEST setting first to see how that works. Most of these cameras can do more than we need for regular stuff like flyers and internet.
• Type of Image: Most cameras have "compression" and the ability to save files in different ways.The best universal type of file is called a "J-Peg" and you can tell them because the picture file name ends with ".jpg" This is what you want to end up with, since they are easy to e-mail, load fast on the internet, and take up less hard drive space.
• Flash Settings: Most cameras have some easy way of changing the flash settings, usually a button that changes symbols in the control panel of the camera. Learn the various choices and how to make it change, especially how to *Make* the camera use the flash (or turn off) depending on particular situations. Don't use the red-eye feature very often.
• Power settings: Since they chew up power, digicams have circuitry that lets them "go to sleep" with various settings to conserve batteries. But it's very frustrating to get ready to shoot and each time you have to "wake up" first. The biggest power consumer is the little LCD screen. Most cameras will have a way of setting-up so that the screen goes off automatically after so many seconds or minutes. There is a setting that also powers down the whole camera in such-and-such a time. - Make sure to set these up to your liking. I keep the camera "on" longer so it's ready to shoot quicker, but I also set the screen to not come on at all unless I need it (pushbutton) - This setup keeps the camera ready but doesn't use lots of power. (Most of the good cameras have a "viewfinder" to look thru as well as the screen on the back. This is a good thing.)

3) Shoot!

The best part about digital cameras is that you can shoot like crazy and not cost any money! So do it! You get better every time you push the button.

There is one little trick to learn as you shoot with digitals. First, it takes a little while for the camera to "boot up" - keep the camera "on" during your shooting session if you want to be able to get quick shots. Second, there is a slight split second delay from when you push the button, and the picture actually is recorded. Most cameras have a shutter button that you can push "halfway" to activate the autofocus, autoexposure, and autoflash - but not shoot. It is good to learn how to do this for better shooting. You only learn this from practice, and then it's like riding a bike!....

Outside, in the sunshine, the little LCD screen is worthless even on the best cameras. Learn to use the regular optical viewfinder more for outdoor shooting. Besides, the screen uses alot of power, the more you use the viewfinder, the less you have to use the screen.