Imaging Problems and Used Digital Cameras Part Two
One of the most annoying imaging problems is "noise". However, there are other problems that are related to contrast, detail, color, and sharpness which you might experience.
You can adjust your digital camera for balancing color but you will need to have a point of reference. This can be done using the white balance control, which uses the color white as the point of reference. Your digital camera can, theoretically, correctly reproduce all colors on the wheel.
Most digital cameras can be automatically set so that white is balanced. For some light conditions this setting will be one of the most appropriate but for some light conditions you can turn off the automatic setting so that you can adjust the camera manually. You might want to do this for an artistic effect, such as when you want to use a white balance to create colors that are unearthly and weird.
However, most of the time you'll want the colors to be reproduced accurately. You can compensate for colors that are inaccurate by using imaging software. It's good practice to try to get the best colors directly from the source.
Exposure times that aren't correct can be adjusted using software but once again you will want to try to get the best image you can when you take the picture. If you get the chance to re-shoot a picture that has been incorrectly exposed you should take the opportunity to make those corrections. If you can't recreate the shot you can save the picture and try to alter it with the imaging software.
Lenses that are of poor quality will create the most imaging problems and make the image hard to correct. A lens that is bad is going to give you images that are bad. This is why it's important that you pick a digital camera that has a good quality lens.
Sometimes even good lenses can create distortion at their max focal lengths. This is often easy to correct since the distortion is often in terms of horizontals and verticals that are inaccurate. You can use imaging software to compensate for any variations in lines. The irregularity of these images can be annoying but not always unpleasing.
If you have a cheap plastic lens it can be almost impossible to clear up the image. If image quality is of importance you will want to get a lens that is good quality glass and take good care of it. Distortion can be caused by dust and dirt on the lens so you'll want to keep the lens as clean as you can without handling it too much. Use a blower and a soft brush to keep the lens clean and also keep it covered when you're not using it.
The imaging problems as discussed above can often be corrected by using imaging software. Photoshop, which is considered to be professional imaging software, can be used when you need to correct irregularities in color, adjust white balance, correct lens distortion, correct exposure, and correct blurring. Photoshop may take you some time to learn to use so keep in mind that you can get some of the basic functions in less expensive software packages.
Remember that your digital photos are considered to be computer data that you can alter all the way down to the bit level. This means that it's possible for you to change even the smallest thing about your images. Imaging software can automatically correct many functions as well as allow you to manually manipulate the digital image.
Understanding Printing Digital Images Part One
Digital photography puts the process of developing pictures into your own hands. And this also means the printing of your pictures, since all you need is a good printer that is attached to your computer.
You can transfer your digital images to your computer where you can then edit them and process them using imaging software. When editing is complete you can print out the pictures. However, a few guidelines should be followed before you print high quality pictures.
When you are transferring the images to your computer some software packages will automatically resize the pictures so that they are easier to send through email or to post on web pages. However, when printing these pictures, you want to avoid any downsizing. When transferring pictures to your computer make sure that you are transferring them at the full resolution.
At full resolution some cameras still won't have enough pixels for you to create printed pictures that look decent. A photo processing shop will print pictures at 300 ppi (pixels per inch). If you want to achieve this same quality you need to have images that are at least that resolution.
Pixels, or picture elements, are the single dots that make up every digital picture. Most cameras will be rated by megapixels (millions of pixels). The total amount of pixels that the camera can record will be the rating. For instance, a camera that is rated at 6 megapixels will be able to capture picture images that are 3008 pixels in height by 2000 pixels in width.
You can fix the number of pixels that are in the digital image. This means that you can increase the size of a picture but there will be less pixels per inch. When the picture is blown up higher than the standard of 300 pixels the sharpness and clearness of the picture will be reduced. A camera that has a rating of 2 megapixels will be able to print pictures that are as big as 5.8" by 3.8" at 300 ppi. A 4 megapixel camera will print pictures as big as 8.2" by 5.4".
When you want good quality pictures the first thing you need to do is make sure that the images you take are the right resolution with a minimum of 300 ppi.
Editing
Digital photography comes with the advantage of allowing you to edit the images before you print them. However, there can be a problem when you are editing images that are in the JPEG format. Every time that you save an image in JPEG format you lose some of the data. You may need to go through a few edits with a JPEG file before you get a good quality for the picture.
Try to minimize the number of edits that you do on a JPEG image to about one or two. Save each file with a different file name. This will keep the original file unique. At the same time remember to save the images in a format such as TIFF, which is an uncompressed format. This will let you do as many edits as you want without losing any of the quality.
When you are ready to print out your images you have two options: you can print them on your own or you can send them out to be printed. Many photo processing shops offer service online which will let you upload the images you want to print to their server. The pictures are printed (often in less than one hour) and then mailed to you or ready for pickup. You can also do this the old fashioned way by taking the pictures right to the shop. Many photo processing stores will have available computers where you can edit your pictures before they are printed.
You also have the option of printing your photos from home. This topic is discussed in the next section.
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