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Almost all compact digital cameras come with zoom lenses. But there’s a big difference between optical zoom and digital zoom. When you use optical zoom, you take full advantage of your camera’s millions of pixels. When you use digital zoom, you’re reducing the capability of your camera’s sensor to a fraction of its maximum potential. One picture (bottom image) was shot with a 7.1-megapixel camera using 3x optical zoom. The other (top) was shot with the same camera using 12x digital zoom, effectively reducing the 7.1 megapixels of image data to less than 0.5 megapixels. The picture’s detail and color quality is greatly reduced, making it look softer. The lesson: Use digital zoom only as a last resort.
From the National Geographic guide to digital photography.
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Comments
Aug 11, 2007 5PM #
I have the "National Geographic guide to digital photography".I have followed this advice since I read it (actually, I turned off the digital zoom in my camera) and I can say that the quality of my photographs has improved since then.
It's easy to fall in the temptation of using the digital zoom or even shooting without noticing you have gone from optical to digital zoom. But then when you see or print your pictures you realize that the quality is poor and you feel very disappointed.
The only real use I can see for digital zoom is when you really want to have a picture of a thing or a detail so i.e. you won't forget it. But it's not good if you want quality photographs.
Thanks for the advice NG!
Aug 11, 2007 5PM #
I can't stand digital zoom.( but for some reason i still use it sometimes). So if i were you iw ouldn't use digital zoom, as you see it makes everything very blurry.
please view my photography website
freewebs.com/johnnyphotography
Thank You
Aug 11, 2007 5PM #
Wow, great post. I hate digital zoom but it's still needed on occasion. Thanks!
Aug 11, 2007 5PM #
I always... and I mean always... disable the digital zoom feature on my digital cameras. I just can't think of any reason to use it considering the poor quality of the images.
Aug 11, 2007 5PM #
Indeed one might as well enlarge a picture on one's computer to see the specific part that one wants to concentrate on.
There some cases when using the digital Zoom brings something interesting; here is one:
When the detail zone you want to really enlarge is highly contrasted with its background. The digital zoom enables the camera to adjust the light to the part you have selected or at least make that part important in the choice of apperture/speed.
Exemple: a shot of the moon with my Canon SX10 IS full optical zoom only gave me a blured light ring around the moon. Adding the 2.3 X digital zom, the light collected on the cells enabled a measure of the necessary speed.
Result available on my computer. Craters become visible. I have not posted in "Myshots" as it is not an "artistic picture..." but the result is convincing technically.
The subject can obviously anything else where a huge contrast exist between the specific area and the background, even at the maximum optical Zoom.
Yours.
Paul
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