Quality Prints Using Digital Zoom??

[dln1957]

I am looking for my first digital camera. Do digital cameras provide a high quality print (4" x 6") if you use the digital zoom? I would like to have a mid-range zoom capability (6-7x), but there don't seem to be any new models with this capability. The latest models make you choose between a compact size / 3x optical or the new ultra-zoom cameras that are much larger. Thanks.

[jessie25]

With the exception of a few cameras (Panasonic LZ1/LZ2 come to mind), most offer standard 3x/4x optical zoom or ultrazoom, this is true.

Digital zoom is nearly always useless. I never ever use it on mine. You can get better results generally by cropping after taking the photo. Please please PLEASE don't buy into the camera company ploy of augmenting the zoom capability of the cameras they sell by advertising "combined" optical and digital zoom.

If you feel you'll be doing a lot of cropping, then just get a camera with higher resolution to give you extra pixels for the flexibility to crop.

[dln1957]

Thanks for the input. I'll show my ignorance here. How is cropping a picture any different than using the digital zoom? Aren't they both "enlarging" the actual photo image? Also how much can you crop if you are using a 4 or 5 MP camera? How about a 6 or 7 MP?

[timmciglobal]

Take the square root of the pixel count to increase its size by 2.

IE:

To zoom in onto the center 50% of a photo your effective resolution drops to 2 megapixels from 8.

Tim

[dln1957]

Let me be more specific with my question. If a digital camera provides the 35mm camera equivalent of 105 mm of zoom capability, will I be able to crop the photo or use the digital zoom to provide high quality photos up to 200 mm?

[timmciglobal]

Depends on the focus, how many megapixels and what you are planning to do with it (print size, display wise)

Can you take a 8 megapixel crop out the center 50% to make it 400 mm and still get good 4x6 prints? Probably. Could you make 8x10 prints? Maybe depends on the subject.

Your better off getting a bigger optical zoom though.

Tim

[Newbie]

I actually believe that digital zoom is useable within certain limits. If you plan to use digital zoom on more than 50%(or maybe 30%) of the pictures you will plan to print, get a camera with more optical zoom.

Then, using digital zoom can work, but never go to the limits. For example, if you have 4x digital zoom, never go beyond 2... Actually 2x digital zoom should be pretty much the maximum.

So, since you are planning to print 4x6 pictures, I would say that 5mp cameras should suffice. Actually with 3x optical zoom, 5mp is the least I'd suggest, with 4x optical zoom 3 or 4 would be acceptable provided that you don't go beyond 6-7x total zoom. For 5mp with 3x, going to 6x with digital zoom, you'd get a 1.25mp picture, it would mean over 200dpi which is more than acceptable from my point of view. Have a look at a little test gallery I made to check digital zoom on my A95: http://nicolas7894.fotopic.net/c418760.html
If you want the originals so you can print them, just tell me. That would actually be your best bet since you'd know exactly what to expect.

BUT optical zoom is still the best thing.