You have to ask yourself, "Why am I doing this?", "What is my objective?"
What are you doing?
Are you capturing heartfelt memories?
Are you wanting something as a souvenir?
Are you just having fun? Is it for you web site?
Is it for a job?
How serious are you?
Some of us have been taking pictures for 25 years. In that time we have seen, and taken, a lot of SPECTACULAR pictures. We have also seen, and taken, some really horrible pictures. Sometimes, in retrospect, it was a complete waste of effort. WHY? Because the shot was out of focus, or under/over exposed, or maybe, the subject was not properly framed.
If you are going to take pictures, DONT DO IT it halfway. DO IT SPECTACULAR. It is just as easy to take perfect pictures, as it is to waste your time. A camera like the SD1000 allows you to take great pictures very easily, but you must understand what is going on.
If you are in control it is very easy. It takes some effort to learn your camera. It takes a some effort to compose, and capture, a great picture. If you don't want to do that, then buy a $20.00 disposable camera, and stop reading.
QUICK STORY
I had a friend who repairs cameras, he is a camera snob. He stopped liking me after I bought the SD1000 and I was telling him how great it is, but he is prejudiced against digital cameras. He is would not even listen and he lost respect for me, "Oh well", I was only telling him as a favor to him. He claims only pros can take great shots. He claims that only great film cameras can take great pictures. I SAY BS.....thus I "had" a friend.
I agree that sometimes, maybe 5% of the time, you need film. Wedding pictures should captured to film. Legal pictures should be on film. If you mainly want to print pictures and REQUIRE them them to last for a long, long time use film. I bought the SD1000 for web site photos, but I now see it can do much much more.
My ex-friend will NOT have the pictures/memories, which I WILL have, because of his a snobbish attitude. I will take my SD1000 to places he will not(or can not) take a big camera. It is true my pictures may not be the best quality, but I will have captured the memory/shot. His memory will fade. The SD1000 will take awesome pictures in 95% on the situations you want pictures.
The SD1000 it takes care of most of these requirements. The ability to recognize and focus on faces is great. Exposure and shutter is automatic.
YOU MUST tell the SD1000 the situation. Are you Inside? outside?, at the beach?, nighttime?, daytime?, underwater? etc etc. Are your subjects moving quickly? etc etc. Are you capturing fireworks????
All you have to do is tell the SD1000, and 95% of the time, it will take good pictures. The awesome thing about using a digital camera with an LCD display is you can INSTANTLY tell IF you have the picture you want.
This is why you need to take the camera out and learn what it can do, and what it can't do. Learn how to QUICKLY adjust the camera, if the picture is no good. THAT IS AWESOME!!. For years, using 35mm film I used to take multiple exposures of a subject using different settings. I set the exposure high, low and in between, I used different shutter speeds for the same subject. Then I would take the film for developing and days later decide if I had a good picture. That is a BIG REASON why I like the SD1000 so much. INSTANT PICTURES, and contrary to the snob, the pictures are quite good.
In life, beauty comes and goes. Spectacular happens, and is gone. You have a limited time frame to captures it. then you can share it, or re-re-relook at it yourself. Memories fade, but if you save your digital images ( maybe in/on several hard drives ) they will last a life time. you can also go to the "instant print" stations at the drug store, and print the image. It may not last as long as a film print, but it can reprinted. I am NOT A FAN of home printers. They cost more than you realize, and they print on "homemade" looking and they are usually unstable ( the ink runs if it gets wet )
Be proud of your pictures. Take time to make sure you have everything set. If you want to share a print, create it on a "real" photo machine. They are self-service, quick, inexpensive and easy. Don't degrade a great shot by printing on crappy "homemade" paper. It is so easy to insert the SD memory card, and create a masterpiece you are proud of.
I have been a photographer for 30 years. I have been hearing about digial cameras for the last 15 years. I started looking at them 7 years ago, and the battery issue ( 10 minute life ), price issue ( $1299.00 ) and the low resoultion quality issue ( only 3 mega pixels ) kept me from converting my good ole 35mm camera. All of these issues have been solved with the SD1000. NOW ... FINALLY all of the pieces came together. PLUS, not only can I capture easy MONSTER SIZE PICTURES, I can use my computer program to alter them, digitally ... KEWL!!!!!!.
Here is one of my first "test shots" with my new SD1000. I captured it at 2048x 1536 lower resoluition. This was before I bought a 2 gig memory card, and decided to capture everything at 7.1 megapixels. The SD1000 will capture 600, size 7.1mp images on a 2gig memory card. This is versus 36 shots on a 35mm camera.
BTW - do you about megapixels?? If an image 2048 x 1536, that is considered 3,145,728 pixels, aka, also known as 3.1 megapixels. I think 640 pixels is about 6 inches on a computer screen. A 7.1 mp sized picture is about 10 feet tall. You are able to reduce to any size you want.
Here is some fun you can have with a digiatl camera. This is my Grandfather. He is still a stud at 99 years young. I respect him more than anyone. He is very wise and still kicking ass ... AT 99!!! ... anyway ... I was messing around, showing him how the camera turned red flowers, into blue flowers. And I was showing him the weird noises the camera can make on "delay" setting....So I set it down, and snapped an "accidently great photo" ... We were not posing, and it turned out great ("accidentaly?? or years of practice? The harder you work, the luckier you become.
For demonstration purposes, I reduced the full BIG 1536 pixels tall picture to only 140 pixels tall. I cropped out the section with the hat to show you how big the picture could be ... and LOL, hehehe, some people might prefer that I not be in the picture at all;) ... thus, I show you what that looks like too. The entire editing process took me 5 minutes, so it is not perfect. IfI wanted perfect I could have spent 20 minutes. It just depends on what you are doing. This is for demonstration, I expect better work out of you;)
The hat logo demostrates how big the picture could be
The hat logo demostrates how big the picture could be
and
For fun, I erased all of me, except the "Marshall" logo on my shirt?
The point is you want to capture GREAT IMAGES ... in MONSTER SIZE ... Captute EVERYTHING at 7.1 megapixels (mp), then later you can reduce it. BUT ... make sure it looks good to start with ... The first step is JUST DO IT. TAKE THE PICTURE, CAPTURE THE IMAGE. Take the camera with you, it is easy. But remember, the camera is only a tool, you must spend a little time learning the camera. That way if/when you check the LCD image, and discover YOU messed up, then YOU are informed enough to QUICKLY change to the proper setting.
Be in control and never make excuses. I would NOT waste my time typing this webpage if the SD1000 camera was not capable of being spectacular. Although it is not perfect, it only cost $200bucks. Heck, that picture of my GrandPa is worth $200.00. Do you have a girlfriend, wife, friend, Mother or father, or house or subject you need to capture? I bet you do. That is why I did YOU the favor of publishing this web page. JUST DO IT.
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