help, whats the difference in 'digital and optical ' zoom?

Question

i am trying to buy a new digital camera, and don't want to look completely stupid in front of the camera ppl tomorrow, so please, tell me what i need to look for. I need a good camera that will get clean clear detailed pictures when i zoom in. probably no farther than 25 feet. I decorate and do wedding and birthday cakes and need to show detail of my work. i don't get the (for example) 4x digital zoom and 4x optical zoom, or the two could be two different numbers such as 5 and 10, please help!!!

Answer 1

i`m using CANON '400 D'.it has 12x zoom. i`ve used before sony w series. 7.1 megapixel 3x zoom. what i advice you is to use a camera that has high optical zoom option.difference between optical and digital is quality of pictures(pixel).when you use digital zoom your picture`s pixel(clearness) will be decreased.but when you use optical zoom your picture`s pixel never be decreased.the choice is in your head now!

Answer 2

There is no way in a few brief sentences that anyone can get you up to speed on all the details of photogrpahy. I've been a photographer (semi pro and serious amature) for 40 years and I am still learning new stuff.

In short, let the sales associate do his or her job. They're the ones who are supposed to have all the answers. You look far more like a fool if you go in pretending to know a lot when you don't. Just be yourself and let them answer all your questions.

That said, the difference between digital and optical zoom is this:

Optical zoom is what the lens does. Optical zoom works with the mechanics of the lens and physically changes the focal length of the lens from some level of wide angle to some level of telephoto.

Digital zoom is what the camera's image processor does. Basically with digital zoom, the camera's image processor interprets the final optical image and zoom's if further. You tend to lose resolution and gain digital noise when using it. I recommend you don't use it; I have a digital zoom on my Nikon CoolPix 4300 which I don't use; it's tempting to use the digital zoom to get more detail, but you lose detail whey you use it.

In short (I know, too late) don't use digital zoom capability as a benchmark when you decide on your camera, get the one with the better optical zoom.

Answer 3

Lets start here: there are 3 classes of digital cameras, the consumer viewfinder-fixed lens class for $350 on down, the prosumer SLR (and DSLR) cameras with changeable lenses etc. selling from $1000 down, and the professional cameras costing over $1000. In the consumer class there are 2 sub-classes, the ones with both the little viewfinder window and the bigger screen on the back and the ones with just the back screen. They are hard to use out doors so the one with the built in viewfinder is a better deal. The difference between a SLR and a DSLR is the fact that the SLR cameras use a mirror to look through the lens same as their SLR film counter-parts. The DSLR ones use a small TV like device to sample the image from the sensor and have a notable shutter lag, mainly between shots.
Now the root of your question: Optical zoom is a property of a zoom lens where as Digital zoom is the act of enlarging the image in the play back screen on the back of the camera after you take the picture. No need to pay big bucks for the name brands as there are only 2, Cannon and Nikon, with a some what lesser preference for Olympus. It's like Coke and Pepsi and you'll get an infinite argument as which is best. For the type of work you do (very similar to mine) I would highly recommend the current Pentax model with the 18x55 mm lens. They seem to come out with a new one about every six months in the $700 price range... so you can get the previous model much cheaper. I got one about a year ago for $599.95 with a $100.00 mail in rebate because they had just come out with the K version of the *ist DL model, which I love. Just covered 2 weddings, a couple of 1st birthdays (my wife makes the dipper cakes) and the National Air Show. The 18x55 was great for the macro work and most all the over all air show and wedding work, though I also used a 135 mm telephoto there.

Answer 4

Don't even bother with digital zoom. It results in lower resolution images as you zoom. What you want is optical zoom.

Generally speaking, to get the detail you're talking about, you'd want more megapixels, and an ability to close focus as well as zoom. An optical zoom 3x or better is the best choice. If the camera lists both an optical zoom number and a digital zoom number, just ignore the digital zoom number. It's the optical zoom that counts.

Answer 5

The optical zoom is what you would see on a 35 mm camera. That is the "natural zoom"
Digital is just as its name says. It is when the camera digitally zooms in. This can sometimes be helpful however it makes your pictures blurry.

So the more optical zoom the better.

Answer 6

Cameras with Optical zoom they actually have an optical zoom lens.

Digital zoom refers to scaling digitally the image.

Optical zoom is better and many cameras do combine both.
Don't buy a camera with digital zoom only, the zoomed pictures will look "pixelated", unless the camera resolution is pretty high.

Answer 7

Optical zoom is good and digital zoom sucks. Optical zoom is "real" zoom done with the camera lens. Digital zoom is really just a way to enlarge pixels and degrade the image. Ignore it completely when you are comparing cameras.

See: http://www.flickr.com/photos/samfeinstein/1098666030/ for one example. The difference is clear. Take note of the digital noise in the so-called digital zoomed image. This is typical. The optical zoomed image is not great, but this is taken with the same point and shoot camera as the other example.

Here are three sample pictures taken with my Canon Powershot SD900, which is a 10.0 megapixel camera. All three pictures are taken with the optical zoom maxed out at 3X or 23.1 mm, which is the equivalent of 111.6 mm after calculating for the lens crop factor. There is no image processing at all done with any of these pictures. All were taken using the self-timer to (hopefully) eliminate camera shake as the camera sat on the top of my car. (Okay, I'll use a tripod next time, but I think they are pretty sharp images.) Please click on "View All Sizes" and then view each image at the largest size available, which should be 3648 x 2736 pixels. The first picture (3xOpticalFull) is the full frame image at 3x optical zoom, or 111 mm. The second picture (4xDigitalFull) is the result of zooming out the additional 4x in digital zoom, for an equivalent of 444 mm. The third picture (3xOpticalCrop) is actually a cropped version of the original image, maintaining the full pixel dimension. In other words, I accomplished the "digital zoom" entirely in the computer and not in the camera. If you compare the full-sized images, I think it is immediately obvious that the third picture is far superior in any aspect that you care to examine. I think it is much sharper (Check the tower and the antenna up near the top of the frame.), has better color, and less digital noise and artifact (Check the plain sky and the shadows on the building.). These images are all tagged "digital zoom."

3xOpticalFull: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7189769@N04/459603923/
4xDigitalFull: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7189769@N04/459603931/
3xOpticalCrop: http://www.flickr.com/photos/7189769@N04/459603939/

In other words, please ignore any claims of superiority based on "digital zoom" when you choose your camera. It is only "in camera cropping" and it is not anywhere near as good as "in computer cropping." Any attempts at cropping a digitally-zoomed picture will be a waste of time.

See also, about half-way down this page: http://photo.net/equipment/digital/basics/

Answer 8

digital zoom means that the picture is zoomed in the image itself, while optical zoom includes the lens literally moving out of the camera like those cameras with external lens. The Panasonic TZ3 has 10x OPtical Zoom, and the camera's lens go out as far as 2 inches! that cool right? but the fact is that optical zoom is much better than digital zooom, and you should look out for high optical zoom cameras!

Answer 9

Optical zoom is zooming using the camera lens. There is no degradation in quality when doing this.

Digital zooming is the equivalent of cropping the outer parts of the picture off and enlarging the print if you were doing it on a photo editing program. It zooms by cutting parts of the picture away. There is definite degradation in quality.

Answer 10

whatever camera you get, just turn off the digital zoom, you wont regret it!