Discovering the Great dSLR Features

All digital SLRs (dSLRs) have six killer features that make your job as a photographer much easier, more pleasant, and more creative. These features are described in the following sections.

A bigger, brighter view

The perspective through a dSLR's viewfinder is larger and easier to view than what you get with any non-SLR's optical window, back-panel LCD, or internal electronic viewfinder (EVF). With a dSLR, what you see is almost exactly what you get (or at least 95 percent of it), although you might need to press a button called a depth-of-field preview if you want to know more precisely what parts of your image are in focus. The dSLR's viewfinder shows you a large image of what the lens sees, not a TV-screen-like LCD view. (See Figure 1.) If you have your heart set on using an LCD, you can still review the picture you've taken on your dSLR's LCD after it has been captured.

Faster operation

Any non-SLR digital camera suffers from something called shutter lag, which is a delay of 0.5 to 1.5 seconds (or more) after you press the shutter release all the way but before the picture is actually taken. Lag is a drag when you're shooting sports action or trying to capture a fleeting expression on the faces of your kids. A dSLR responds to your command to shoot virtually instantly and can continue to take pictures at a 3- to 5-frames-per-second clip (or even faster). Try that with a non-SLR camera! All functions of a dSLR camera, from near-instant power-up to autofocus to storing an image on your memory card are likely to operate faster and more smoothly with a dSLR than with other types of digital cameras.

Lenses and more lenses

Certainly, many non-SLR cameras are outfitted with humongous zoom lenses with 12X or more zoom ratios. A typical "superzoom" range is the equivalent of 35mm to 420mm on a full-frame digital or film camera. Yet, these "do-everything" lenses don't do everything. Only a digital SLR, which lets you pop off the lens currently mounted on your camera and mount another one with different features, has that capability. Non-SLR digital cameras rarely offer wide-angle views as broad as 24mm to 28mm. Digital SLR lenses commonly offer views as wide as 10mm. You'll also want a dSLR if you need to focus extra-close or want a really long telephoto. The lenses offered for dSLR cameras are often sharper, too. For many photographers, the ability to change lenses is the number-one advantage of the digital SLR.

Better image quality

You'll find non-SLR digital cameras today with 8 to 10 megapixels of resolution. (You can even find camera phones with resolution in that range.) But a good-quality dSLR almost always provides better image quality than a traditional digital camera of the same or better resolution. Why? Because the dSLR's sensor has larger pixels (at least 4 to 5 times larger), which makes them more sensitive to light and less prone to those grainy artifacts called noise. An 8-megapixel dSLR usually provides better images with less noise at a sensitivity setting of ISO 800 than an 8-megapixel non-SLR camera at ISO 400 - and the snapshooting camera probably doesn't even have an ISO setting of 800 or more.

Camera-like operation

The workings of a non-SLR digital camera have more in common with a cell phone than with a traditional film camera. If you don't like zooming by pressing a button, visiting a menu every time you want to change a setting, or fine-tuning focus with a pair of keys, you should be using a digital SLR.

More control over depth of field

Depth of field (DOF) is the distance range in which things in your photos are in sharp focus. DOF can be shallow, which is a good thing when you want to make everything in your image other than your subject blurry, so that your subject is isolated or highlighted. Depth of field can also be generous, which is great when you want everything in the picture to look sharp.

Digital SLR cameras allow you to choose among shallow DOF, extensive DOF, and everything in between. Non-SLR cameras usually give you two choices when you're not shooting close-up pictures: having everything in sharp focus and having virtually everything in sharp focus. If you want to use focus creatively, a dSLR is your best choice.

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