I want to create images for a web site using digital photography. I have been told that you can get better results using a digital video camera than from using a digital still camera. Is that true? Are there any details pertinent to this that will help me decide what to buy? thank you for any help.

-- Chris Starbuck (cstarb@hotmail.com), May 21, 2000

Answers

I have 2 digital cameras. One is an Olympus D360-L still camera, and the other is a Sony DCR-TRV-103 digital camcorder. I love both of them and each have their benefits. I have much more flexibilty with the Sony Digital 8 camcorder due to about 1 hour of digital video that I can grab any specific frame from that 1 hour. Also the Sony has neato digital effects that can enhance an image in real time. Check out these Jesus images that appeared on a local Church to see what I mean. The URL is http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Zone/7261/jes.htm I am an Amateur and have learned that the greatest help to any of my didtal images is SOFTWARE= Adobe Photoshop 5.5....Bill

-- Bill Fort (desert_eagle50@juno.com), May 21, 2000.

I disagree somewhat. I bought a Sony TRV-310 to for this exact add-on feature, digital still images. They are only "acceptable", designed for monitor viewing and NOT printing. Yes it is handy for frame capture, but that's about it's limit. Comparing a digital video camera to a digital still camera, is like comparing the latter to a high rez scan of a 35mm slide. There simply is no comparison...

-- MikeB (airlinestuff@yahoo.com), May 22, 2000.

I have a Sony digital 8 camcorder and use the still function all the time and it is pretty good. I take my stills (or freeze frame the video) and make floppies on a sony digital printer. I then take the floppies, around 20 pic's per floppie, and either make small prints or e-mail them. The resolution is only 640 X 480 so it will only make marginal prints if you keep them small but works great for e-mail. Another problem with getting a vidcam is getting the video/pictures into your computer (my sony printer/floppie maker is $500.00!).

-- brian sheedy (sheedy@gis.net), May 22, 2000.

I was faced with a similiar decision. To buy a digital camera or a digital camcorder. I wanted the ability to take stills but at the same time take video footage. Luckily, the store I went to enabled me to test how the digital camcorder stills compared to the digital camera stills. The answer: No comparison. The digital camera stills blew away the camcorder stills in quality. Of course, people will say this depends on the type of camcorder you are testing, however, the store allowed me to test the best camcorders on the market. If images are more important than video footage, then a digital still camera is the way to go. I also chose a digital camera that has the ability to take 40 seconds of movie footage - good for the internet, but I would not suggest for television usuage.

Hope this helps.

-- Haskell (haskell@squareusa.com), May 24, 2000.