Digital cameras are the trend these days. Because of these cameras, more and more people are getting hooked to and practicing the art of photography in today's modern society. This is a good idea, since photography is an art that expresses one's thoughts and abilities of conveying a story through a still photograph. True, there are rules that govern the practice of photography; however, these rules are not cut and dried. Some photographers actually break the rules and can still come up with a decent photograph that pleases the general populace.

There are several advantages that one can enjoy from a digital camera. Here are some of them:

Ease of Use. Most digital cameras are easier to use than the traditional film camera. Just like a film camera, you can just point and shoot in order to capture your image. However, the viewfinder in both digital and film cameras let you see only about a certain percentage of the actual shots. In digital film cameras, however, you can see the final shot in your LCD. You can also frame shots better with the LCD than with the optical viewfinder.

Instant Results. Because it is digital, you can now see how good your shots are. You can then delete those that you do not want to have in your collection.

More Pictures. The storage media used by digital cameras have generally higher capacities than a film camera. In a film camera, you can take as much as 36 shots per film with a lot of it sometimes wasted in erroneous shots and exposure problems. In a digital camera, however, you can take as much as a thousand shots (depending on the resolution setting) with the advantage of having only the best ones remaining in the batch.

The Evolution of Digital Cameras

Just like today's technology, digital cameras have also undergone evolution. The first digital cameras were only capable of low resolution images that were at most just 4 megapixels in size. The earlier ones also lacked a very crucial feature in today's photography equipment: motion stills and blur reduction.

In the old days of digital photography, you need to have a steady hand in order to be able to shoot good photographs. This is good training, however. You learn to control the tremors in the shooting hand using older cameras, and then operate the newer ones with ease.

The latest digital cameras, however, are better than those that preceded them. Here are some of the latest technologies and improvements that you can find in digital cameras.

Improved Autofocus

As digital cameras evolved, their creators had in mind to put into them a very important feature: the autofocus. The autofocus helps an aspiring photographer to focus on a certain subject digitally: most point-and-shoot cameras (even the earlier ones) can autofocus on something that interests the photographer using preset algorithms. These have worked in the past, but crudely; sometimes the camera focuses on the wrong subject resulting in an erroneous photograph, or something that the photographer did not intend.

Most camera manufacturers nowadays have improved not only their autofocus capabilities, but also the camera's capability to distinguish between an object and a person. Sony Corporation was the first to introduce this capability, and other companies have followed suit. This is the face recognition system, an improvement on the automatic focus capabilities of digital cameras that is useful especially when one is shooting portraits or shots that predominantly feature human faces.

In fact, Sony Corporation's “W” series of their Cybershot point-and-shoot cameras have introduced a new feature that built up on the face recognition feature: the smile shutter. This feature requires any one of the subjects in the frame to smile before the shutter fires.

Improved Sensitivity to Light

One of the biggest problems of both DSLRs and point-and-shoot cameras in the past were their lessened sensitivity to low light. Older cameras require that you use flash in order to clearly capture the scene at low light, but later cameras can now allow their users to shoot at low light. Some current point-and-shoot cameras also have the capability to shoot at ISO 3200, the higher sensitivity rating so far in digital photography.