A digital camera is a camera that takes digital photographs on a light-sensitive sensor. Many digital cameras can also record sound and videos besides still photographs. These cameras can store thousands of images on a small memory space. The users can also edit the stored images. They can also delete the stored images. Deletion of stored images will free the device's memory which can then again be used for taking more photographs.
The digital cameras now-a-days are being incorporated into devices like mobile phones & personal digital assistants (PDAs) and vehicles. There are various types of digital cameras like video cameras, line-scan cameras, bridge cameras and live-preview cameras. The video cameras are further classified as camcorders, professional video cameras and web-cams. While a web-cam is attached to computers for video conference purposes, a camcorder is meant for the use of amateur photographers.
A Bridge camera often has a super-zoom camera lens that provides a very wide zoom range. These cameras are often confused with digital SLR cameras as their appearance is similar to each other. Many of the Bridge cameras store images inloss-less RAW format. They are generally lighter that DSLR cameras and provide images of good quality. Most of the compact digital cameras store images in Tagged Image File Format (TIFF) and Joint Photography Experts Group (JPEG) file formats. Some cameras also use formats like Design Rule for Camera Format (DCF), Digital Print Order Format (DPOF) and Exchangeable Image File Format (Exif).
Zoom camera lenses are designated as 3x, 4x, 5x etc. These designations refer to the ratio between the longest and shortest focal lengths. A larger zoom designation does not necessarily mean that the image cannot be magnified any more. A zoom lens is one wherein a photographer can vary the focal length of the camera lens within a predefined range. The zoom lens allows users to achieve a variety of perspectives and compositions. These zoom lenses come handy when the user has to capture images of a dynamic subject matter like an athletics event.
