The Gadioc

What is the difference between optical zoom and digital zoom of a camera?

The optical zoom is good and digital zoom sucks. Optical Zoom is "real" zoom with the camera lens. The digital zoom is actually a way to expand and degrade the image pixels. Ignore it completely when comparing the cameras. See http://www.flickr.com/photos/samfeinstein/1098666030/ for an example. The difference is clear. Take note of the digital noise on the enlarged image digital call. This is typical. The image with optical zoom is not great, but this takes the same point and shoot camera as another example. Here are three sample pictures taken with my Canon Powershot SD900, which is a 10.0 megapixel. All three images are taken with the maxed out 3x optical zoom and 23.1 mm, which is the equivalent of 111.6 mm after calculating the crop factor of the lens. No image processing everything done with any of these images. All were taken with the self-timer for (hopefully) eliminate camera shake as the camera sat on top of my car. (Okay, I'll use a tripod next time, but I think the images are pretty sharp.) Please click "view all sizes" and then view each image in the largest size available, should be 3648 x 2736 pixels. The first image (3xOpticalFull) is the full frame image at 3x optical zoom zoom, or 111 mm. The second image (4xDigitalFull) is the result of zooming additional 4x digital zoom, for the equivalent of 444 mm. The third picture (3xOpticalCrop) is actually a shortened version of the original image, while maintaining pixel dimension. In other words, I accomplished the "digital zoom" completely on the computer and not on the camera. When comparing the images to size complete, I think it is immediately evident that the third image is far superior in every aspect that matters to discuss. I think it's much sharper (Check the tower and antenna near the top of the frame.), has better color and less digital noise and the engine (check the clear sky and the shadows on the building.). These images are labeled as "zoom digital ". 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 choose the camera. It's only "growth chamber" and is not anywhere near as good as "the computer culture." Any attempt to trim a digitally zoomed image will be a waste of time. See also, about half-way down this page: http://photo.net/equipment/digital/basics/

Kodak Z915 10MP 10X Optical Zoom Digital Camera with Sof...