 BetterPhoto Member |
Digital Vs. Optical Zoom What is the difference between digital and optical zoom?
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Brendan Knell |
Digital zoom is just cropping and enlarging the image, which will result in a lower quality image. Optical zoom is when the lens moves. Sorry, I can't give you a better description on this.
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- Carolyn M. Fletcher  Contact Carolyn M. Fletcher Carolyn M. Fletcher's Gallery |
You will want to turn off the digital zoom. It gives you some distortion.
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robert G. Fately |
Alexandra, an optical zoom means that the lens elements themselves move back and forth to create different levels of magnification (well, different angles of view, but it's the same thing). The film or the chip receiving the light is unchanged - the lens does all the work. A digital zoom is a marketing "cheat". Basically, what happens is that the digital camera's computer ignores the outer area of the chip and only records/displays the inner portion. This is not different than taking a negative you exposed with a 50MM lens, then enlarging only the central 1/4 area - the final print will be the same as if you had taken the photo with a 100MM lens. Of course, with digital cameras, all this can be done instantly in-camera. The problem is that since it only makes use of 1/4 or 1/10th of the pixels in the chip, digital zoom greatly reduces the amount of information recorded in the shot. This is why most folks will tell you to ignore that specification anyway - do not be swayed by some manufacturer's claim of 3X optical, 12X digital - the digital pretty much is garbage.
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Christopher A. Vedros |
Another reason you should turn off digital zoom is that you get the exact same result if you take the image with no digital zoom and crop it closer on your computer. At least that way, you have the choice of cropping or not cropping. If you use the digital zoom in the camera, you just get the lower-resolution zoomed picture and that's it.
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