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So advanced, it's simple.

It seems most of the photography advice I've been handing out lately is what to look for in a digital point-and-shoot. It's happened so often, I've got almost got it down to a boilerplate response:
  1. DP Review.com (or c|net, or Steve's Digicams)
  2. Digital zoom is useless.
  3. Low Shutter Lag (the time it takes between pressing the button and taking the picture) is important.
  4. Pick them and up and play with them. Find one that seems logically laid out to you. Fiddling with buttons = lost photo opportunities.
  5. Look at the lens. Typically (though Samsung's got some nice glass now), camera manufacturers have better lenses, and all the light that hits the CCD has to go thru a lens first.
  6. Download Picasa from Google if you're on Windows. If you've got a Mac, iPhoto is best.
(Note the absence of "Megapixels! Megapixels! Megapixels!" in the above list. 4 megapixels is good enough for 90% of the pictures people take).

The other non-computer tech advice I've been handing out as of late is iPod-related: Why choose an iPod over another mp3 player? What makes the iPod so cool, and why buy it over a Gigabeat/Dell DJ/iRiver /etc?

Which begs the question, why isn't there a dominant digital camera model/brand, like there is with mp3 players?

It's not that Apple's never made a digital camera before, and in fact digital cameras have been around longer than mp3 players. And there's been dominant consumer camera models / brands in the past, like the Canon AE-1, Minolta Maxxum, Olympus OM-1, Argus C3 and even Kodak's Brownie line.

But we've not seen that one camera model really grab hold in the digital cameras like the iPod has with digital music. There's been some great, innovative cameras like Nikon's CoolPix 900 and the new slim-line Casios, but nothing's excited the consumer and been THE force in the market (yet) as the iPod has with music.

Although I love my Canon S50 and Nikon D70, the fact is, they're not cool. Useful, affordable and reliable, but not cool. Compared to my iPod, their interfaces are clunky, their controls are awkward, apparently placed at random and different from one camera to the next. Because of the different shape and layout of each camera, the learning curve is new for each camera you buy. Sure, the shutter release is usually by your right index finger, but after that, there's no consistency of control placement. The camera UI is also different from one brand to the next, and even between different models in the same line.

And then there's the different software each camera manufacturer bundles with their digital cameras. WalMart, CostCo and Ritz Camera may use different companies to develop the 35mm film rolls dropped off at their stores, but their envelopes are the same size, the type of services they provide is similar and the information they need to complete the processing is identical. The same can't be said for the software to download a picture from a Nikon camera and an Olympus camera.

The consumer digital camera market today looks like mp3 players did in early 2001. Sure, we know we need one, and there's a lot of solutions out there, but no one's figured out the right combination of price, features and usablity like Apple did with the iPod. When the iPod and iTunes rolled out, the rest of the industry saw how to do digital music right, and quickly copied Apple's lead. That same idea with digital photography for the consumer, done correctly from start to finish, has yet to appear.

“So advanced, it's simple.”

  1. Anonymous Anonymous Says:

    Came across this post. Bravo! Clear, reasonably objective, rational.

    A certain amount of UI standardization is highly desirable. Where would we be if cars didn't operate in mostly the same way? There's still room for differentiation (how the radio works, where the window buttons are, etc.), but one should be able to use the core capabilities without a scores of pages of instructions. The situation hasn't changed since this original post.

    I'm not an Apple fan, because Apple takes things too far. Latest example - iPad doesn't run Flash (Apple says HTML5 is so much better). But while they push you down their preferred path a little too hard, they do a great job of designing that path - so that their products are easy to use, attractive, and yes, cool.