For the serious shooter Camera Labs is an excellent resource watch the videos to get a quick idea of what elements make-up the camera that you think apply mostly to you the images you are, and will be, trying to capture. PS I would love to have that guy's job.
Canon G9 this lil' *#@%er has live output to the LCD screen on the back, like a video camera! This is cutting edge technology and wasn't developed till around this year, and was actually mentioned in May's issue of PDN "46 reasons to love photography now". Looks like out-the-door (with tax and all) you can pick it up for around $500. It also records video I believe but won't zoom while recording, making editing a challenge.
If that's too high $$$ I'd still stay in the Canon family. Even though I don't own a single Canon I've really fallen out of love with the Nikon family mainly because of poor auto focusing and cheaper glass in the lenses.
RAW- The quality of the image really becomes apparent when your zooming in a bunch to say cut something out, touch it up, or add elements that weren't in the pic to begin with. If your taking photoshop classes I'm sure you guys have discussed RAW images and how vast their color depth is (16 bit) in comparison to jpgs (8 bit), so its a good idea to get a camera that has the capability to shoot RAW.
MEGA PIXELS- If you plan on talking pics you want to manipulate in photo shop I'd suggest a 8 mega pixel or higher. It'll keep you on the technology curve for a while. The higher mega pixels out there on the prosumer market are 12-14 mega pixels. The biggest one I've ever heard of was 30 MP, but that was to shoot large format $&!% like billboards.
MEMORY CARD- All consumer cameras will most likely come with like a 12mb one so you need to buy a bigger one. I have bought the cheapest of the cheap cards and found no problems. So my recommendation is don't pay more than $20 for a 2GB card. They rape you on price sometimes with these guys charging upwards of $60. If you plan on using the cards to archive $&!%, I'd say spend the extra doe, but if your dumping to drive religiously just get a cheap one.
Good luck and email me if you want to run a camera by me. I recommend writing a list of pros and cons of things you've experienced with cameras before. When it gets down to decision time you can be sure you don't screw yourself, by say getting a camera that doesn't zoom while in video mode. Here are some elements I often look for because I use my point and shoot mainly to capture nights out.
Alicia's List of things she wants a camera to do:
AMAZING fill flash (when shooting a group with background, does the flash fill the background or is it completely illegible and black? This happened to a friend traveling in Spain with many museums and buildings in the back not showing up at all, they may as well been in their own backyard and not half way around the world.)
Fast power up (like 2-4 seconds for those spur of the moment occasions)
Continuous shutter (I shot someones golf swing once and needed my camera to shoot 5 frames per second, luckily I had a mode on my camera that sufficed)
USB plug (or similar) to upload directly from the camera & streamlined charging cable (no hoakie bases which suck to haul around when traveling)
ISO control
White balance control
EV control for those super dark or super bright moments
Shutter control to shoot faster,hard to catch things like pets, kids, and moving objects. Usually you can turn the flash on to force the camera into a faster shutter speed, but I'd rather have the control
Video capabilities with variable recording sizes and the ability to zoom while recording which makes editing easier because you can cut from a MS to CU shot with out having to show the camera movement.
Audio pick up in front (mic's is the back only pick up he videopgrapher's voice!
Do yourself a favor and pick up one of these little Joby gorilla pods as well. Great for shooting things you have to hold the camera really still for like double exposures, sunsets, and low light conditions. And they hook to damn near everything! I've already bought and lost two!
