Better Photo Booth Camera

[Ed Scolforo]

Question for those who know: I have a Canon Powershot A70 3.2 mp camera that I've not been happy with the picture quality. I use a photo booth and tripod, usually in the auto mode without flash with daylight bulbs for lighting. I'm not capturing the beautiful grain patterns in my bowls and other turnings, and wonder if a higher mp camera would give better results. I can't spend alot of money but have seen the 8mp Canon Powershot A720 IS for $219. Has anyone used this camera? My objective is a camera that will give good photo booth images for around $250. Thanks for any ideas.
Ed

[Tim Morton]

My first suggestion would be to try and mess with the settings. My family is always telling me they need "better" cameras (meaning spending more money). I am always able to change a setting and show them that its "not the camera"
You might try and post a few of your shots here and let us try and see what might help.

[Scott Shepherd]

Ed, it's my understanding that the megapixels won't make a difference unless you plan to use it to make large photos. It's my understanding that you can take a 3MP, 6MP, and 10MP shot of the same thing, print it at 4" x 6" and you cannot tell the difference. The difference comes in when you enlarge the photo to a point where it exceeds the pixels per inch. For a 3MP, I believe that limit would be in the 8" x 10" range.

However, if you do a lot of cropping and need the final image to be good, then you can easily take a 6MP photo and crop it some and still have a good quality image at 4" x 6".

Or if you have a 10MP, you can crop it drastically and still have a high quality good 4" x 6" shot.

It really depends if you plan to use it to print, how large the print will be, or if it's just for an image on the internet. If it's just small prints, then there will be no difference between any of the MP's.

[Greg Funk]

How about trying brighter lights? Inexpensive cameras have small sensors which introduce more noise at lower light levels. If lighting is an issue adding more pixels to the sensor can make things worse as the individual pixels on the sensor get smaller and less sensitive.

Greg

[Darryl Hazen]

Ed,

If you are shooting close up focus becomes more critical. Your camera should give you a sharp image unless you're closer than the lens is capable of focusing. If your photo color is shifted toward orange you may be having a problem with the light source. Incandescent lighting tends to appear orangish. Flash units are balanced for daylight. Have you considered "off camera" flash?