Tutorial Two: Digital Camera use and applications

“A new technology is rarely superior to an old one in every feature”. Briefly discuss this statement in relation to digital camera technology. What would you consider to be some of the pluses and minuses digital camera technology holds in relation to more traditional film based cameras? Positive You can see the photo taken immediately, able to delete unflattering/unwanted photos at no cost, photo's can be stored on pcs/external hard drives and memory sticks, as well as transposed onto CDs and are still able to be processed onto photo paper. The cost of digital prints is overall more cost effective than developing films. Digital cameras come with a variation of different settings eg) black and white, moving shots etc and the cameras are generally smaller. Negative Often don't get around to printing photos, loss of excitement associated with developing a film, digital cameras can be extremely complicated due to the vast amount of settings. Quality is sometimes not as good compared with film. Technology is always changing so the cameras are quick to be out of date.

List some of the ways that digital images can be stored transferred and manipulated using other communications technology. Digital images can be stored using PCs, external hard drives, CDs - making slide shows and adding music, DVDs, memory sticks, can be emailed to other people, cellphones, and can post them on many blog sites eg) flickr, bebo, facebook,

Given the prevalence of image capturing devices, and thinking about the issues discussed in tutorial one, consider what sort of ethical issues may arise with their use. It can raise issues about trustworthiness. People are now able to take photos more easily and discretely as devices such as cell phones contain photo taking options. When photo capable cell phones came out there was a discussion about this and how people would be able to use these to invade others privacy and take photos of others without them knowing.I think that since then this has become more relaxed but stories about inappropriate photos do pop up in the headlines every now and then.

Briefly discuss some of the ways that digital images could, or are, being used in occupational therapy practice. When I was on my fieldwork one placement I was shown how to work the hospitals very complicated digital camera in order to accompany one of the OTs on a home visit and take photos of the client using the specific equipment given so that this could be used as a visual prompt for her, as well as providing the team with some insight into how she was coping at home with using her equipment. Unfortunately we did not end up seeing her but this preparation shows how occupational therapist are using digital imaging to assist them in their practice.

Provide a brief summary of the services offered by Flickr.com Flickr is a site interested in the storage of photos. It offers users a place where they can organize their photos in a meaningful way, share photos and keep in touch with family and friends, form a group, and search other photos that have meaning to them.

Name one other photo storage website which offers a service similar to Flickr.com Facebook is another internet site that allows the storage of photos but it is different to flickr as it also has your personal blog attached to it and contains ways of interacting with friends and contacts.

Explain what the difference is between a digital and an optical zoom Optical zoom is like the lens on a film camera. The lens changes focal length and magnification as it is zoomed. When using optical zoom the image quality stays high throughout the zoom range. Digital zoom crops the image to a smaller size and then enlarges that cropped image to fill the frame again. With digital zoom the quality has significant loss as the image ends up with a blurred look.

Explain what is meant by the term mega pixel Mega pixels are how manufacturers categorize digital cameras by putting them in terms of pixel count. A pixel is in element that makes up the digital image, so 1 mega pixel (MP) means that 1 million pixels make up the image. Currently the most popular cameras have between 2 MP and 5 MP. The lower scale MPs are good if the purpose is to make 4"x6" and 5"x7" pictures. To produce larger prints such as 8"x10" 4 MP or 5 MP cameras would be a better choice.