Digital cameras can save on film and printing costs, but dye-sublimation printing that produces photographic quality results can easily run 75 cents per print. An important piece of advice is to keep a supply of batteries handy even if you use rechargeables. You won't lose pictures already taken, but running out of batteries is comparable to running out of film. What to look for High resolution, long battery life, and a large image capacity are obvious desirable characteristics in a digital camera. An LCD viewer is not a necessity, but it's useful in determining whether the content and quality of an image is sufficient.
Many digital cameras are like low-cost film cameras when it comes to the lens.
The lens is fixed, which is suitable for most photos, but close-ups, telephoto, and wide angle shots will require additional lenses. You should also consider a camera's download method if you anticipate taking lots of pictures. Serial ports run at 115.2Kbps, but even at that rate a single image can take 30 seconds to download. Parallel port connections can improve on this time, but removable memory, such as PC Card flash RAM, is the fastest method. It's important not to overlook external power supplies.