MegaPixel ! Myths demystified

Many people ask me, what is megapixel? As the name suggests 'mega' means 10 to the power of 6 and 'pixel' is the smallest picture element in an image. So 1 megapixel is 1000000 pixels. So does it means that more megapixels in a camera will produce much better images. If I were to answer this question, I would say yes and no. Why 'Yes', because more the pixels in an image, more the detail in an image. With more megapixels, you can blow up the picture to a bigger size with more sharpness. But if you were to take only regular size prints (4x6 inches), then you only require 2 megapixel image. For 4x6 inches image, there is no fun of clicking at 12 megapixels. This would only add the bigger filesize and more time for transfering the images to yur computer. But again if you like to tweak your images before printing, then clicking on a higher megapixel helps. Say, you are shooting a wildlife, but you don't have high zoom lens in your camera, then shooting with a high megapixel camera will help in cropping the image later on the computer while keeping the sharpness intact. But how many of you crop the images on the computer. So I would suggest 5 megapixel and above for shooting everyday pictures.

For more about resolution, you can read resolution dymystified on www.printbucket.com