differences in digi and slr

[turtle]

ok, i'm sort of a noob and ya i'm confused
btw, sory if this has been asked already

in an slr, the light sensory acceptor thing (ccd or something??) works however it works

in a digi cam not slr, the shutter opens up and lets the light in, but if you look on the screen of the digi cam, dont u see exactly what the lens is seeing

if so, then generally wat exactly are the better qualities or differences in an slr than a digi cam when looking through the digi screen,

aaaand... when looking at the screen on a digi cam and you take a picture, the screen goes black then, do you hear the shutter open and close or just close. aarghh, this is hard to explain, if my first question is answered, ill try to work out the second one....
thanks

 

[Hertz van Rental]

ok, i'm sort of a noob and ya i'm confused
btw, sory if this has been asked already

in an slr, the light sensory acceptor thing (ccd or something??) works however it works

in a digi cam not slr, the shutter opens up and lets the light in, but if you look on the screen of the digi cam, dont u see exactly what the lens is seeing

if so, then generally wat exactly are the better qualities or differences in an slr than a digi cam when looking through the digi screen,

aaaand... when looking at the screen on a digi cam and you take a picture, the screen goes black then, do you hear the shutter open and close or just close. aarghh, this is hard to explain, if my first question is answered, ill try to work out the second one....
thanks

I'm not exactly clear as to what you are asking....
In an SLR the light comes in through the lens, is reflected 90? by a mirror into a prism which turns the image right way round and you see the image in the viewfinder.
In a digicam the camera works like a tv camera which converts the scene into electrical impulses which are then converted back to an image by the LCD screen. It's like looking at the scene via closed-circuit tv.
Is that helpful?

 

[turtle]

ooo i get it...thanks

 

[markc]

SLR means single-lens-reflex. A camera can be a film SLR or digital SLR. All it really means is that the lens that is used to take the picture is the same lens that you see through with the viewfinder. This is differnt from a TLR (twin-lens-reflex, which has two lenses), a rangefinder, etc. Film vs. digital only referers to the capture method. You can have the light land on film or a digital sensor. All of these styles can have fixed or interchangable lenses. A common misconception is that an SLR means a camera that has interchangable lenses just because they most often do.

It does get tricky with the new digital stuff that doesn't follow old camera design techniques. A lot of the digital cameras will show on the LCD screen exactly what the sensor sees, without having to use a half-silvered mirror or any of the other traditional SLR techniques to view the same image the taking lens sees. Technically, I believe these are still SLRs, even the tiny compact ones. There is a single lens, and it's used as both the taking lens and for the "viewfinder" image.

There are tradeoffs. In my 10D, which is built just like a film SLR, I see the scene through the lens. This has the benefit of being able to see detail and lighting that the camera sensor itself may not be able to, so that I have a chance of spotting some detail and adjusting for it. With the kind I previously mentioned, you get to see exactly what will be stored in memory, as it's already in digital form if it's being shown on an LCD. Which you prefer depends on how you like to work.

The shutter is still a shutter, so it will both open and close, no matter what the camera (as long as it has one).

 

[turtle]

now i dont get digicams, if its like a tv cam, where exactly is the little camera in the camera that lets us see whatever on the lcd,

so the shutter opens and closes, letting the light hit the ccd, and is a totally different device than whatever device is used to show stuff on the lcd when ur not taking a picture?

 

[Big Mike]

Not quite.

As I understand it, p&s digi-cams don't have a shutter the way a real camera does. Light is always hitting the sensor and that is why it can show you a real time image on the screen. Rather than a shutter, the sensor simply records an image for a particular period of time to get proper exposure.

This is why current digital SLR cameras do not allow you to view a real time image on the view screen...because they have a real shutter and light only hits the sensor when the shutter is open.

 

[photosoup guru]

Big Mike hit the nail on the head. Also, a bit off topic but w/e, dslr's have a larger ccd (some use a cmos sensor but never mind that). Because they have a bigger sensor the image captured can be of higher MP or capture more detail and have less noise.

Some P&S cameras have a small LCD in the viewfinder and one on the back of the camera, and don't have a little off center lens. So in a sence they are SLR's, thus the new term that has been introduced "SLR-Like".

 

[Big Mike]

Some people have speculated that some day, true DSLR cameras will have a small sensor, somewhere in front of the shutter so that an image can be viewed on the screen before the actual image is captured...similar to p&s digi-cams.