Does an SLR Camera Produce Better Photos?

I get a number of requests asking what type of digital camera is best for someone who is either looking to make a career out of photography or is planning to undertake a photography course.

The answer is an SLR camera. There are two main reasons for this. The first is that the picture quality produced by an SLR camera is far better than that produced by a smaller compact model. The second is that an SLR camera forms the hub of a camera system that can be built up over a period of years as requirements change and the money required to buy a new piece of kit becomes available.

In this article I will look at why an SLR offers better quality than a typical compact, point and shoot camera. I will use a later post to talk about building a camera system.

In the digital world one of the main reasons why an SLR better than a compact model is down to the size of the camera’s sensor. The sensor is the area inside the camera where the image is captured and recorded. The sensor inside and SLR is much larger then you will find in a smaller compact camera. This means that the pixels can be much larger in size. The size of each pixel is important. The larger the pixel the more detail that it can hold. More detail equals better quality.

The second reason for better quality photos with an SLR camera is that the lenses you can buy are simply better than those found on smaller cameras. It is easier to build a good quality large lens than it is to build a good quality very small lens. A good quality lens will also cost at least as much and quite often considerably more than a small compact camera. This gives you an idea of the extra quality that a manufacturer can afford to build in.

There are other reasons why SLRs are better cameras as well. Internal components such as focusing and metering systems tend to be of a higher quality. The poor performance of smaller cameras when higher ISO used is well documented in my reviews. With an SLR camera you can expect much better lower light results. Another plus point with an SLR is that shutter lag is much less of a problem.

You will also find a full set of manual exposure controls inside an SLR camera. These do not affect the picture quality in the same way a sharp lens or larger pixel size will, but by manually setting the shutter speed or aperture size you will change the way the photograph will look. Likewise manual focusing is very handy to have too.

So there is no doubt in my mind that if you see yourself as a serious photographer the SLR route is the one to go down.

Next I will run through building your camera system.