Prepared By K Saravanan

Topic
4. Digital Camera 1.History 2. Generation of Camera 3. Film Camera 3.1 Film 3.2 Flash 3.3 SLR 3.4 TLR 3.5 Instant 3.6 Automation 4.1 Camera Controls 4.2 The Sensor (Charge-Coupled Device) 4.3 Pixels and Resolutions 4.4 Lens and focus 4.5 Shutter 4.6 Aperture (F Stop) 4.7 ISO 5.Types Of Lenses 6.User Tips 7.Future Technologies 8.Findings

WHAT IS CAMERA ?

A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the Camera obscure Latin for "dark chamber"), an early mechanism for projecting images. The modern camera evolved from the camera obscura.

The Camera Obscura is a natural Phenomenon, and has a long history. In its simplest form it is a small hole (aperture) through which light passes from an object outside into a darkroom. The image appears upside down on the wall opposite the hole.

A camera works just like a human eye - as seen in this picture of the eye as a camera obscura from Rene Descartes 'La Dioptrique. The size of the hole will affect the sharpness of focus and the brightness of the image (look here, here and here to make your own camera obscura). In the 4th Century BC Aristotle wrote about the phenomenon. Around the same time Mohist philosophers in China also noticed the phenomenon.

400s BC First Pinhole camera principles documented by Chinese philosopher Mozi. 1011-1021 First camera obscura was built by the scientist Abu Ali Al-Hasan Ibn al-Haitham, born in Basra (9651039 AD), Ibn al-Haytham (aka Alhacen, Alhazen) is credited with the invention of the camera obscura and pinhole camera.

1660s First large transportable (portable) camera obscura was built by Irish scientist Robert Boyle and his assistant Robert Hooke. 1685 First portable camera obscura that was small enough for practical use was built by Johann Zahn in German.

Artists used a portable camera obscura like this to trace the images projected onto the ground glass. In the 19th century Henry William Fox Talbot dreamt of capturing the images of the world he could see on the screen. Talbot's own drawing abilities produced poor sketches. After numerous experiments he created a permanent light sensitive paper to capture the image. The term photography comes from the Greek world for light and draw drawings from light.

1814 First photograph taken by Joseph Nicphore Nipce- French, by coating a pewter plate with bitumen and exposing the plate to light. First permanent photograph was made in 1826.

Daguerreotypes and calotypes -1830s

Louis Daguerre and Joseph Nicphore Nipce (who was Daguerre's partner, but died before their invention was completed) invented the first practical photographic method, which was named the daguerreotype, in 1836. Daguerre coated a copper plate with silver, then treated it with iodine vapor to make it sensitive to light. The image was developed by mercury vapor and fixed with a strong solution of ordinary salt

Joseph Nicphore Nipce View from the Window at Le Gras, c. 1826 Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center The University of Texas at Austin

The only problem is It takes up to 15 Minutes of EXPOSURE to fully capture the image.

Dry plates - 1871

dry plate, in photography, glass plate coated with a gelatin emulsion of silver bromide. It can be stored until exposure, and after exposure it can be brought back to a darkroom for development at leisure. These qualities were great advantages over the wet collodion process, in which the plate had to be prepared just before exposure and developed immediately after. The dry plate, which could be factory produced, was introduced In 1871 by R.L. Maddox. It was superseded by celluloid film early in the 20th century.

Kodak and the birth of film The use of photographic film was pioneered by George Eastman, who started manufacturing paper film in 1885 before switching to celluloid in 1889. His first camera, which he called the "Kodak," was first offered for sale in 1888. It was a very simple box camera with a fixed-focus lens and single shutter speed, which along with its relatively low price appealed to the average consumer

Brownie box camera, circa 1910

How does a film type camera work?

Light is focused on to a light sensitive chemical deposited on a thin film. The light is allowed to strike the film surface for a short time by the use of a shutter. The shutter acts as a valve for the light. When light strikes the film, the light sensitive chemical undergoes a chemical change. The amount of light makes a proportional amount of change in the light sensitive material (within limits). Too much light can 'overexpose' the film, causing too much of the light sensitive 'grains' to change and not leaving enough of them unexposed to make a discernable image. After exposure, the film is chemically treated to 'develop' the image. The chemical treatment causes a permanent change in the light sensitive grains, and renders them insensitive to light. It also makes them visible. The lens focuses the light on the film. The 'focal length' of the lens determines how large the focused image will appear on the film.

35mm Film
35mm film is known as such because the width of the film is 35 millimeters (mm). Running along both sides of 35mm film are perforations that have been standardized to a Kodak Standard pitch KS-1870. With this standardization, cameras advance each frame by 8 perforations, or approximately 38 millimeters, to create perfectly spaced images that do not overlap. The image size of each image on film is 24x36 millimeters, with a 2 millimeter gap between each frame.

Medium Format
Medium format film is much larger than the 35mm counterpart, and is preferred by many professional photographers. Of course, due to the size of medium format film, a medium format camera will be needed to use it. Most often, medium format film is 6 x 6 cm square or 6 x 4.5 cm rectangular (commonly referred to as 645).

Large format
Large format film works a little different than both 35mm film and medium format film as there are no spools used. Instead, large format film is individual 4x5 sheets that are loaded into a special film holder that locks into the back of a large format camera. The holders will hold two sheets of film on both sides, and must be loaded in the complete dark.

Black and white film

The image on a black and white film negative is actually the inverse of the actual image. That is to say, all the areas that show white on the negative will be black on the print, and all black areas of the negative will show white. When printing onto photo paper light is able to pass through the white areas of the negative resulting in more light hitting the paper and leading to a dark spot. Black areas of the negative are the opposite, resulting in less light hitting the paper to produce a light spot.

Color print film

Color film consists of an acetate or polyester film base with multiple emulsions coated on the base. Each emulsion layer is only sensitive to specific colors or lights. In the classic example of color sensitivities are red, green, and blue (RGB). The top layer of film is blue sensitive as all silver-based films have some sensitivity to blue light. Beneath the blue layer is green and red sensitive layers. Of course, each film may differ from the classic example and may contain multiple layers sensitive to each color, with each layer having different sensitivities to speed and contrast. Because of the complexity of emulsion layers, color film can be exposed over a wide range of lighting conditions and is much more flexible than black and white or slide films.

Color reversal film Color reversal film, or commonly called slide film, creates the opposite of color negative film or black and white film. Instead of creating a negative to be printed to a positive, the slide film is a positive of the image As the namereversal suggests, slide film works the opposite of print film. In print film the red, green, and blue emulsion layers are exposed and leave a negative dye of cyan, magenta, and yellow. Slide film is a subtractive process that starts with layers of cyan, magenta, and yellow. When the film is exposed, the dye is subtracted to reveal red, green, and blue colors. Thus, when processed the film reveals the actual, positive, colors of the image.

35 mm film Camera
Oskar Barnack, who was in charge of research and development at Leitz, decided to investigate using 35 mm cine film for still cameras while attempting to build a compact camera capable of making high-quality enlargements. He built his prototype 35 mm camera (Ur-Leica) around 1913, though further development was delayed for several years by World War I. Leitz test-marketed the design between 1923 and 1924, receiving enough positive feedback that the camera was put into production as the Leica I (for Leitz camera) in 1925

Leica I, 1925

Kodak got into the market with the Retina I in 1934,

Argus C3. Although the cheapest cameras still used rollfilm, 35 mm film had come to dominate the market by the time the C3 was discontinued in 1966.

The fledgling Japanese camera industry began to take off in 1936 with the Canon 35 mm rangefinder, an improved version of the 1933 Kwanon prototype. Japanese cameras would begin to become popular in the West after Korean War veterans and soldiers stationed in Japan brought them back to the United States and elsewhere.

Single Lens Reflex Camera

The photographic single-lens reflex camera (SLR) was invented in 1861 by Thomas Sutton,

The mirror in a single lens reflex (SLR) camera reflects light upwards through a pentaprism to be viewed. The pentaprism turns the image the right way round for the eye to see. When a picture is taken the mirror flips up to allow light to hit the film at the back of the camera. As the eye seems the image through the main lens it appears identical to that produced on the film.
The first production SLR with a brand name was Calvin Rae Smith's Monocular Duplex (USA, 1884).

A similar revolution in SLR design began in 1933 with the introduction of the Ihagee Exakta, a compact SLR which used 127 rollfilm

Exakta

Film Camera

Earliest Flashes
From the early days of photography it was obvious that artificial light would be indispensable; freed from the vagaries of the sun, pictures could be taken where natural light was lacking or on dull days when studio work became impossible.

Flash
The earliest flashes had of a quantity of flash powder consisting of a mechanical mixture of magnesium powder and potassium chlorate that was ignited by hand. Later, the electric flash-lamp used an electrical circuit to trigger a fuse to ignite explosive powder (e.g., magnesium) The flash-lamp was invented by Joshua Cohen (a.k.a. Joshua Lionel Cowen of the Lionel toy train fame) in 1899

Flash Synchronisation
By the late 1930s manufacturers began to incorporate flash synchronisation into their cameras. Brian Coe & Paul Gates suggest "the first mass produced camera with this facility being the Falcon Press Flash in 1939. Other early flash cameras were the Agfa Shur-Flash and the Kodak Six-20 Flash Brownie box camera, both of 1940." Brian Wilkinson adds the Kine Exakta of 1936 to this list

Twin-lens reflex camera

The twin lens reflex camera has a separate viewing and taking lens, one over the other. Light entering the top lens is reflected up by a fixed mirror to a viewing screen. The image appears reversed on the screen.

The first practical reflex camera was the Franke & Heidecke Rolleiflex medium format TLR of 1928

Instant cameras
In 1947, an inventor named Edwin Land introduced a remarkable innovation to the world -- a film that developed itself in a matter of minutes. This new instant camera technology was a huge success for Land's company, the Polaroid Corporation. In 1949, Polaroid made more than $5 million in camera sales alone! Over the proceeding 50 years,

Automation
The first camera to feature automatic exposure was the selenium lightmeter-equipped, fully automatic Super Kodak Six-20 of 1938, but its extremely high price (for the time) of $225 Autofocus (AF) really could be called power-focus, as it often uses a computer to run a miniature motor that focuses the lens for you. Focusing is the moving of the lens in and out until the sharpest possible image of the subject is projected onto the film. Depending on the distance of the subject from the camera, the lens has to be a certain distance from the film to form a clear image. The process of autofocusing generally works as follows: (1) An autofocus processor (AFP) makes a small change in the focusing distance. (2) AFP reads the AF sensor to assess whether and by how much focus has improved. (3) Using the information from (2), the AFP sets the lens to a new focusing distance. (4) The AFP may iteratively repeat steps 2-3 until satisfactory focus has been achieved . This entire process is usually completed within a fraction of a second

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/camera-autofocus.htm

Digital Camera

Digital cameras
Digital cameras are becoming more popular and a number of designs are on the market. As digital cameras use electronics to capture and store the image they are not restricted to the traditional camera designs incorporating film transport mechanisms. Therefore their size and shape often vary greatly.

Digital cameras usually incorporate an LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) viewing screen that displays the scene viewed through the lens. However as this process takes power from the battery and the refresh rate of the viewing system is quite slow an alternative direct viewfinder is often provided.

Early development.. Willis Adcock - a Texas Instruments Engineer, designed a filmless camera that was not digital and applied for a patent in 1972, but it is not known whether it was never built. The first recorded attempt at building a digital camera was in 1975 by Steven Sasson, an engineer at Eastman Kodak. It used the then-new solid-state CCD (charge-coupled device) image sensor chips developed by Fairchild Semiconductor in 1973. The camera weighed 8 pounds (3.6 kg), recorded black and white images to a cassette tape, had a resolution of 0.01 megapixels (10,000 pixels), and took 23 seconds to capture its first image in December 1975. The prototype camera was a technical exercise, not intended for production

DSLR

Basics of Digital Camera

Key Concepts Camera Controls The Sensor (Charge-Coupled Device) Pixels and Resolutions Lens and focus Shutter Aperture (F Stop) ISO

Camera Controls 1. Microphone 2. AF-assist Beam 3. Red-Eye Reduction Lamp 4. Self-Timer Lamp 5. Viewfinder Window 6. Flash 7. Terminal Cover 8. A/V OUT 9. DIGITAL USB Terminal 10. DC IN Terminal 11. Ring 12. Lens 13. Ring Release Button

1. Indicators 2. Power Lamp 3. Power Button 4. Zoom Lever 5. Shutter Button 6. Shooting Mode Dial 7. Mode Switch 8. Print/Share Button 9. Function/Set Button 10. Menu Button 11. Display Button 12. Exposure/Erase Image 13. Browsing 14. Flash 15. Macro/Manual Focus

1. LCD Monitor 2. Viewfinder 3. Speaker 4. Wrist Strap Mount 5. Memory Card Slot / Battery Cover 6. Memory Card Slot / Battery Cover 7. Tripod Socket

Digital Camera

IMAGE SENSOR - is a device that converts an optical image to an electric signal, replacing the job of film in traditional photography. - The sensor is made up of millions of "buckets" that essentially count the number of photons that strike the sensor. This means that the brighter the image at a given point on the sensor, the larger the value that is ready for that pixel. - The number of resulting pixels in the image determines its "pixel count. A CCD or charged-coupled device is an analog device. When light strikes the chip it is held as a small electrical charge in each photo sensor. The charges are converted to voltage one pixel at a time as they are read from the chip. Additional circuitry in the camera converts the voltage into digital information.

Types of Sensors
Foveon Sensor It uses a matrix of photo-sites, each of which consists of three vertically stacked photo detectors. Each of the three stacked photo detectors responds to different wavelengths of light (Red/Green/Blue)

Array Sensor
Array Sensor (Bayers Sensor) It uses an array for arranging RGB color filters on a square grid of photosensors. The filter pattern is 50% green, 25% red and 25% blue, hence is also called RGBG or GRGB

CCD

Pixels and Resolutions

A pixel (short for picture element) is the smallest single component of an image

Pixels and Resolutions

Each pixel has typically three or four dimensions of variability such as Red, Green and Blue. The more pixels used to represent an image, the closer the result can resemble the original of an image.

Pixels and Resolutions

The number of pixels per inch (ppi) in an image is called the resolution. Image resolution describes the detail an image holds.

Pixels and Resolutions

Pixel counts can be expressed as a: single number (e.g. 3 Megapixel digital camera). pair of numbers (e.g., 640 x 480 VGA display monitor), and therefore has a total number of 640 480 = 307,200 pixels or 0.3 Megapixels.

Pixels and Resolutions

A megapixel is 1 million pixels, and is a term used not only for the number of pixels in an image, but also to express the number of image sensor elements of digital cameras.

Pixels

Lens Lens and Focus

Object Distance The distance from the center of a lens to the object.

Focal Length The distance from the center of a lens to a point where it focuses light (sensor) in mm.

The focal length determines a camera's field of view. The shorter the focal length, the wider the field of view.

Shutter and Shutter Speed

Shutter is a mechanism in the camera that controls the amount of light that reaches the sensor. Shutter Speed
Shutter speed is the length of time the shutter is open. A typical shutter speed for photographs taken in sunlight is 1/125th of a second. The agreed standards for shutter speeds are 1/1000s- 1s.

Very short shutter speeds are used to freeze fast-moving subjects

Very long shutter speeds are used to intentionally blur a moving subject for artistic effect.

Shutter Speed Shutter Meche

Aperture (F-Stop)

Aperture is the size of the opening between the lens and the shutter that lets lights onto the sensor.
Aperture range usually extends from f2.5 to f22.

Aperture (F-Stop)

A small aperture is used when shooting in bright light and vice versa. The smaller the aperture the slower the shutter speed, vice versa.

Aperture and Shutter Speed

The smaller the aperture the slower the shutter speed, vice versa.

The smaller the aperture the slower the shutter speed, vice versa

Aperture and Shutter Speed

Very deep depth of view - F- 8.0
Aperture Tutorial - YouTube.flv

Very shallow depth of view - F- 1.8

Aperture
Aperture Tutorial - YouTube.flv

ISO (International Organization for Standardization )

ISO is short for International Organization for Standardization and tells the cameras light sensitivity. In analogue cameras with film is the films luminous display. A high ISO value makes the camera more light sensitive so you can shoot with quick/short shutter speeds in a dark environment. The disadvantage of a high ISO value is that the picture is more grainy. In traditional (film) photography ISO (or ASA) was the indication of how sensitive a film was to light. It was measured in numbers (youve probably seen them on films 100, 200, 400, 800 etc). The lower the number the lower the sensitivity of the film and the finer the grain in the shots youre taking. In Digital Photography ISO measures the sensitivity of the image sensor. The same principles apply as in film photography the lower the number the less sensitive your camera is to light and the finer the grain. Higher ISO settings are generally used in darker situations to get faster shutter speeds (for example an indoor sports event when you want to freeze the action in lower light) however the cost is noisier shots.

What is ISO?
In very basic terms, ISO is the level of sensitivity of your camera to available light. The lower the ISO number, the less sensitive it is to the light, while a higher ISO number increases the sensitivity of your camera. The component within your camera that can change sensitivity is called image sensor or simply sensor. It is the most important (and most expensive) part of a camera and it is responsible for gathering light and transforming it into an image. With increased sensitivity, your camera sensor can capture images in low-light environments without having to use a flash. But higher sensitivity comes at an expense it adds grain or noise to the pictures.

The difference is clear the image on the right hand side at ISO 3200 has a lot more noise in it, than the one on the left at ISO 200.

Every camera has something called Base ISO, which is typically the lowest ISO number of the sensor that can produce the highest image quality, without adding noise to the picture. On most of the new Nikon cameras such as Nikon D5100, the base ISO is typically 200, while most Canon digital cameras have the base ISO of 100. So, optimally, you should always try to stick to the base ISO to get the highest image quality. However, it is not always possible to do so, especially when working in low-light conditions. ISO Speed Example: ISO 100 1 second ISO 200 1/2 of a second ISO 400 1/4 of a second ISO 800 1/8 of a second ISO 1600 1/16 of a second ISO 3200 1/32 of a second In the above ISO Speed Example, if your camera sensor needed exactly 1 second to capture a scene at ISO 100, simply by switching to ISO 800, you can capture the same scene at 1/8th of a second or at 125 milliseconds! That can mean a world of difference in photography, since it can help to freeze motion

What is the iso button on my camera

Shutter Speed ,Aperture And ISO

Types Of Lenses

Normal/ Standard Lenses Telephoto lenses

Macro Lenses Aspherical & Fluorite Lenses

Mirror Lenses Wide Angle Lenses Zoom Lenses Prime Lenses

Lenses made

Types Of Lenses
Normal/ Standard Lenses
These are lenses provided by the camera manufacturers along with the camera as a part of the kit. These are generally of the 18 55mm focal length for a normal 35mm camera

Telephoto lenses
These are the lenses with focal length longer than the standard lens. Also called as Long focus Lens. These lenses are generally used to take photographs from a distance. Especially for nature and wildlife photography where you can not go near to the subject but want to fill the frame with the subject from a distance. Normally, 70 300mm lens is recommended for such purpose though different combination can be used based on your requirement.

Mirror Lenses
This is a special design of a long focus lens in which some of the lens elements are replaced with the mirrors. These lenses are generally lighter than the normal lens of the same focal length but they come with fixed aperture.

Wide Angle Lenses

These lenses have lower focal length than the standard lenses which helps in getting more area of view in the frame from the same distance. Typically used for landscape photography. These lenses can increase the perspective distortion. So, caution is recommended

Zoom Lenses
These are the lenses with variable focal lengths. In these lenses the positive and negative elements of the lens are put together in such a way that by moving them you can get varied focal lengths. You can also find telephoto lens with zoom lens capabilities. Do not get confused between the two.

Prime Lenses
As opposed to zoom lenses, prime lenses have fixed focal length. These lenses generally have lesser moving parts as compared to zoom lenses and thus reduce the problems like chromatic aberrations. Prime lenses are also referred to as fast lenses. These lenses generally have larger apertures which allow you to photograph in lower light and create wonderful bokeh effect.

Macro Lenses
These lenses are designed to do close up photography like flowers, insects, etc. Basically the macro lenses have very high focusing movement than the normal lenses.

Aspherical & Fluorite Lenses

These lenses with special purpose. Fluorite lens uses one or more elements of calcium fluoride (CaF 2 ) made from synthetic crystals. This lens has a very high color correction. Aspherical lens elements help to compensate for distortion in wide-angle lenses, and compensate or eliminate spherical aberrations in lenses with a large maximum aperture. They also allow manufacturers to produce more compact lenses than was previously possible using only spherical lens elements. These are costly lenses

Lenses made

Film vs Digital
1.Film media is consumed while digital media isnt. 2.Digital provides instant feedback while film doesnt. 3.Digital cameras cost much more than film cameras. 4.Digital processing costs much less than film processing. 5.Digital is much easier to work with than film

Nine Dos and Donts for the New Camera Buyer

DO read your cameras manual. Its one of the few books that was written
expressly for the camera that you own. Also, see if there is a Magic Lantern Guide published for your camera theyre much better written and well illustrated . Keep your camera with you as you read and find each control or feature as you read about it.

DO read all of the menu screens. Granted, some menus are kind of obtuse, but the menus are the dashboard of your camera and the more familiar you are with the menu choices and sub-choices the faster you can custom-set your camera to a particular situation. DO take your manual with you when youre out shooting. If youre out on a Sunday afternoon cruising for snaps and you encounter a question about camera controls, you dont want to wait until you get home to find the answers. Keep the manual in a plastic zipper bag. DO take lots of pictures. Photography, like any craft, is a learn-by-doing process. The more photos you take, the more comfortable youll feel with your new camera and the more likely you are to experiment

DONT, however, shoot carelessly. Take the time to think about each photograph
that you take; think quality, not quantity.

DO feel free to leave the camera in the Program or Auto exposure mode while youre getting used to it. Better to shoot pictures right away than
to avoid the camera because youre intimidated by its complexities. Lots of pros, including me, use the program mode regularly.

DONT be afraid to experiment with all of the controls. Try out different
exposure modes and see what happens. Search for and play with unusual modes like flash exposure compensation. Again, just read the manual and have fun. Short of dropping it on concrete, you cant hurt the camera. Theres a reset button (see your manual) to take you back to all of the default settings if you get hopelessly tangled.

DO print your pictures frequently so that you can see your mistakes and successes more clearly. Theres nothing like seeing a nice 8 x 10 of a
great shot to boost your confidence (or, if the shots not so great, to show you your technique flaws).

DONT live in a creative vacuum. Join a photo-sharing

community, see what other photographers are doing creatively, and get advice from those who own the same camera.

How to Take Care of Your Digital Camera

The camera body, especially the lens, can be easily damaged through rough handling and scratches. Ive owned a Canon S300 camera for a long time, and it still works fine. Why? Because I do put in effort to take care of it. Here are some tips for taking care of that precious camera of yours - ranging from lens care, temperature and storage conditions. Be sure to follow these tips so that your camera will be very well protected over its lifetime.

How to take care of batteries

Run batteries fully flat before recharging. Have two or more batteries and
rotate them regularly. If batteries behave odd or wont last very long, repeat a discharge and charge procedure multiple times. Even though modern batteries supposedly dont develop a memory, I did resurrect some batteries with this procedure.

Tips for prolonging your battery power Use Your Viewfinder Instead of the LCD Screen
Through the flip-out, LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) screen, you do get the best visual representation of what your video will actually look like, but if you want more battery power, keep the LCD shut. You will have an energy saving between 10% -20% depending on the type of camera and screen.

Buy Large and Extra Batteries

When you buy your camera, it usually comes with a starter battery pack, that will last about an hour. You can use these starter packs for as long as you own the camera, however it is a good investment to upgrade to a larger battery as soon as you can.

Even though they can be expensive, you will thank me the next time you shoot your ultimate video and do not run out of battery power. You can keep the starter battery pack as a reserve, knowing you can tape for another hour.

Summary
Apply the procedures described above to all rechargeable batteries in your household, to get the most lifetime and maximum capacity from your batteries. To get the best performance and lifetime out of your camera or camcorder, visit me on www.estudy.net.au for our video DIY camera care and protection or check out my free articles and videos on this subject.

Camera Check & Maintenance General advice:

1) Do not overuse head cleaning tapes, as the can be abrasive to the video heads. 2) 2) Use quality Tapes I recommend camera manufacturer tapes. Try to use the same brand only Discard damaged tapes 3) Have at least 2 batteries. Battery test. Run batteries fully flat before recharge. You have to know how long batteries last for proper shoot planning. If batteries behave odd or dont last very long, repeat a discharging and charging procedure a few times. Even though modern batteries supposedly dont develop a memory, I did resurrect some batteries with this procedure.

Camera check: Tape cameras 1) Fast forward and rewind a whole tape.
2) Play back a pre-recorded at the beginning and at the end of the tape. 3) Perform a test recording by constantly panning and zooming the camera in and out. Here youlook for distortion and pixilation in playback of the recording. If it does show up, you mayhave an issue with the video head drum or tape path. A remedy can be a cleaning tape, if unsuccessful, see a repairer. 4) Do this recording test in SP (Standard Play) and LP (Long Play)! A tape-path or video head issue is much more obvious in LP.

Disc cameras
Do the test recording and playback procedure as described above for tape cameras. If you do have any issues with the recordings, you may clean the laser lens. If unsuccessful, see a repairer. Repairs can be expensive, as in most cases the whole disc drive needs to be replaced. This drives are a lot dearer compared to computer disc drives!

HDD and Flash Memory cameras

Test record and playback. There is nothing else to do.

Lens check
Test the iris by checking scenes on a bright sunny day outdoors and indoors under low light conditions. Check the optical zoom for smooth zooming from wide angle to full zoom in. Do this in both directions and observe the auto focus tracking. Sensor check, DSLR Cameras: Try to take a photo of a blue sky and look out for little dark spots in the picture on playback. Do this by zooming in on different sections of the picture. Any dark spots indicate dust and dirt on the sensor.

Fire-wire port This is an important issue, particular when buying a 2nd Hand camera.
Make sure the camera is recognised by the computer. If not, there are in the most cases only two things which can go wrong. When you are lucky, it is the socket itself with broken pins or much worse the computer on the main circuit board. These circuit boards are none serviceable items and need to be replaced, which is extremely expensive.

Future Technologies Salt-Sized Camera

German Researchers Unveil Tiny Camera for Endoscopes

German researchers have developed a 62,500-pixel camera that fits on the end of an endoscope, as shown here.

Human Eye Camera Adds Zoom

Researchers Improve Curved Image Sensor Technology The human eye camera attempts to mimic the human eye's ability to see by using a curved image sensor. When the camera takes a photo with this technology, the image is recorded by a series of silicon detectors and electronics that conform to the curved surface of the image sensor ... similar to the curved area in the back of the human eye thats the focal point for light entering the eye.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/click_online/9585903.stm

Goodbye, Shutter Button

Cameras of the future, according to Kikukawa, may no longer require a shutter button. Instead, photographers could wink or use a voice command to tell the camera to record a photo. In this case, the camera probably would be built into a person's glasses, or another everyday item. With the camera built into a pair of glasses, aiming the camera would be easy, too.

Redefining "Ultra Compact"

An ultra compact camera generally is defined as a camera that measures 1 inch or less in thickness. Such small cameras are great because they easily fit in a pants pocket or a purse.

"Smell-graphy"
Photography is a visual medium, but the camera of the future may add the sense of smell to photographs. a photographer could command the camera to record the smell of the scene, embedding it with the visual image that it captured. The ability to add smells to photographs would need to be optional, though ... adding smells to a photograph of food or a field of flowers would be great

Unlimited Battery Power

The camera of the future could incorporate some sort of solar energy cell, allowing the battery to either operate only from solar power or allowing it to charge the battery using the solar cell.

1856 First underwater photograph taken by William Thompson, Ireland, using a watertight box. 18711880 First concealed cameras and hidden cameras disguised as pocket watches, hats, or other objects. 1942 First analog CCTV cameras installed. German engineer Walter Bruch was responsible for the design and installation of the CCTV cameras. 1948 First one-step instant camera built by Edwin Land, American scientist (owner of the Polaroid Corporation) called the Land Camera or more commonly known as the Polaroid Land Camera. 1949 First disposable cardboard camera built by Photo-Pac. 1957 First self-contained amphibious underwater camera, the Calypso-Phot, built by Jean de Wouters for Jacques-Yves Cousteau. 1960s First digital camera signals used in cameras over analog by NASA. 1961 First film-less digital camera concept is credited to Eugene F. Lally. American space scientist 1975 First digital camera invented by Steven J. Sasson. American electrical engineer 1996 First IP camera was released in 1996 by Axis Communications.