Digital Imaging Cameras With Charge Couple Device And Video Options

No use crying over spilt milk. You were searching for some old books in the attic when you chanced upon an old, moth-eaten album, lying in a dark corner. The images of your beloved grandpa and grandma had faded, the edges were torn and some of the photographs were just not recognizable. There would have been no reasons to shed tears if these priceless memories were archived using the digital imaging process.

It was not the fault of your parents too, because the technology of digital imaging had evolved many years after their birth. In fact the current generation of digital cameras has appeared in the early 90's. In the days gone by the photographs taken from a camera used a technology far different from the ones used today. Light reflecting of the surface of the subject being photographed was focused through a lens & aperture on a glass plate, coated with light-sensitive chemicals. The action of the light falling on these chemicals went on to produce an image. The glass plates were later replaced by polyester sheets and rolls sensitized with photo-sensitive chemicals.

In the current generation digital cameras, digital imaging is achieved by passing the light reflected off the subject through the lens and aperture into a array of `CCD' (charge coupled device). The intensity of the current emitted by the CCD is directly proportional to the amount of light falling on them. This information is passed on to a central processor, which calculates the inputs from all the CCD's and makes an image, which is stored on a flash stick (a type of non-volatile memory). Some high-end cameras, especially the ones that are equipped to take videos too, also have an inbuilt CD writer and the images are burnt on the CD itself.

The photograph that you see on the TV and in modern theaters are all the marvels of digital imaging. Even the X-ray plates used by the radiologist depend on digital imaging since this technology offers a far sharper image. Digital images are stored in the computer's hard drive or in other removable media in different file formats, the common ones being .bmp, .jpeg, .png etc. The photographs that you see in the newspapers and magazines are called as analogue images. They cannot be altered without digitizing them first.

Did the last line shock you? Yes, you have guessed correctly. The old damaged photographs, lying in front of you can be restored. They can be scanned on a flatbed scanner and the digital output from the same can be corrected using digital imaging software. These scanned images, which are digital in nature, can be loaded on a computer and using a number of popular software packages, they can be restored back to their pristine beauty. While you are waiting patiently for the digitally corrected photograph to be printed out, why not send across the same to your son as an email attachment? Digital imaging