WHAT CAMERA SHOULD I BUY Part 3 BRIDGE CAMERAS, SUPERZOOMS AND SPOTTING SCOPES

These are in between the compact cameras (point and shoots) we covered last issue and full-size DSLR’s/Mirrorless cameras we’ll cover next issue.

Bridge cameras have been around since film days, and have always provided the same niche – a ‘bridge’ between camera classes. They provide an introduction to DSLR’s, with similar weight and size, manual controls and electronic viewfinders (EVF) but almost never have interchangeable lenses - that is a key distinction from DSLR’s. The high zoom cameras a lot of hunters will be familiar with, the Nikon P1000 and Canon Sx70, are part of this class of camera but generally referred to as ‘superzoom’ cameras.

Something I’ve neglected to hammer home in previous articles is the importance of sensor size. In this case bigger is always better. See the below graphic for a better illustration, but to give you an idea the 1/2.3” sensor you see in a lot of compact cameras (and superzooms) has a surface area 38x smaller than a full-frame 35mm sensor! The problem with a larger sensor is that as you go up in sensor size you need correspondingly large lenses to focus the light back to that big sensor. Which is why you see the sports photographers running round with giant two foot long lenses that cost tens of thousands of dollars.

Bridge Cameras

There are a couple of quality contenders in this class, two that would seriously tempt people away from DSLR’s I think. If you’re ready to delve into photography and move past the compact camera