DIGITAL CAMERAS GROWING IN POPULARITY

Bruce Slinkard checked the image display on his Sony Digitl Mavica. He uses a wide-angle lens converter to take house pictures for area real estate companies.

Forget film and darkrooms. Today's digital cameras capture the scene electronically and allow images to be viewed instantly on screen or downloaded into a computer.

They can be printed on a computer printer or mailed electronically to friends, relatives and business associates.

From contractors to real estate firms, local businesses have found digital cameras to be helpful tools.

When Dennis Vollink toured old St. Vincent's Seminary as a member of the River Campus board of managers, he photographed some of the interior architectural features with a digital camera.

Vollink heads up Drury Southeast Development, a Cape Girardeau-based company that builds motels. Vollink uses digital cameras to record the progress of construction work at job sites. The digital images also can be electronically mailed.

Vollink said when the company needs a part for a broken crane it can send a digital image of the part to the supplier via e-mail to make certain the proper part is ordered.

Scott City resident Bruce Slinkard takes digital photos for real estate firms and displays them on a Web site, allowing house hunters to take virtual tours of homes for sale.

Slinkard started his business in January. He said his business wouldn't exist without digital cameras."It is more economical and faster," Slinkard said of using his three Sony digital cameras."I have a friend of mine, who is an appraiser in St. Louis, who uses digital cameras exclusively," he said.

Staples, which operates an office-products store in Cape Girardeau, sells its share of digital cameras. The cameras range in price from $300 to $1,000."A lot of Realtors use them to take pictures of houses," said Ray Smith, who works in the store's electronics department.

Smith said schools use the cameras to take yearbook pictures.

The cameras operate on batteries. The battery in the camera lasts about three hours, after which it has to be recharged.

Some of the cameras store images on 3-by-5-inch floppy disks. The smaller cameras use memory cards, which are about half as big as a standard credit card. Floppy disks can hold 20 to 25 images. Memory cards can hold up to 60 images, Smith said.

Digital cameras increasingly are popular with consumers. People like the idea of printing their own pictures right off their computer, said Leslie Sadler, assistant manager of the electronics department at the Target store in Cape Girardeau.

Target sells five different digital camera brands, ranging in price from $300 to $500. Sadler said digital cameras come with zoom features. They all have small screens that allow the photographer to instantly view the photo."If you don't like it, you can delete it right on the spot and take another one," she said."You can do a lot of neat things with them," she said. The digital photos can be electronically mailed, eliminating the need to send family photos by regular mail.

But digital cameras haven't cornered the photography market. There is still room for conventional cameras.

Don Beattie runs Nowell's Camera Shop in Cape Girardeau. He doesn't stock digital cameras."We are sticking with traditional photography right now," he said.

Beattie said digital images don't compare in quality with slides or prints.

In addition, film images can be processed and put onto computer disks for those who want digital images.

Beattie said digital cameras and related equipment for the serious photographer can run as high as $15,000 to $20,000.

In contrast, a high-quality 35 mm camera sells for under $600, he said.

Still, Beattie acknowledged that digital cameras appeal to some consumers. "They are fun," he said.

Digital cameras allow the photographer to record brief messages, accompanying the photos. A person can take a snapshot of the family and send the photo and a verbal message to friends and relatives.

Staples' Smith predicts digital cameras will continue to grow in popularity. There's no end, he said, to the use of digital cameras.