Covering digital cameras since 1998
(by Conrad H. Blickenstorfer)

In 1997 we published Pen Computing Magazine, a bi-monthly covering PDAs, Palms, Pockets and Tablet PCs, then called pen computers. One of the big hassles was to do our product photography: Set up the studio or outdoor shots, rush the film to the One-Hour photo store, wait, run back and hope the pics came out okay, then scan the usable ones into Photoshop. It was a pain.

That year we bought a digital camera, an early Olympus model, just for fun. Well, it turned out the Olympus, with its sub-megapixel resolution, was able to do pictures good enough for use in our print magazine. Not full-page ones, of course, but the smaller ones. No waiting, no scanning. We loved it. So much, in fact, we decided to launch a magazine dedicated to just digital cameras. We were the first. And so Digital Camera Magazine was born.

Looking back it is amusing how even years after the first digital cameras appeared, the prevailing opinion among photography experts was that digital would never replace film. I recall a conversation with the publisher of a large photography magazine. She was smart and savvy and certainly well versed in technology. Yet, when I asked her when digital would replace film, her firm answer was, "It will never happen." Well, it did happen, and a lot sooner than almost anyone predicted.

In the meantime, it hasn't been smooth sailing. In the haydays before the dot-com crash and 9/11 things went well for "Digital Camera and we even partnered with one of the early, visionary photosharing services, PhotoPoint. After 9/11, it was never the same. We outlived some much better funded magazine, but the dwindling print ad revenue and rising printing and mailing costs made us switch to becoming a turnkey content provider and production shop that created Digital Camera Magazine for a larger publisher. We did that from 2003 to early 2006 when the magazine rights reverted back to us.

We (Dave, Carol, Geoff, our contributing writers, and myself) saw that regardless of whether we'd continue print, we'd have to have a much stronger web presence, and so we launched the DigitalCameraRoundup.com website in addition to Digital Camera Magazine's site at www.digicamera.com. The idea for this site was simple: We'd have a front page with digital imaging news and announcements. Then we'd have a separate homepage for each of the major camera companies, describing them and listing their entire product lineup, with links to either full or capsule reviews. And we'd, of course, have roundups where we compare and rate cameras in the same class.

Why do we think this is a good idea? Because out there you either find "reviews" that are noting but a few lines of regurgitated press release text OR those ultra-hyper detailed dissertations with busloads of detail only the geekiest are interested in. And lately, half the stuff you find on Google gets you to a "landing page" with mostly ads and no information. Here at DigitalCameraRoundup.com we do real-world reviews on digital cameras that fascinate us, and we give you all the facts you need to make good buying decisions.