If The Stork Brings Babies, What Brings Digital Cameras? A Trade ShowIf The Stork Brings Babies, What Brings Digital Cameras? A Trade Show

Judging from the volume of press releases, more digital cameras than babies have been born in the month of February. They're popping out all over -- even General Electric is introducing a line of silicon snapshooters. The reason is the Photo Marketing Association International's upcoming annual trade show in Las Vegas March 8 to 11. And the cream of this year's crop may have been introduced yesterday -- a 10-megapixel Nikon, the new Coolpix P5000.The past year has been a big one for digital photography. PMA statistics say that the volume of prints made from digital camera images increased by 49% for the yearr ending November 2006. And the ties between photography and high technology are growing stronger in other ways, as well. Online ordering activity grew 122% in that same year, and the number of digital images printed by one-hour photo places and instant kiosks grew 60% and 41%, respectively. (The number of prints made on home printers grew, but by a comparatively anemic 28% -- do you suppose it might be because buying ink for a color inkjet printer is a user experience that has many of the aspects of being mugged?)

The Nikon Coolpix P500, announced in time for PMA 2007, is a classy camera obviously designed to appeal to serious photographers who aren't quite serious enough for all the complexity and cost of one of Nikon's high-end digital SLRs.

The P5000 has a fixed lens with the standard short 3X zoom range that collapses compactly into the camera body to make it easy to carry. It captures images up to 10 megapixels in size, and it includes vibration reduction and a light sensitivity range up to ISO 3200 for low-light shooting (though this works only at five megapixels). It's the full range of exposure controls that really mark the camera out as advanced amateur equipment. It includes 16 still photo modes, seven movie modes, shutter- or aperture-priority, and fully automatic and even fully manual modes. It will list for about $400 when it ships later this spring.

General Electric's digital cameras are so new they haven't yet appeared on the company's Web site. (You can find a press kit here.) Details are few: "Entry-level GE digital cameras will start with 7 megapixels of resolution and 2.5-inch LCD screens. Higher-end GE cameras will offer up to 12 megapixels of resolution and 3-inch LCD screens. A photo printer also will be included in the line." Expect to hear more from GE -- and from just about every other company that makes a digital camera or a software package or photo printer -- in the run-up to the PMA show over the next couple of weeks.