With the multitude of choices and situations, there’s no such thing as the one best camera (though I have a favorite that I’ll share in a minute).

A camera for design research has to meet many needs (sometimes contradictory needs).

• Discreet: you will get a more authentic record of your observations when people are not overwhelmed by a huge camera. Discreet cameras lend themselves to more candid photos.
• Compact: A camera small enough to carry easily with you everywhere. Lugging kilos of pro photo gear may get beautiful quality images - but any camera will take a better photo than all that pro gear left in a hotel room because it’s so heavy.
• Image Quality: A picture of use in context is indeed worth a thousand words. It helps when the picture is sharp, has low noise, good contrast, and great color. Even more true if you will use the images to print large posters or other empathy tools for the team.
• Works in the Dark: A camera with high ISO, or light sensitivity, and a fast lens can get you usable pictures in dimly lit rooms, from clubs to night time streets or houses without lighting. Note that having a high ISO listed as an option doesn’t mean much. Look at sample images for actual performance. Lens speed is how fast a lens captures light, and lower numbers are better.
• Wide Angle Lens: A lens that can cover the whole scene in one or two frames. A wide angle lens gets the big picture.
• Telephoto Lens: A lens with a long reach can pull in the details of a scene, or capture an intimate moment from across a street.
• Cropability: Megapixels are often a marketing trick, but a high megapixel camera gives you more wiggle room to crop a detailed section of a picture while keeping image quality. Unfortunately, adding megapixels often decreases photo quality, so check sample shots before buying.
• Shoots Video: As mentioned above, a camera that can do double duty and shoot video significantly expands your options for data collection by just adding a few extra memory cards. Keep in mind that video takes a lot of time to analyze. A lot. Hours of video can mean days of analysis.
• Inexpensive: you should be concerned about your research topic, not whether or not thousands of dollars of gear will go missing. Gear anxiety sucks.
• Rugged: Speaking of gear anxiety, research cameras get dropped, sat on, and have to stand up to less than ideal conditions in rain, dust, & dirt. Weather sealing and metal bodies are your friends.

I’ve made a quick, fairly arbitrary pass as showing ten different options for cameras for design research and ethnography. The really important part is not which camera you choose. It’s that you choose, and then get out and *do* design research. Most links go to Amazon, because it’s convenient (I haven’t set up any affiliate payback, so please don’t feel obligated or encouraged to buy).

1. Cellphone - The camera you have with you takes a better picture than the camera you don’t. Sometimes, your iPhone will be all the camera you have, and it’s better than nothing. People are often somehow less threatened by cameraphones. Of course, if the actual camera itself is the focus of your phone purchase, then Nokia and Sony Ericsson both have better choices. But I own an iPhone as a mobile device first, and camera second.

2. Ultrazoom - point and shoot, but with amazing reach from wide to tele. Nothing else in the industry can match that zoom range in such a compact package. If you’re wanting to take photos of street vendors from across the street, these are your cameras. The Panasonic Lumix FZ28 is the latest in a long line of Panasonic’s class leading ultrazooms. The upcoming Canon SX1 offers improved image quality and a longer zoom, but Panasonic can be counted on to counter with their own new release next year.

3. Compact RAW Shooter - I’m not sure there’s a really good name for this category, which is compact camera for people who own SLRs. The G10 shoots RAW files, which allow more quality in postproduction processing of your images (but more work too). It also handles relatively well in low light shooting. For the best image quality short of an SLR, the G10 is the backup choice of many professional photographers. The G10 has a nice wide angle lens, but doesn’t have much zoom reach. As an all around camera, it’s going to produce great quality images.

4. Compact Super Zoom - Panasonic pioneered the “travel zoom” camera, with 10x zoom lens in a package not much bigger than a typical 3x zoom. The current release, the TZ5, boasts a 28-280mm zoom lens, offering both wide and long zoom in a package that can easily slip into a pants pocket (provided you’re not into skintight pleather).

5. Digital SLR - The king of image quality in this roundup. SLR’s feature bigger sensors for better image quality and better low light performance. They also have the ability to swap lenses, so you can have wide or tele capabilities on hand. Lenses can make as much difference to image quality as camera bodies, and can cost as much, too. Here I’ve called out the Nikon D300, which is Nikon’s semi-pro camera body. Further up the quality chain include the D700 or D3 in Nikonland, and the 5D Mk II in Canon’s line. A DSLR is overkill for someone starting out. If you already shoot with a DSLR for your own photography, then by all means consider using it for design research. But even if you’re comfortable handling the complexity and bulk of an SLR, keep in mind that it’s hard to be discreet with a soupcan size lens aimed at someone.

6. Ultracompact - cameras are getting smaller and smaller. The limits are much more about ergonomics than components, and todays ultracompact cameras can slip easily into a shirt pocket. The Canon SD880 offers a 4x wide angle zoom and a fairly sturdy body. Other compacts include Pentax Optio M series, Casio Exilim, and Panasonic FX. For a dedicated, discreet camera, an ultracompact is the way to go.

   I’ve called out some interesting choices that may be worth looking at in your particular situation.
   

7. Compact Waterproof - The Pentax Optio W60 is interesting because it can stand up to dust, water, and cold better than the cameras we’ve already touched on. If you’re going to be on the beach, looking at resort or adventure travel, or other messy environments, the Pentax may be worth a look. Olympus also makes a similar ruggedized waterproof camera, but it takes their proprietary, slow, and relatively expensive memory format, so I’ll give the nod to the Pentax here.

8. Video Only - maybe you want to focus on video, despite the added work of analyzing the clips. The Flip Video Mino is a super compact, high quality flash video recorder. It doesn’t have a zoom, but it’s easy to keep on hand and easily transfers files to a PC for editing or analysis. Depending on your budget, you could give Mino’s to participants for longer video diary studies or similar longitudinal research.

9. Built in Printer - This is included as more of a novelty than a real recommendation, and is only being released in Japan this month, but I think it would be useful for storyboarding, affinity diagramming, or other visualization to be able to quickly choose pictures to print on demand. Of course, you can do this with a dedicated photo printer too, but I think these Xiaos would have been great when I was teaching design students about field research (we used polaroids).

So, there’s my round up of cameras, combining my photogeek and ux design worlds. And my favorite? The Panasonic TZ5, which is really very small and discreet but still offers an astounding zoom range for the package. Did I miss a significant camera, or kind of camera? What kind of gear do you use in your design research? I’ll turn comments on so you can let me know.