I just got a Fuji Finepix A340 4 megapixel digital camera. For 165.00, it's packed with features. Does the picture quality, as far as sharpness, improve significantly when you increase the megapixel settings or is it just the actual resolution (dimensions) of the frame that increases?

What type of shots are usually done using the fine setting which is only available at the 4 megapixel setting?

Most of the cameras available have the dial with different preset settings for different environments. Is there really a big difference in using these individual settings instead of leaving it on auto? The images look really good on auto.

I don't know the Finepix A340 but generally speaking sharpness and resolution are completely separate things. A detail that is NOT in your picture because you chose a low resolution setting can't be sharp or unsharp simply because it's not there.

The level of sharpness does not depend on the megapixel setting but mainly on the quality of the lens and how precisely the camera is manufactured.

The "fine" setting on your camera probably effects the JPG-compression (and hence the file size) when writing the data to the storage device. I assume that "fine" means lowest compression ratio and best quality. If you choose other settings, the picture will show more compression artifacts than with the "fine" setting.

Hope this helps.

Thanks Rainer. That's what I was looking for.