Hardware Components for Digital Graphics

There are various hareware components that can be used to create and manipulate digital graphics. I will now describe these components.

Mouse:

The mouse is a pointing device for the computer. The person rests their hand on the mouse and as they move, this co-ordinates a curser on screen which we use as the main selector for the task that is being carried out on the computer.

In digital graphics we use the mouse to select any element etc. in the software that we use to edit images and to carry out any other task in digital graphics.

Screen/Monitor:

 The screen or monitor is the part of the computer that we are always looking at. Without the screen/monitor we couldn't do anything on a computer as we wouldn’t be able to see what we are doing. When we want to carry out any task on the computer we always look at the screen.    The screen is vital to the computer for us, and this is even more true when we are working with digital graphics. This is because when we are creating or editing something, we first of all need to see what we are doing and second, we need to see what that something looks like throughout the process and as a finished product.

Graphics Tablet:

  A graphics tablet allows you to draw or create a drawing onto the computer. It’s a small appliance which connects to the computer using a USB cable and comes with a stylus. You draw onto the tablet and then your drawing comes up on screen.

This is a very important part to people in digital graphics as they can design logos, edit images etc. This may be also a useful part to designers who need to know what they are designing to the fine detail and because this is connected to a computer then they can save and come back to it at a later stage. 

Digital Camera: 

A digital camera is a device in which people use to take photographs. This camera can be re-charged and also has the capacity to hold a memory card. Therefore there is no use for the disposable cameras as the images can be taken off and saved to the computer. These images can then be printed to a range of sizes.

A digital camera is very useful in digital graphics as it can be used to take images and photographs. Then we can takes these images or photographs and edit them on the computer. Digital cameras also allow you to edit images without connecting to a PC. It allows us to change the size of the images, make the image black and white, sepia and a range of other effects. 

Scanner:

A scanner is used to take printed images onto the computer. We sit and images into the scanner as shown in the images below and then close the lid. Then depending on the make of the scanner we either scan through the settings on the scanner or through the computer itself.

This is very useful in digital graphics as we can take images that we already have, scan them in and then edit them on the computer.

Images, documents etc. That can be placed in the scanner can be any size. Standard scanners are usually of A4 size, however larger or smaller scanners are available.

Flash Cards:

Flash cards are small memory cards that can be placed in cameras. They are an extra storage device that can hold data, documents, images etc, and they come in storage sizes from 1GB up.

Flash cards or SD cards as some call them, are very useful in digital graphics as a lot of images and photographs will be taken and because of the flash card, then these can be saved and stored on the camera.

USB Storage:  

USB storage is a device that is also known as a USB pen, key or drive. The device plugs into a USB socket on your computer, laptop, etc.

Once connected to the computer, data, information, images, documents etc can be saved and stored. Then once this process is complete we can take the device and connect it to another computer and work on.

This device would be very useful in graphic design as it can be used to work when editing images and then taking the image to another computer etc.

FireWire:

FireWire is a high performance serial bus for connecting devices to your PC.

FireWire provides a singles plug and socket connection which obviously connected into your PC and your ready to use it. Up to 60 devices can be connected using FireWire with data speed transfer up to about 400 megabits per second.