Infrared camera - Understanding thermal Image quality

When you are planning to purchase an Infrared camera, it is very important to understand the attributes which can impact the image quality of the thermal images. There are three main areas which influence thermal image quality i.e. pixel resolution, thermal sensitivity and fixed pattern noise.
The three resolution standards are low (160*120), medium (320*240) and high (640*480). When evaluating an infrared camera, the number of pixel is relevant and increased resolution is important to achieve high image quality. High resolution also allows one to zoom and still maintain the image quality.
Thermal sensitivity is the measure of how well the infrared camera can image when the contrast is increased. The signal to noise ratio improves when viewing hotter objects. Low thermal contrast applications include building diagnosis where the infrared camera is used to image interior walls with minimal temperature variations. There are lot of benefits associated with high image quality like more intuitive diagnosis of heat related problems, greater flexibility to inspect targets at varying distance, ability to visualize low thermal contrast targets, better diagnosis of temperature anomalies, improved infrared visible fused image.