new to dslr

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bigduncan

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iam about to upgrade to dslr and was looking for some advice on witch camera to get
iam looking at a budget of about £300 to £350
it also has to be wife compateable i.e easy for her to take a few pics if she wants
not bothered if its 2nd hand
any advice would be great
if anyone has a camera for sale just drop me a pm
thanks in advance
 
Hi, I will happily advise, but I think it would be best if you could say what sort of photography you will be doing, and whether or not you want to use it for video or not.

The first thing to really consider is what lenses you would need, and they should eat most of your budget as its the lenses that matter a lot more than the camera body.

You may also need a flash as the built in ones on SLR,s are usually pretty useless.

To be honest you will struggle to get a decent DSLR on your budget, and may be better off looking at a good bridge camera, or even a really good compact like the Canon G11 or G12.
 
was just after a 2nd hand camera
would be used for hols etc
also like to take pics at stockcar racing
both still and action
so would need a longish zoom
do'nt want to spend to much as it'll only be used 2 or 3 times a month
 
I love mmy Nikon d3100. Its a great little camera.trying to remember what we paid for it.... think it was 340. Ive found it a great starter into dslr's.also pretty handy as a HD video cam as well.
 
A zoom lens will cost you some money, your cheapest option would probably be the Tamron 18-200 zoom as a single lens. The only drawback with this is at full zoom the aperture is restricted to f6.3, which will make action shots a bit tricky as it limits the amount of light coming in. You could put one of them lenses on any of the basic cameras on the market. Be careful if buying a second hand Nikon body as not all Nikon lenses are compatable with all Nikon cameras. Something to do with the auto focus motor, but I'm not entirely sure as I am not a.Nikon user.

The beauty of a DSLR is the ability to swap lenses and and add external flash guns, if you are not planning on adding more lenses than just one I'm not really sure there is any benefit to be gained from a DSLR over a bridge camera.

I have a DSLR but don't take it on holiday as it is too bulky once I add my standard lens, zoom lens, wide angle lens plus flash guns etc..and my Fuji finepix is perfectly adequate for holiday snaps, and it fits in my pocket.

Have a look at dpreview.co.uk, they have an in-depth review of nearly all digital cameras available past and present.
 
my fathers friend has just asked me if i want his spare dslr its a canon eos 450d
with standard lens
is this a good starter camera ?
oh the price would be under £250
any opinions or advice please
 
bigduncan said:
my fathers friend has just asked me if i want his spare dslr its a canon eos 450d
with standard lens
is this a good starter camera ?
oh the price would be under £250
any opinions or advice please
Click to expand...


I have just sold my 450D as a starter DSLR camera they are a good buy. The kit lens should do you for a while and when you get a bit more adventurous with the settings you can upgrade the lens then. And if he has looked after it you are getting it at a good price.
 
The 450D is a good camera, I still use my old 400D as a second camera when I need to have 2 on the go at once, which I do for Wedding photography. The 450d is perfectly capable of providing professional quality images.
The standard lens is supposed to be quite good, but you may find you will want to buy a zoom lens of focal length 70 - 300 to go with it. You don't necessarily need to fill the frame with the item you are photographing either as you can crop the image later.

If you can get it for under 250 and its been looked after I would say its a good price.

It can be used on fully automatic so your wife will be able to just point and shoot, or you can use multiple settings to have full control over the aperture and shutter speed.
 
i have just had a search on the net and found a pansonic g2 from a couple of retailers for under £300
are these 3/4 cameras any good ?
i think by the looks of these cameras that this is maybe better for me than a fully blown dslr
are the plenty of lens out there by 3rd party makers
sorry for all these questions but iam not quiet as hot on cameras as iam macs/ phones or razors
all your help and advice is
helping me a great deal
thank you all very much
 
I don't know much about the 4/3 rds cameras, but I did just have a look on warehouseexpress which is where I buy most of my camera gear and they didn't appear to have many lenses available.

If its flexibility you are after then I think a DSLR is the best approach, you can always upgrade bits as you progress then.

Stick with one of the well known brands and you can't go far wrong.
 
If you can get a good price on a 450D you won't regret it. I've had one for years and it is excellent. If you are after lenses an slr offers loads more options than micro 4/3. If you want something small a good compact is best.
 
I think CMOT has hit the nail on the head. You need to decide what you are going to use the camera for. I have 4 cameras a Sony 12mp point and press and Pentax same spec, they are both my work cameras and get chucked around in my work bag. they take adequate photographs but are limited as to what you can do with them. Also don't fall into the mega pixel trap, my other compact camera is a Canon Sure Shot S90 this is around the price you are looking at (well the S95 its newer brother is). This is the camera that goes on holiday with me ans also is in my DSLR bag as it takes fantastic photographs and is a great second camera. This one is 10mp but the way it processes light is what counts. It is fixed lens but has most of the controls I have on the DSLR and it fits in my pocket, (its thanks to CMOT that I got this camera!!)
The last one is a Canon 60D which I have yet to use as it only arrived today. This is the one that I will be using for more serious stuff (as well as photographing razors..........)

So do you want a good quality camera that you can carry around and take great photographs with that will fit in your pocket (and has an auto setting for the wife)? Or do you want to get a bit more creative and have the options of upgrading to different lenses etc ?

If its the 1st choice I would say go for a good compact camera and not worry too much about interchangeable lenses , if its the 2nd get the 450D.
 
monkeytennis said:
I love mmy Nikon d3100. Its a great little camera.trying to remember what we paid for it.... think it was 340. Ive found it a great starter into dslr's.also pretty handy as a HD video cam as well.
Click to expand...

I just pulled the trigger on one with a 18 - 55 f3.5 kit lens. I went Nikon as most of my friends are Nikon based so I have a pool of lenses to borrow and test before I throw down any more money. That's pretty useful to me as the whole point in buying this thing is to document the incoming child, (not the birth, that would be nasty), so I have my heart set on a prime lens for portrait work and I can't decide on 35mm or 50mm.

Best deal I could find was, jessops @ £399, (there were a few other cheaper vendors, but they had shady reviews on the web).

Nikon are currently offering a £30 cash back on d3100 and single kit lens packs. The top cash back website has a 5% rebate on all jessops SLR purchases. All in all I expect to pull back £50 on the deal. I think I found some internet voucher thing via google that gave me free delivery as well.
 
Hi

I've just been down this road, trying to weigh up cost vs features and lenses.

It started off with a workmate tempting me with his Canon 400D complete with a couple of lenses (18-55 and 55-250 IIRC)

Anyway, after much hunting around and reading up on specs and reviews, I eventually found myself going for a 550D with the standard 18-55mm kit lens - this was second hand but in as-new condition and all for just £300 (which seemed a reasonable price to me). I also bought a 17-85mm lens to use in place of the standard 18-55 (this was another £150 and again in as new condition).

My choice in camera was driven mainly by the processor, with the 550D having the DIGIC4 which is much better than the DIGIC3 (450D) and better still than the DIGIC2 (400D). The 550D is pretty much the same camera as the current model (the 600D) but without the flip out screen - and I couldn't justify the price premium just for that feature. The DIGIC4 has much better low light handling than the DIGIC3 and it was introduced from the Canon EOS 500D - as such, if you want Canon, I would recommend looking for a 500D or better.

Lenses are a different matter - if you're wanting to photograph stock cars, then I guess you're going to be a bit of a distance away from them and may need a relatively good telephoto lens - probably one with image stabilisation, unless you want to invest in a tripod too. And it's the lenses where things start to get really expensive. Here, you can pay anything from £50 to £5000 depending on your budget, needs and wants. It's hard to recommend here as it's purely down to personal preference. You could argue that you would do fine with an entry level 70-300 mm lens, but then again, if you read reviews and the technical details in the images interest you, you may be better off with a 300mm prime lens at around £1200 (2nd hand).

At the price I paid, I think I got a relative bargain - keep shopping around and there are bargains out there to be had.
 
thanks for everbodys advice and help
iam going to try and get a 2nd hand canon eos 500d or a 550d
just have to find one in good nick now
once again a big thanks for all the help
 
I just bought an old Olympus e410. Doesn't get the best reviews in the world, but does get some good praise too. Twin lens kit second hand for £250. Its like brand new and came with CF cards, tripod, case and all original boxes! Bargain I think. Its a 4/3 which makes it light and smaller which is good for me.

Be aware that most of the compact lens changable ones are micro 4/3 and use a specialist mount

I'm slowly getting used to it, bit of a change from my Ricoh CX1 which died and wasn't viable to replace the malfunctioned part. I am impressed with it, and for the money I am chuffed.

My girlfriend's dad just laid down £700 on two lenses on some deal which saved him £Â£. Very nice and he is a Canon fan. I did look at both those and Nikons before choosing something intermediate. Should I choose to pursue something newer and "better" in future I may have to look again at them. The advantage is a greater selection on lenses at a reasonable price, the Oly had a very limited selection but aren't too expensive for a prime. I already have a 17-45mm and 40-150mm - can't imagine I'm going to need anything other than the wide angle that I want
 
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