Complete and utter novice after an SLR

[andy mac]

I fancy having a dabble at a bit of photography. I have seen a cheap slr with lens, and am wondering what peeps think of it. I am a complete novice, and as such, it is merely for a bit of experimentation, etc, and need to know if this is OK. I begrudge forking out a shedload for a really good one, If I end up being utter pants, so just need something to do the job. is this one OK?? Worth the money, or completely crap bit of equipment?

www.dixons.co.uk/martprd/store/dix_page.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@0251600652.1134946877@@@@&BV_EngineID=ccfgaddghkllhemcflgceggdhhmdgmh.0&page=Product&fm=undefined&sm=undefined&tm=undefined&sku=574367&category_oid=-21572

Cheers!

[Andy M]

I reckon the general consensus will be to go for either a:

www.jessops.com/search/viewproduct.cfm?PRODUCT=NIKD50&refer=prr

or

www.jessops.com/search/viewproduct.cfm?PRODUCT=CANEOS350DB&refer=prr

(both prices through PriceRunner, both will probably be cheaper elsewhere).

[poah]

better off with the nikon D50, canon 350D or konica minolta 5d

[andy mac]

Cheers chap.. I'll have a look at those :-)

[RobDickinson]

Minolta is cheap.

Canon 350d is prolly a little 'better' than a D50 but not as new.

Go to a camera shop and see how they feel in your hand and where the controls are, this (usability) IMO is as important as the image quality and differs from person to person.

[speed8]

I just got a 350D from Canon outlet on ebay. £450 all in.
I had a feel in Jessops and everything felt fine for me. At that price I figured it was ideal for an intro to DSLR and it has the normal warranty too.

[Tuna]

Can I just point out that the learning curve on DSLRs is STEEP. They also often don't work as well as 'point and shoot' cameras - quite a few users buy DSLRs and end up leaving them on auto everything whilst having to put up with the limitations of whatever kit lens they got. DSLRs also have the disadvantage of not being dust proof (unless you buy some fairly serious lenses), and need a certain amount of maintenance.

Think carefully about getting a 'bridge' camera - Sony and Fuji particularly do ones with fixed lenses that give you lots of pixels, big zooms, some manual control when you need it and can also do things like video that DSLRs can't. Some of these cameras will produce results that are quite stunning and are very forgiving of user error.

I graduated from a Fuji S602z bridge camera that taught me about f-numbers, aperture and so on before buying a 350D earlier this year. I got nine thousand photos out of the Fuji before I felt I could 'do better' with an SLR.

[andy mac]

yeah.. I understand that, but I had thousands upon thousands of piccies on my old laptop, and figured I'd try my hand at a decent camera, and mess with shutter speed,etc. I want to learn, so figured the best way is to get one, and do thousands more and experiment with all the settings. It's not a fad, I just want to try my hand at some other stuff. I had an Olympus C-3000 and althought you could mess with quite a few things, I wanted to renew it as it was getting VERY old and battered. Figured i might as well take the 'next step' I appreciate your concern though, and am grateful for your help.

[Tuna]

In that case I'd recommend a Canon 350D. Consider the battery grip if you can get it as part of a package deal - some people think it transforms the camera's handling, but I tend to take most photos without it. I've got the 17-85 IS lens, which is excellent and very flexible, and the 50mm 1.8 prime which is absolutely fantastic for available light portraits. I'd also recommend at least a 1Gb card, better to go with 2Gb, which should cope with a full battery's worth of photographs at high quality jpeg.

[simpo two]

In that case I'd recommend a Nikon D50.[/quote]
1Gb will hold about 350+ large fine JPG images.

[m12_nathan]

Buy my D70 with lenses off me instead

[simpo two]

m12_nathan said:

Buy my D70 with lenses off me instead

Are you going for the D200?

[m12_nathan]

Close but no, I'm off to Canon...