Advice On New Camera

_-J-_

_-J-_

_-J-_

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Hi all, first post in this section of the forums, however have been browsing this part for ages and have to say there are some great photographers in here.

Anywho i'm looking to get a DSLR and would like your fine advice on my below choices, i currently have a Sony CyberShot point and shoot and will like something with bit more manual settings as want to further my photography as a hoby.

Been looking at (All come with a free bag :)) :

Nikon D40 Black + AF-S DX 18-55mm Lens - £225
Sony Alpha A200 + 18-70mm f/3.5-5.6 Lens - £244 (After cashback)
Canon EOS 1000D + 18-55 IS Lens - £292 (After cashback)
Nikon D60 + AF-S DX Nikkor VR 18-55mm Lens - £292 (After cashback)
Sony Alpha A300 + 18-70mm Lens - £292 (After cashback)

I have looked at other threads and people mention the D40 and A200 and said they were good cameras for starters, however i don't want to have to be shelling 3-400 out on a new body in about 6 months. So are the features on the higher priced cameras worth it for a starter into the world of DSLR?

The type of shooting i will be doing will be general photography, maybe a bit of sport and wildlife. Ocassional landscapes, mostly "urban?" photography.

Cheers for the advice in advance.
 
I prefer Nikon most, but the D40/60 are poor starter cameras in terms of lens compatibility.
Sony are OK but will never be as big as Canon or Nikon so they're not a long-term option either.
That leaves you with the Canon. It's a decent camera and Canon have a great set of lenses to expand with, stretch to the 450D if you can.

But if you're fairly certain you want to get into photography for a few years save up and get a used Nikon D80. That will last you very well and has great features and handling.
 
robertgilbert86 said:
I prefer Nikon most, but the D40/60 are poor starter cameras in terms of lens compatibility.
Sony are OK but will never be as big as Canon or Nikon so they're not a long-term option either.
That leaves you with the Canon. It's a decent camera and Canon have a great set of lenses to expand with, stretch to the 450D if you can.

But if you're fairly certain you want to get into photography for a few years save up and get a used Nikon D80. That will last you very well and has great features and handling.
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Cheers for the advice, so basically there all rubbish apart from the 1000D lol.
 
I just ordred the D40. For that price it's a bargain. That's about 125 quid for the body and 100 for the lens. By the time you add in a mem card or 2 it comes out to £250.

Anyway The D60 is the same as the D40, but the D40 is supposedly better, if you don't let 6vs10MP put you off. The D60 comes with a VR lens though which is nice.

The A200 and the A300 are pretty much the same, except the A300 has live view, and a tiltable LCD screen. there are pluses and ,inus to this, read a review. Takes old minolta lenses and looks to be a nice camera, and if it was the same price as the D40 I could possibly have went for that.

The 1000D is Canons latest entry level, lots of features. I think it fits in between the 400D and the 450D, so perhaps check those out.

As for lenses for the D40 being poor starter cameras in terms of lens compatibility? Surely as a starter camera lens compatibility is a moot point? Only somebody who is already loaded up with non AF-S lenses would have a problem in that regard?

And, all Nikon lenses will work, just the non AF-S ones won't autofocus.

0.02
 
I would go for either the Canon or Nikon simply because of the extensive range of lens' and other accessories available should you wish to add to your kit in the future.
As a Canon fan I would point you in the direction of the 1000D package (the lens it comes with is very good), but I know you won't go far wrong with the Nikon option either.
 
It's getting to the point where you can say "yes, one of the above", the Sony system has some very good features (in body anti shake etc), the Canons IS lens is good and it comes with decent software, the Nikon D60 has a good anti dust system and the D-lighting feature is very useful.
 
whitecrook said:
I just ordred the D40. For that price it's a bargain. That's about 125 quid for the body and 100 for the lens. By the time you add in a mem card or 2 it comes out to £250.

Anyway The D60 is the same as the D40, but the D40 is supposedly better, if you don't let 6vs10MP put you off. The D60 comes with a VR lens though which is nice.

The A200 and the A300 are pretty much the same, except the A300 has live view, and a tiltable LCD screen. there are pluses and ,inus to this, read a review. Takes old minolta lenses and looks to be a nice camera, and if it was the same price as the D40 I could possibly have went for that.

The 1000D is Canons latest entry level, lots of features. I think it fits in between the 400D and the 450D, so perhaps check those out.

As for lenses for the D40 being poor starter cameras in terms of lens compatibility? Surely as a starter camera lens compatibility is a moot point? Only somebody who is already loaded up with non AF-S lenses would have a problem in that regard?

And, all Nikon lenses will work, just the non AF-S ones won't autofocus.

0.02
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Can you let me know what the D40 is like when you get it? Is it your first DSLR.

Might nip into the shop and try them out on Monday.
 
Just bought a Canon 1000D with 18-55 lens for £282 - £252 with the £30 cashback.

Wanted to get into dSLR photography, for the price and features, I was strongly advised to go for the Canon. My friend has the 450D, the 1000D is pretty much the same minus a few features and the lower resolution.
 
_-J-_ said:
Can you let me know what the D40 is like when you get it? Is it your first DSLR.

Might nip into the shop and try them out on Monday.
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Sure. It's my first DSLR, moving up from most recently a Pentax K1000 SLR all manual camera.

I just realised I think I paid £215 or so for my first digital camera (canon 2MP A60) about 5-6 years ago..... Now decent DSLRs are in the same price range....
 
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Just received the D40 today.

First impressions:
very light. Build feels really nice.
The kit lens weighs virtually nothing...
Really easy to get started. Was taking pictures within couple of minutes of opening the box.
Plenty settings and options, enough to keep a new DSLR user occupied . It doesn't seem too complicated which is a real bonus.

Display is easy to read , the viewfinder is great, perhaps not quite as large/bright as my K1000 (pentamirror vs pentaprism ?)

Seems really simple and basic to use to change settings / options, all seems very logical to me. didn't need to read the manual to work any option (yet :) ), although needed to read it to understand what they do.

AF is very quick and very quiet.

18-55 isn't enough zoom for me. I'll need to get a 200/300 lens.
Also not too keen on the twist for zoom/and separate ring for MF. Prefer slidetozoom and twist to focus on the same ring... I'll get used to that though.

Continuous shooting mode is pretty sweet.


things next on the list / offboard flash (SB400/600?) Longer lens 200/300. Will go into a shop and check them out on the camera.
 
SB-600 if you can afford it, though if you can only get the SB-400 I've got a Nikon I-TTL cord for sale which will give the capability of bouncing light off a wall. The 55-200vr is a cracking little lens at good money, if you want to zoom a little further but can't stretch to the money of the Nikon 70-300VR, the Sigma 70-300APO is now available in the HSM type you need to AF with the D40 and is a very reasonable quality zoom for about £160
 
Can the SB400 light not be tilted separately from the flash body? (if you see what if mean?)

Can I use an older flash with the D40? (still nikon though?)

Yes the 55-200VR does look nice, good price too, but I'll really need to see if 200 is enough to please me. I may really want to go for the 300, which would mean more cash.

What about an older manual focus zoom 300 lens?
The Nikon AF 70-300mm f/4-5.6G is available for less than £90 ...

Would prefer to stay with actual nikon lenses.

I'll wait a little while to get familiar with the camera and the features before spending more money on something I'm not sure about though... :)
 
No the 400 will tilt but not swivel, it's a lovely little flash mind you and suits the D40 well, the 70-300 (non vr) Nikon lens is perfectly acceptable but it's manual focus (difficult I find on a small sensored/dim viewfindered camera like the D40) and nowhere near the same lens as the 70-300VR (unlike the 55-200 and VR the 70-300 is a totally different lens to it's VR cousin). It'll work ok off a tripod but is inferior in build quality, image quality and flexibility compared to the Sigma.
It is however very cheap.
Older flashes will work (well some will) like the SB-24 etc but look in your manual to see what features you will lose, it would be a shame to use one really, the I-TTL system Nikon use at the moment is the best flash system in the world.
Careful of using very old flashguns, the different trigger voltage could ruin your camera.

Remember that a 200mm lens gives the same field of view on an APS-C sensored camera as a 300mm on a 35mm, which, incidentally, is why the viewfinder is dimmer than your Pentax, the hole you are looking through is only 2/3rds of the size.

BTW I've got an SB-400 Instruction manual that I no longer need (sold the 400 about a year ago), if you get one s/hand I'll send it to you gratis.
 
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Guzzidom said:
No the 400 will tilt but not swivel, it's a lovely little flash mind you and suits the D40 well, the 70-300 (non vr) Nikon lens is perfectly acceptable but it's manual focus (difficult I find on a small sensored/dim viewfindered camera like the D40) and nowhere near the same lens as the 70-300VR (unlike the 55-200 and VR the 70-300 is a totally different lens to it's VR cousin). It'll work ok off a tripod but is inferior in build quality, image quality and flexibility compared to the Sigma.
It is however very cheap.
Older flashes will work (well some will) like the SB-24 etc but look in your manual to see what features you will lose, it would be a shame to use one really, the I-TTL system Nikon use at the moment is the best flash system in the world.
Careful of using very old flashguns, the different trigger voltage could ruin your camera.

Remember that a 200mm lens gives the same field of view on an APS-C sensored camera as a 300mm on a 35mm, which, incidentally, is why the viewfinder is dimmer than your Pentax, the hole you are looking through is only 2/3rds of the size.

BTW I've got an SB-400 Instruction manual that I no longer need (sold the 400 about a year ago), if you get one s/hand I'll send it to you gratis.
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Cheers for the post.

Yes. This difference in sensor size (crop factor etc) is why I think I'll really need to go to a shop and try the lenses on to get a feel for them. I don't know anyone who I could try theirs out.

As i have posted elsewhere I mostly used a 70-200 on my 35mm, and often wanted it to be perhaps a 50-200 instead. So the 55-200 may be (almost) ideal for me. Especially as it's a newer lense with VR. I think if there was a (18|28)-135 VR that would probably have been a 'direct replacement...' But the non VR one is the same price as the 55-200VR...

If I can get a flash unit cheap enough I'll certainly be getting one whether it be 400 or 600. I realise that lighting makes a bigger difference to pictures than what lense is used so especially for things like picture of the kids indoors etc, moreso than a telephoto.
 
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I think Nikon have just released their "nifty fifty" in AF-S flavour (at least the F1.4 version), that's a great indoor lens.
You can get the Sigma 18-125OS HSM (same as VR) and the Sigma 18-200OS HSM both in Nikon fittings, that would give you 27-190mm or 27-300mm equivalents, the 18-200OS recently beat the Nikon 18-200VR in a magazine group test.
Personally I think the 18/55 and 55/200vr is a great little combo giving you the same field of view as 27-300mm with VR for the longest (shakiest) part of the range.
 
whitecrook said:
snip.....
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What card did you get to go with it, when i was looking at the kit on the shop i was looking at it came with a standard SD Card, when i added just the camera it suggested a HDSD Card :confused:

Any chance of a couple of photo's to see the image quality?
 
SDHD is just SD but higher capacity so should be "backwards" compatible as it were. i think anything over 2gb is SDHC
 
I ordered 1 SanDisk Extreme III SD 2GB and 1 SanDisk Extreme III SDHC 4GB . But they haven't arrived yet.

So I have been using a Kingston 2GB SD card that I bought for my Wii.

I'll up some photos soon. Can I stick full size images on imgshack?

the manual states that Nikon only recommend using:

sandisk / toshiba / panasonic and lexar(upto1GB) cards "operation is not gauranteed with other cards".

<shrug> if it's an SD card it should work...
 
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here are some pics. Still getting used to the camera. Even though it's a 'entry level, basic camera' it still has a bunch of stuff to figure out.

If you want any more or specific things let me know..

click the thumbs for full straight from camera... The water one has been cropped....













 
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