DSLR cameras

[Scotto]

Looking for advice from the quorum:

My lovely wife wants a DSLR for Xmas. So I'm doing my research. We're looking for entry level here, not PRO stuff. And I don't have $1500 or more to spend on a body. We're looking at the $800- or so area, hopefully with a lens. I've looked at the canon T3 rebel on line, and it seems like a good camera. The Nikon D90 is looking better, but I'm thinking for that camera I'd have to go used. Used is a possibility. Henry's would back up a used camera, if they had one.

What do you guys suggest for things to look at for a DSLR? And what cameras would you recommend? It would be used primarily for landscape\travel pics. And family pics - not too much for action shots. Video would be nice, but not crucial.

Help?

Thanks - Scott

[Snafu]

Canon's t1i (if Henry's still carries them) is a decent camera. It is not the latest and greatest but it is a good camera. I picked up mine with their 18-55mm lens. They offer the camera kit with different lens. The t2i is its replacement and might be the lower end model now.

Henry's is a great place and their extended warranty is good.

If you are on a budget then also consider the cost of a memory card (or cards - 8GB is a decent size and there are different speeds to consider), clear lens filter (to protect the lens) and camera bag (if you do not already have one). I wanted to get a second battery so I can keep one charged but so far I have not needed one.

You can drop by any time to look at mine.

[Morpheus]

I just picked up the sony @55 and I'm happy with it so far. It's got the new opaque mirror, so it's much quicker than the older dslr's that had to physically move a mirror to take the picture.

It also does high def video.

I haven't had it long enough to have a huge opinion on it so far, but I can say it is very fast. It will do a 10 frame burst shot in about 1 second flat.

The downside to a fast camera is you need a fast video card, and they're expensive.

[nige]

I say Nikon or Canon. Either are great quality and the choice of lenses is unmatched. I wouldn't worry about the body too much, just get something that she will feel comfortable using. The lenses are where the money is spent, and believe me, you can SPEND it The body will get old, but for the most part, the lens tech doesn't change too much.

I have a Canon 60D that came with an 18-135mm EF-S lens which makes it useful "walkabout" lens for shooting all sorts of things near and far, big and small. Besides that, I use an EF 50mm lens for screwing around with. I would like to trade it for a ~30mm though, I need something a little wider. Most Canons will accept the older EF lenses, and the newer EF-S lenses - lots of choices if I want to be creative, the crazy, expensive Full Frame Canons generally take EF lenses only.

I didn't shop too much for Nikon, because my father has a stash of nice lenses for me to try with my Canon. I think Slawek has one and he knows how to use it

Digital Photography Review is a good site for comparison
http://www.dpreview.com/

If you want my recommendation, a Canon T2i with 18-135mm EF-S kit lens would be a great setup for her to start with, unless you think the will like the flippy screen, in that case a T3i, or a 60D with the same lens. The 60D has a bigger body and top LCD (handy). The built in flash on these things are generally sh!t and ruin the picture, so she might want a standalone flash for indoor portraits, or a wide prime lens like the Sigma 30mm F1.4 lens that works well in low light.

Whatever you get, put a filter on the lens (more for protection than anything), and a nice little bag to keep it dry if she gets stuck in the rain. Water is about the only thing that will REALLY fark them up

[nige]

actually if you're gonna get a filter, a polarized one would make her landscapes look really good.

[Bow_Tied]

Side note on Henry's - if you buy all the stuff, the bag, lens cloth, the battery charger etc. they will come down on the price - there is a fair bit of flex room on the accessories. I don't have an slr but have bought 3 digital cameras from Henry's for home/work and was able to get an easy $100 off the price each time by asking "what can you do for me" and then not taking the first offer "gee, that was more than I was budgeting for". Depending on the sales person, some are harder nosed than others. Go in when they aren't busy and do that before the Christmas rush. HTH

[Jayman]

We picked up a Nikon D50 body a couple of years ago for $200 from a guy here at work for this very purpose. No lenses, just the body. He was upgrading to a D5000 body, but was keeping his lenses, so it was just the body.

We then proceeded to Henry's to look at lenses, and were astounded at the prices you can spend for these things! I've always wanted a fish-eye lens, that is until I saw how much they actually cost! We ended up getting a Nikon 18-105 lens for around $400. Great all purpose lens to start out with.

Anyways, as Nige said, the money is spent on lenses for the most part.

One of the really good things about the Nikon lenses, is that they are compatible with pretty much all of the older Nikon camera bodies, all the way through to the newest bodies. So if you get an older entry level camera body like we did for cheap, and then spend your money on the lenses, you can always upgrade the body later on if you feel you want something that has more options, or is newer, or whatever. Although the newer camera's have more fancy options, you can still get a really great, functional camera body inexpensively.

You almost never see someone selling their lenses, but you can almost always find the camera bodies for sale, especially with Nikon, because the lenses are interchangeable.

Although I'm not positive, I'd feel fairly confident in saying that the same thing applies for Canon as well.

[shockwave28]

I have the Nikon D80 with the 18-135 lens, I bought it when it first came on the market. Love the camera, have never regretted the purchase.
If I am not mistaken the D90 is the basically the replacement for the D80.
The biggest deciding factor for me was how it felt while shooting. The Sony A1 felt like the grip was tiny, the comparable Canon just felt awkward to me. I went to Henrys and tried a few of their cameras out before I made my final decision.
If you are going to be carrying it around for a while, my suggestion is it would be best to get one that is comfortable to you.

[inblack]

Debbie and I use 2 Nikon D700's and a D40 for our Wedding Photography Bis
We have parted ways with our 'old' D200 - traded it in on one of the D700's

Yes the D90 is a replacement for the D80,
As the D300 replaced the D200
and the D50 replaced the D40

The D90 was the first to add Video to a Nikon DSLR
The DX000 (thousand series) all have the video ability of the 90 and they are simply the new 'consumer - advanced amatur' line.

Nikon v Cannon - Nikon is (to me) more intutive the menus are better and the on board controls are easier to operate sight unseen. (with your eye on the viewfinder or when working in the dark.
No disrespect to Cannon but Nikon is essentially a Lens and Camera company. That is wat they do, I like that. Cannon has thier fingers in so many pies thier focus (no pun intended) is constantly split.

Lenses - Price - yes we haev spent over $2000 on a single lens. It is worth it depending on your intended use. The price climbs steeply based on two basic factors - Maximum Aperature at maximum Zoom - IE an F2.8 70-200mm is greater than $1000 while a F4.8-5.3 70-200mm lens will be <> $500.
And in Nikon speak DG vs DX - or cropped sensor versus Full frame.

Fitment - Older Lenses - yes the bayonet mount will fit just about any Nikon - BUT the Auto-Focus might not work on smaller 'consumer' DSLR bodies. With these bodies Nikon started using the SWM focusing method where the motor is physcialy in the lens and the smaller bodies do not have the manual drive gear that is required to rotate the older lens AF hardware.

A need to know - there is no reason to buy a full frame lens for a cropped sensor body. There is no advantage to be gained from this particular feature. In our case the D700 is an FX body (full frame) if we use a DX lens on that body the computer will 'crop' the image to fit the lens. We will end up with a smaller image becuasethe camera has to adjust to recieving less light than it needs to fill the FX sensor. Without this digital cropping we would end up with heavy vingetting on all of the images.
This does not happen on the 'smalller' format sensors a DG lens provides a larger image that the sensor can record so yo still end up with an image as large as you would expect (maybe just not as large as you saw through the viewfinder)

Henry's will always work on the price - they will package just about any combination - all you have to do is be friendly and ask.
Thier Store Credit card can be a benfit as well. Yes the intrest is higher but it just about always allows you a 6months no payment option. Just get into a routine and pay the full value before day 175 and you are all set.
The extended warranty is good and worth it - we used to to get a sensor replaced in our old D200 - it would have been a $600 repair many times more than the Extended warranty cost was.

[Scotto]

Lots of advice here - thanks lads. Now I am going to pour over it.

Again - thanks. This is the stuff I was loojing for.

Scott

[amplifire]

For Canon, there is a cheap 50mm 1.8 lens that you can get for around $100, much cheaper than other options, and while it's not the highest quality we've been using it exclusively on our camera for years and love it. We actually sold the kit zoom lens, it just wasn't getting any use. For the kind of shots we take which are mostly indoor, portrait type shots, it's been great. I wish it was a 30 mm instead, but for $100 you can't go wrong.

[inblack]

Yeah those are GREAT.
The Nkon equiv is a F-1.4 50mm Prime. The plastic body version is <>$120
I have had one for years, and I love it.

[X-Treme]

Okay, here are a couple of good deals in the price range you discussed.

This one is at Vistek for a Canon Rebel T3i. Includes camera body, 18-55 mm & 55-250 mm IS lens, Matin Extreme 20 camera bag, Acumem 8 GB SDHC card and Matin Microfibre lens cleaning cloth. $1049.00
http://www.vistek.ca/store/ProPhotoCano ... cloth.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

This one is similar at Henry's. Includes only Canon Rebel T3i camera body, 18-55 mm & 55-250 mm IS lens. $999.99
http://www.henrys.com/63989-CANON-REBEL ... 50-IS.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Here is a review of the camera from dpreview.
http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/canoneos600d/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Scotto]

Thanks Buddy.

I'm probably going to do the shopping on Wednesday - will let everyone know what I got when it happens...

[nige]

A need to know - there is no reason to buy a full frame lens for a cropped sensor body. There is no advantage to be gained from this particular feature. In our case the D700 is an FX body (full frame) if we use a DX lens on that body the computer will 'crop' the image to fit the lens. We will end up with a smaller image becuasethe camera has to adjust to recieving less light than it needs to fill the FX sensor. Without this digital cropping we would end up with heavy vingetting on all of the images.
This does not happen on the 'smalller' format sensors a DG lens provides a larger image that the sensor can record so yo still end up with an image as large as you would expect (maybe just not as large as you saw through the viewfinder)

With regards to Canon on this notion, the Canon EF-S line of lenses will not physically fit on the full-frame (35mm equivalent) camera bodies; only on the crop sensor bodies such as the T1/2/3/Rebel 60D, 7D etc. The EF lenses will fit both bodies (full-frame and crop sensor). If Jennifer buys the crop sensor body and some EF lenses, she won't be stuck with incompatible EF-S if she decides to get a FF body later down the road.

You should know that when you mount an EF lens on a crop sensor body (especially the wide field of view and fisheye), you won't get as wide a field of view as you would using the same lens on a FF body.

[X-Treme]

A need to know - there is no reason to buy a full frame lens for a cropped sensor body. There is no advantage to be gained from this particular feature. In our case the D700 is an FX body (full frame) if we use a DX lens on that body the computer will 'crop' the image to fit the lens. We will end up with a smaller image becuasethe camera has to adjust to recieving less light than it needs to fill the FX sensor. Without this digital cropping we would end up with heavy vingetting on all of the images.
This does not happen on the 'smalller' format sensors a DG lens provides a larger image that the sensor can record so yo still end up with an image as large as you would expect (maybe just not as large as you saw through the viewfinder)

With regards to Canon on this notion, the Canon EF-S line of lenses will not physically fit on the full-frame (35mm equivalent) camera bodies; only on the crop sensor bodies such as the T1/2/3/Rebel 60D, 7D etc. The EF lenses will fit both bodies (full-frame and crop sensor). If Jennifer buys the crop sensor body and some EF lenses, she won't be stuck with incompatible EF-S if she decides to get a FF body later down the road.

You should know that when you mount an EF lens on a crop sensor body (especially the wide field of view and fisheye), you won't get as wide a field of view as you would using the same lens on a FF body.

If you want to understand what these knuckleheads are talking about do a Google search for 'Field of View Crop Factor.'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crop_factor" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[inblack]

U calling me a Knucklehead !!!?!?!?!?!?!?

Gino .... Don't make me come over there.

[X-Treme]

U calling me a Knucklehead !!!?!?!?!?!?!?

Gino .... Don't make me come over there.

Hehehe.

[Scotto]

Decided and got the Canon T3i. It will fit her hands. It is a very good camera. Was a good deal from Henry's - two good lenses with good apertures, card, bag, extra battery, and lens covers plus an extended warranty which will run for four years. Jennifer will have lots of fun running around being paparazzi girl. Looking forward to her face in (gack!) 25 days.

She's hovering over my shoulder here, so gotta run off...

thanks for all the advice, the suggestions, and the folks who showed me their cameras to help out.


Scott

[nige]

cool, I'll have to come over and check it out after christmas. Which lenses did you get with it?