OMG, not another DSLR thread.

[rumppole]

Well yes I'm afraid.

But BCF is to blame, in a way.

Ive been looking at the BCF photographers thread and I'm blown away with some of the images captured. Well done people.

I have a handheld and its served me well on holidays and family gatherings. But the time has come for a more advanced piece of equipment.

I and the wife partake in trackdays and attend many motorsport events including the GP and F1 at silverstone. I also tour at least once a year on the bike and also have the usual family holidays and weekend excursions. This I hope will give you some idea of the main usages of a camera for myself.

I want a DSLR. I want it to be a capable piece of kit. I want it to be cost effective. I don't want to pay for the ability to send pictures directly to cloud from anywhere in the world, because quite frankly, plugging it into the computer at home will suffice. I do want a camera that will capture high speed motorsport images and take a quality and high resolution image from a moderate distance.

Yes, I've read up on DSLR cameras. The amount of information is mind blowing. It would seem that every manufacturer believes theirs is best.

So. I ask those of you with DSLR experience. What would be an ideal starter camera for the type of photography I have mentioned above?

I have a budget of £500 but of course I'm interested in bang for buck.

Finally, what software would be recommended for simple editing functions such as red eye, anti glare, contrast and colour adjustment and maybe some touch ups. I really don't like the price tag of photoshop.

As always thank you for any advice you give.

Rumps.
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Sermo datur cunctis; animi sapientia paucis.

[yaigi]

Hi there. I have an Olympus E410, because I worked in Curry's at the time, it was on offer, and I got it on Buy Now Pay in 12 Months. If I had my time again, I wouldn't opt for it, not because I don't think it's an ace camera, it's bloody brilliant, but the lenses are waaaaay expensive and harder to come by than Nikon or Canon.

So, from my experience, I would say don't opt for Olympus. Shop around for a good deal, check out the price of extra lenses.

Might be worth checking out GIMP which is some photo editing software I have heard good things about, had a quick play with it, hasn't got the functionality of photoshop but it certainly has some good, useful features. It's free, so certainly worth a try.
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Currently own - Fazer 600, 2000, Red. (But no riding as baby on board atm)

[Bendy]

Do you want it to do video?

I did, so I bought a Canon 600D.

Not bothered? Then you can look at the second hand stuff and probably get something a level up from that for similar money, or an older version for chips.

I'm very happy with the little Canon - its small and light compared to some of the heavy metal my mates carry around (cough cough 1D) which means I'm far more likely to take it places. It it a far better camera than I am photographer so for now it suits me perfectly.

Should pick one up just within budget, but could be pushing it if you want an extra lens. See what 550Ds are going for these days - pretty much the same thing without the twisty screen afaik.


Oh - and as ever, the Nikon vs Canon thing... it was an easy choice for me as out of all the photo nerds I know, all but one uses Canon. Therefore if I wanted the ability to borrow lenses now and then, I had to go Canon too.

[Drew]

[Spudly]

I have a Canon 1100D which is billed as an entry level DSLR.

I do all sorts of photography with it, long exposure, astrophotography, landscape stuff, HDR, family pics, you get the picture.

I haven't even begun to test the limits of this cameras capabilities. Digital cameras these days are so damn capable, even an entry level camera has features a photographer in the 60s would only dream about.

My personal advice would be to get an entry level DSLR - Nikon or Canon, doesn't matter which, since each have their own strengths and weaknesses - then spend the rest of your budget on lenses.

The package I bought came with the camera body and an 18mm to 55mm lens. Spend another £80 or £90 on a 50mm prine lense, then if you can, another hundred or so on a 70mm to 200mm/300mm telephoto.

That should set you up with enough glass to cover most of your needs as well as having an awful lot of camera to play with as well.

In the meantime though, start taking photos! Doesn't matter what you use, let the photon hit the pixel.
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The Old Apprentice

[Kol]

Pick yourself up a second hand Canon 400D from eBay for around £200, and spend some money on a decentish zoom lens. Say 75-300mm would be a good start for Motorsport photography.

That'll give you a good base to start from and you can build your kit up as your experience grows.

[chris-red]

[rumppole]

Thank you all.

Karma given for sound advice.
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Sermo datur cunctis; animi sapientia paucis.

[Stevie GooGs]

Is 500 your budget for now or your total, as one thing you will regret is buying a crap body now if you get into photography. In my experience buy cheap you buy twice., it all depends on what results you expect and what type of photography you want to do.

I spent over 1.4k on a lens and everyone always says you will be able to see for miles with that and its not true LOL. You pay a lot of decent glass and imho pick between Canon or Nikon as there a lot of second hand stuff out there and a lot of choice.

You put a good lens on a crap body you are wasting money, if you put a crap lens on a good body your wasting money as your not going to get the best results.

I started off with a 400D and 18-55mm lens, i regret buying it with the bundled lens as imo its shit. I then bought the 70-300 and it was ok but always want bigger as i was doing wildlife photography and motorsport, i then got a macro lens which was good for not just macro but portraits etc.

I decided to upgraded to a Canon 5D and then bought a 100-400 L lens, 17-40 L lens, decided to sell the canon 5D for the MK2 as there are a lot of things that suited me on the MK2 as i do some studio work and remote controlling the camera via pc helps.

I've then went on to buy a lot of other gear and spent a lot more than I first thought I would, as i bought my first DSLR to take photos of my son and its all stemmed from there.

IMHO if you are expecting great results then i doubt £500 will get you want you want.
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Bike Pics! -> My Photography Website

[rumppole]

[Stevie GooGs]

I totally understand i was in the exact same situation as yourself and i went for a bundled 400D back then it was pretty decent. I was a complete novice never used a DSLR before. Just warning you the costs that can get involved with it.

A DSLR in un trained hands is not going to be better than your compact camera, im amazed as the amount of people using DSLR's on full auto and never bother to use manual.

The point of the DSLR in my eyes is to give you more control of settings and allow you to swap lenses for different requirements.

For what its worth youtube has a hell of a lot of guides to help you get started.

Always read reviews on stuff m8 i found i wasted some £ buying cheaper accessories ie Jessops flashgun £150 i think was complete shit honestly one of the worst things ive bought and saved and got canon 580ex ii was double the price but well worth it.

Same goes with tripods i got one as a xmas present think it was £50 and never felt confident putting something worth about a 1k on £50 i was wobbly so no good, ended up buying manfrotto and still using it.

I find a lot of stuff is over priced in photography.
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Current: 2019 Yamaha T7 -> 2015 KTM Superduke R | 2000 Yamaha R1 Past -> 2009 KTM 990 SM -> 2005 kawasaki ZX10r -> 2000 Honda CBR 600 FY -> 2002 Honda XLV 125 Varadero
Bike Pics! -> My Photography Website

[Bendy]

[chris-red]

[Stevie GooGs]

[Bendy]

[chris-red]

[Stevie GooGs]

[Kickstart]

Hi

I would also vote for saving money in the short term and buying an older decent quality body. 20D or the like. 8mp is fine for any normal size prints and the basic quality is fine. Sure newer stuff might give you better high iso performance, more fps, faster auto focus, etc. But nothing that will suddenly enable you to take better pictures.

However even then that leaves you with a limited budget for a longer lens. The basic 75-300 Canon is OK for the money, but does have limits which you will easily find (ie, take a shot of something white against a dark background and you will see purple fringing).

[Seb]

Two pointers I don't think have been covered yet:

First off, raid your local second hand shops, plenty of bargains to be found particularly if you don't mind the odd gotcha here or there. To give you an example, we've got a Canon fit Sigma 18-50 F2.8, new it retails for ~£300+, we've got it up for sale for £100 because it's got a dead mite on the very edge of one of the inner elements, it doesn't show up on the frame and I suspect most people wouldn't notice it if we didn't point it out. The downside with it would be if you then decided to sell it on, hence how we got it in so cheap. On the subject of older Lenses, budget Canon bodys tend to be a little more compliant with old used lenses, whereas cheaper Nikon models tend to want fairly recent AF-S lenses unless you are prepared to focus the thing manually. Kind of a shame as otherwise I prefer the Nikon stuff.

Secondly, don't fall into the trap of thinking a huge focal length is the be all and end all. Decent quality long focal length lenses tend to be expensive whereas good short zooms and primes can often be gotten particularly cheaply. Unless you absolutely can't get close to whatever you're shooting at, try just walking forward a bit more, you might just save a ton of money and get a better photo to boot
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2010 Triumph 1050 Sprint ST

[_Will_]

I can understand why everyone want's to go a get a dslr to learn about photography, but at the moment with companies churning out 'evil' cameras like there is no tomorrow and ever impressive compacts its a much more cost effective route until you 'know' you want to spend a bit more on top notch kit, then even when you take the plunge it can fall back as your second or take anywhere/family camera.

They come with large sensors, manual controls and usually a fair choice of decent lenses.

Many many cameras have such advanced features that make them as good as even mid/prosumer level equipment and are usually forcefully crippled on release (as are entry level dslr's) so that they don't eat into sales of higher end gear.

Some 'Mirrorless' cameras even have advantages over dslr's as there is no mirror they can use higher flash sync speeds, obviously their size can be better in use (unless you want it as a fashion accessory) and as stated cost.
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Past -Honda qr50 | 2004 Peugeot Tkr s 50| | 1996 Yamaha XJ600s Diversion|

[Cunnington]

I picked up a repackaged 500D with kit lens for about £300 at the turn of the year. It was a nightmare trying to compare different models across the brands, particularly as you wont know what you are looking for, and you wont know what you are looking for until you get your hands on one and start to actually use it.

Someone in the photography thread recommended "Understanding Exposure" by Bryan Peterson, which I would also recommend. Photography is not that complicated, but there is a plethora of features crammed into cameras these days (such as having third stops on the exposure meter) as manufacturers try to outdo each other which Bryan does a good job of cutting through and getting the basics across.

I like and am used to my Canon. My old man has an older Olympus, which is fine in the automatic modes but I cannot get on with when I go into manual mode, as I cant find what I am looking for, and there is less information available when actually shooting. Do you have a mate who has one you could play with to see how you get on with it? I feel that I struck it lucky with mine, and know how handicapped I would feel if I'd ended up with something like my old man's one.

On a final note, if you are looking online, be aware that there are a number of convincing scam sites - if it is too good to be true, it probably is.
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The Shaggy D.A. wrote: "You are invisible. Those who can see you are trying to kill you."

[doggone]

Good points through this thread, I have a 5Dii and couple of L lenses but if all you are going to do is put a few web-sized images on flickr or forums like this you can get perfectly satisfactory results for less than a 10th of the cost.
Getting to know an SLR will help to get better results from a mid-range compact if you can get to grips with using manual mode.
Also has to be said that acquiring a top-notch editing program like Lightroom will work wonders for many pictures even taken with a phone.
In fact for images online improving editing will do more to make your pictures better than anything.
Note this does not mean using arty filters or strange effects, often you are just lightening dark areas and carefully controlling contrast, saturation and sharpening.

As a side note most compacts have manual options to reduce contrast, saturation and sharpening.
If you are reasonably handy with photoshop or whatever, dropping these down to near minimum settings will give you a file which can be tweaked in levels and sharpened only as much as required.
Often the standard modes tend to be over contrasty and saturated which isn't always what you want at all.