Help Needed... Affordable SLR for a newbie

[Trainsrgr8]

Hello guys.

 

Recently i have been getting more and more annoyed with my samsung compact camera, which takes great shots of still things, but the shutter speed is generally too slow for fast moving trafic that i see on the WCML. I have been edgingto get an SLR camera for a while now and have been thinking with a birthday coming up this may be a good time to get one...

 

However, being a student the £500 plus mark for D90's and so on is too much for me to spend. I am also not familiar with ISO and so on so i think this would completely baffle me. I have been looking at a Sony Alpha DSLR - A230 which claims to be a good step into SLR photography...

 

http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/alpha-dslr-a230-digital-slr-camera-18-55mm-sony-zoom-lens-02988657-pdt.html

 

Jus wondered if anyone has used this camera before and could tell me if it is a worthy investment?? Or indeed if there are any other relatively affordable SLR cameras for the begginer out there??

 

Many Thanks

 

Danny

[Gwiwer]

I'm not familiar with the model you are looking at but I am familiar with the fairly big price gap between the point n shoot range of compacts and the next level. There are some rather good top end compacts now with faster response times and around the 12 - 20 mp range.

 

A quick word about ISO as you find it confusing. Think of it in terms of how quickly the camera processes light. If you have a low setting then the process time will be somewhat longer (though still tiny fractions of a second) and a slower shutter speed will be required. If you set a higher ISO (or for film users if you use a higher ISO film) then it will respond to the light more quickly and a faster shutter speed can be used but can give a grainy effect if there is not enough light.

 

If the light is at a moderately low level as is often the case in the UK you can be better off sticking to automatic mode if not familiar with how to "play" with the settings. You can make adjustments and learn as you go, which is one of the beauties of digital photography in that you don't waste a roll of film any time you do this, but I don't advise it on a trip to capture that steam charter where there is no second chance.

 

The current DSLR models will offer ISO settings to 3200 or more.

[beast66606]

Danny,

 

What Digital Camera gave the Sony 85% its main issue being "handling"

 

Review here.

http://www.whatdigitalcamera.com/equipment/reviews/digitalslr/27243/1/sony-alpha-a230-review.html

 

Don't worry about ISO as long as the camera produces decent images up to 400 and preferably 800 ISO you will be fine for most circumstances.

 

At this price range the Nikon D3000 or the Canon 450d (bit more money) come out better.

 

This second hand 20d is a good one too ...

 

hth

[Glorious NSE]

As Dave says don't ignore second hand - you can get a Canon 300d body for a little over £100 and a 20d for about £200 (or less if you look at Dave's link! ) - either of them are excellent "bangs for the buck" if you're on a tight budget.

 

If your budget is the £300 of that Sony then the money saved could be used to fund a half-decent zoom lens to go with it to give you a bit more variety in what you can do.

 

You will need to learn how to use it properly over time (what I mean is your shots will still not come out how you want them if all you do is bung it on auto, effectively that's no different to what your existing camera is already doing) - but that's something you can work at as you go along, and the benefit of these is that you have the capability to set anything manually to experiment with and see what works for you.

 

 

[JeremyC]

I suggest you also look at the Canon 1000D, which can be bought for around 350GBP with the 18-55mm standard lens. My son has just bought one for his bird photography [though he also purchased a 'slightly' longer lens for it as well] and it produces very nice results. I use a 300D for railway photography and would also recommend it if you are prepared to buy second hand.

 

Amazon often seem to have good prices for cameras. My son got his from PC World, which was offering it for quite a good price.

 

Jeremy

[Steadfast]

I've used a Canon 400D for the last 2 years, and really would recommend trying to get yourself something similar second hand. It is well built, hasn't had an easy life, and can be picked up for a bargain price as Martyn and Dave have pointed towards, also well worth looking at a zoom lens too. My 55-250 IS lives on the front of the camera with railway photography, with the 18-55 kit lens getting occasional use as required, which isn't that often when linesiding tbh

HTH

cheers

 

jo

[Trainsrgr8]

Thanks for the info and help guys Well my birthday is in July and i have savings from work so i will have to see what i can pull ogether money wise but i do have a couple of models in mind...

 

2nd hand is also something i hadn't thought of!

 

Thanks again

Danny

[ClikC]

I recommend second hand too.

 

I bought an Sony A100 about years back now, bargain price for a truely excellent camera complete with an excellent Sigma lens. Bare in mine that although is says "Sony", it's all from Konica Minolta heritiage.

 

Regards

 

Matt

[Hammer]

Regarding second hand cameras, Pawn Shops can be worth a look (also good for lenes although seldom the 2/3rds lenses my camera uses...). Make sure to look up local camera shops as well. Small chains and local shops often have second hand bodies and much better advice then Jessops etc.

[Trevellan]

I can recommend the EOS20D from personal experience. It was my first digital SLR (in 2005) and still acts as a backup to my newer pro model. If you're thinking of building up a kit it might be worth looking at the systems offered by Canon, Nikon etc. Serious photographers always tend to be quite partisan in this respect!

[Glorious NSE]

Just a bit of expansion on the logic behind s/h

 

DSLR's in general tend to be relatively solid, well built pieces of kit, so buying s/h is more viable with a DSLR than it might be with a consumer compact - and as new model releases are relatively frequent and some people upgrade regularly (or come in/out of photography as a hobby) there is a regular flow of s/h equipment (especially so for the big names, Canon & Nikon) onto the market that can be had at a fraction of the cost of the new gear.

 

For example the 300d (figure on spending about £120 s/h) was in the same place in the Canon range as the 550d (£700+ new) is now for example (the 350d, 400d, 450d, 500d have come out in the interim, and the last couple of those are still available "new" from shops trying to clear "last year's model")

 

Whilst the 550d is almost certainly a better camera with 7-ish years of development of the range behind it, something like the 300d is probably more capable as a camera than the vast majority of folk need.

 

I have one of the 55-250is lenses that Jo has and it's a really good bit of kit, again if you shop around you can get one for about £150 in new/factory reconditioned condition - such as:

http://cgi.ebay.co.u...=item45efa65417

 

With the WCML then shooting with a zoom to do long shots "under the wires" is quite a nice capability i'd have thought - saving the money by buying a s/h camera and using the money saved to increase the capability beyond the basic kit I think is quite a sensible move.

 

I was in a similar situation to you a year ago looking to move to a DSLR which equalled or bettered the zoom capability of my old bridge camera for a budget of about £300 - I went for a 300d (including a 18-55 lens) plus the 55-250is lens, the money left over sorted me out with a spare battery to cope with a potential for long days of continuous shooting

 

I went for the 300d because (a) it fitted my budget, (b ) it used the same memory cards (CF) as I had plenty of them from the bridge camera (therefore less expense to get set up to shoot) and ( c ) Canon/Nikon were larger operations so had more secondhand stuff available (hence more competition and lower prices)

 

That 20d kit that Dave linked to would certainly tempt me as an alternative option today, the 20d is the next range up in quality from the 300d (the 20d has been superceded by the 30d, 40d, 50d) - effectively the second tier (of several) of Canon DSLRs

 

I suspect my upgrade path from where I am now could involve a 20d, especially as the prices seem to be becoming very affordable!

 

Why am I thinking of an upgrade? The 300d takes great photo's but I tend to shoot the wagons in a train (see http://ukrailrollingstock.fotopic.net/ or http://thehumblebox.fotopic.net) - the memory buffer of the 300d is fairly small (about 4 shots) - on a train of bogie wagons I can usually manage every other one for example whilst the camera is busy saving the shots to the card - the buffer on a 20d is several times larger (something like 27 shots) so I should be able to increase the number I catch! That's a pretty specialist requirement though, for most folk doing general train shots the 300d will work perfectly.

 

I'm not particularly partisan in terms of manufacturer, i'm only talking Canon as that's what I know most about (as Trevor says, watch out as lots of folk are, and they will have great delight in telling you that their favourite model X is subtly better specced than model Y!!)

 

The truth is that for the vast majority of folk any DSLR will be more than capable of doing more than they need.

 

Again part of the logic for thinking of the 20d as an upgrade path for me from the 300d would be that it uses the same resources (batteries/cards) as the 300d so I don't have to start again with that kind of thing, the 350d in contrast uses a different battery so i'd have to buy at least one more to keep the same capability.

[Oldddudders]

Pretty sound advice coming from all directions here. One of the "fashionable" measures of virility in DSLRs is megapixels (MP), and you may find some shop trying to convince you that this is a be-all and end-all. It ain't. I have a Nikon D40 (6MP) - Nikon's cheapest-ever DSLR, recently discontinued - which takes excellent pics and produces very pleasing A3 prints - and most people don't even have an A3 printer. I also get rather good pics out of my 2004 D2h - at 4.1MP - and I wasn't too unhappy with my original secondhand 1999 Nikon D1 at 2.7MP, either!

 

The Canon D300 and upwards range is, as has been said, well worth looking at, ditto Nikon D40/50/60/70 (oddly the D70 is the oldest of those, but still 6MP, so hardly lacking). Do your homework on the Internet and find out about each model that interests you. There are issues of lens compatibility within ranges - e.g. the Nikon D40 can only function fully with AFS lenses, and other makes may have the same limitations. There are also independent lens makes that may be more affordable - especially secondhand. Sigma and Tamron are the leaders in my view, but again check for absolute compatibilty.

 

Importantly for lineside photography, the DSLR will usually deliver the shot virtually immediately you press the button. Many lesser cameras often will not!

[Lord of the Badgers]

I can only echo OldDudders sentiment. I notice an early respondee suggested buying a high megapixel compact. It's a false economy image quality wise - high megapixel sensors on compacts will produce inferior (albeit very nice in isolation) images compared to even the D40 as mentioned above. Too many pixels crammed onto a tiny sensor = noise & washed out colour (due to crude noise suppression) & tiny inefficient lenses.

 

compacts have tiny sensors (unless they're a leica x1 or one of the new semi-compacts which have removable lenses) compared to SLRs. you need pixels not to be too crammed over high pixel counts. no one prints much beyond A4 anyway.

 

 

The likes of the d40 and the Canon 20d will pan a 12mp compact for sheer image quality, and you won't need flash nearly as much. oh & the AF will mostly be streets ahead speedwise.

[Pinkmouse]

I can't disagree with 'owt said above, but as an option, also have a look at the Olympus E420. It doesn't have a lot of bells and whistles, but does take very good pics.

[tebee]

I think I would second(or third or whatever) the advice to go for a used semi-pro DSLR a few years old. There are a few around that have been very well used but most of the pro photographers would only use one of these as a second, backup camera, so most have years of life left.

 

I think (most) Canon lenses have superb optics, though some of the recent outsourced Chinese made ones are not so good, so tend to stick with them.

 

I've just taken my own advice and picked up a Canon 20D with a 18-55 image stabilizer lens off eBay for £215 - it arrived yesterday so I was playing with it last night which accounts for my late reply to this thread.....

 

There is lots on eBay though the prices vary wildly, most of the buy-it-now's are NOT bargains and should be avoided. If you want a real bargain and are prepared to take a risk, bid on a body only DSLR were the photo shows the body without the cap on where the lens should be. This is a no-no, there is a possibility the sensor may be contaminated by dust if you do this, so many people will not bid on one of these. It means the seller does not know much about what he is selling. It's the equivalent of selling a steam loco and calling the tender a coal wagon and showing in the picture attached to the loco the wrong way around ! The downside is that you may end up with a camera with dust contamination, but it may be possible to carefully clean the sensor and even if you can't the results will still be way better than a compact !

[Chrislock]

Hi Danny,

I think it's true to say that any DSLR will knock the spots off a compact.Its to do with sensor size and lack of that shutter delay you get with compacts.

I have had a Canon 400D, which felt great from the first time I picked it up, is intuitive to use and I have no urge to change it for a supposedly superior model. Coupled with a EFS 18-75 lens it just delivers superb pictures, even on auto!

The lens cost as much as the camera in fact, and I would reiterate the advice about buying secondhand for that reason - it increases your options.

 

Don't worry about ISO or owt else at this stage.

A DSLR will not disappoint you - and you may even find a new and rewarding hobby!!

Remember to budget for a decent sized memory card!

Regards,

Chris

[Pete the Elaner]

I have not gone digital with my SLRs yet, but have my eyes open.

Some good advice above. I was disappointed that several replies were posted before Olddudders mentioned that more pixels are not better. That's one of the best pieces of advice you can follow. Who cares if you have more pixels when the colour is bleeding across them?

 

I agree with looking at 2nd hand too. I know several semi-pro photographers & they have to keep renewing their equipment to keep up with competitors. Their old, well looked-after kit is more than good enough for most amateurs, especially those who have been using compacts. Pro gear is more rugged & less likely to fail.

 

There may be a price gap between compact & SLR but the difference in quality & flexibility is enormous.

 

Check the number of lenses available. Upgrading lenses then bodies while maintaining compatibility is a good upgrade path. Unfortunately the best lenses don't appear on e-bay very often as they age less quickly than bodies.

You may also want to move on to model photography. It is worth checking what lenses & filters are available for this too.

 

Manual photography is fun. You may not know much about this now, but it is worth learning about.

[Lord of the Badgers]

 

 

There is lots on eBay though the prices vary wildly, most of the buy-it-now's are NOT bargains and should be avoided. If you want a real bargain and are prepared to take a risk, bid on a body only DSLR were the photo shows the body without the cap on where the lens should be. This is a no-no, there is a possibility the sensor may be contaminated by dust if you do this, so many people will not bid on one of these. It means the seller does not know much about what he is selling. It's the equivalent of selling a steam loco and calling the tender a coal wagon and showing in the picture attached to the loco the wrong way around ! The downside is that you may end up with a camera with dust contamination, but it may be possible to carefully clean the sensor and even if you can't the results will still be way better than a compact !

 

Just a tip with regards to dust, start with a rocket blower brush (any good photographic retailer), lots of people are keen to rush to all those "sensor swab" things, but in all my years of digital SLR - since 2002 - I've never used a sensor swab, always being nervy of damage. I've always triggered up the mirror & given some good blasts from the rocket blower.

 

Dust on the sensor isn't necessarily the end of the camera.

 

Only when that doesn't work, then I'd go near the sensor itself.

 

Be sure, perhaps stating the obvious, when changing lenses, point the body downwards as you change the lens. I've heard of loads of people complaining bitterly that my own camera (d3) is a dust magnet.

I've had two specks of dust since I got the camera nearly two years ago.

 

Finally, another complaint is of stuck pixels. This is something to look at, but only if you have lots (RARE). One or two is fairly normal. I had two on my original DSLR (D100) but you saw them only on long exposures & a quick spot of a clone brush removed them. Not that they would've shown up in printing, because they're only one pixel across typically. IMO one or two stuck pixels should not be a cause for regret, since they're usually only visible at 100% zoom - yet you never print at that resolution.

 

Congrats on your Canon - that's great deal on a really nice camera. Gives a lot of current DSLRs a run for their money.

[mcowgill]

I'd just like to add another comment on the perceived need for more Megapixels as the be all and end all of digital cameras.

 

I still use a Nikon D70, the original one I bought when they were serious money died just over year ago when Welsh Highland Railway weather overcame the electronics! It was replaced with a used body off Ebay, same camera, the seller said it had been heavily used and had taken nearly 2000 images, that sounded 'just run in' to me and so it proved.

 

It was only after switching to Digital that I started to get pictures published in the railway press, the lack of immediacy with film meant my newsworthy shots often weren't by the time the slides were back with me. My measley 6 Megapixel Nikon D70 has produced an almost double-page spread in Rail Express magazine. They're a fussy lot at REx, but had no worries about pushing one of my images to that size across the magazine as my first picture for them. I 'm not in any rush to change the camera to produce bigger files.

 

Here's that first published photo from 2005: http://www.cowgill.fotopic.net/p12395417.html

 

Martin

[5944]

the seller said it had been heavily used and had taken nearly 2000 images' date=' that sounded 'just run in' to me and so it proved[/quote']

 

I had a Canon 350D that I replaced with a 7D a few months ago. The 350D had taken 40,000 images and the 7D is already up to nearly 6000 in 4 months. Most of the shots are just practice shots to get the focus or settings right, but it still counts as wear and tear. The only reason I replaced the 350D was because I was looking for a bit more flexibility which the 7D offers, such as video and the ability to take photos in pretty dismal conditions without suffering from excessive grain. The 350D was perfectly capable of providing photos good enough to be printed up to A3, and possibly even larger.

 

The 350D took a hell of a lot of abuse, including being dropped multiple times and having a bottle of water explode over it, yet it still kept on working! I had to replace the small internal battery that powers the clock etc. a couple of times, but other than that there was nothing wrong with it. As has been mentioned, get a decent lens for it. The standard kit lens is a cheap piece of plastic, which I replaced within a few months of buying the camera. You're also better off buying a few lenses, rather than something like an 18-300mm lens. The distortion at 18mm is awful, and at 300mm the image won't be that sharp. The 7D I bought came with an 18-135mm lens, which is reasonable, though still quite poor at full wide angle.

 

One site I do look at when shopping around for camera bits is http://www.dpreview.com/ There is a lot of useful stuff on there, not just the reviews. A lot of it doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but I find it isn't biased in its reviews

[Chrislock]

http://www.cameralabs.com

is also good as they give you a video walkthrough of most models, and have quite a backcatalogue if your thinking used.

[Coombe Barton]

For a wedding last year I was loaned the groom's DSLR set. My neck suffered for a week because it was so ****** heavy.

 

When I last boiught a cam I looked at SLR types, looked at what lenses I'd used with the 35mm SLR I had, and decided that 99% of my pix didn't use anything but the standard 28-110 zoom. I also looked at the environment I was photting in. It was:

• Quarries
• Mines
• Buildings
• Archaeology
• Fieldwork

So with the possibility of dust ingress and the problems that causes I chose a Fujifilm S9500 (this was 4 years ago) because it has a manual zoom control and it fitted in my hand. The successor is similar, I believe. Apart from auto, there's shutter and aparture priority, full manual control and a load of other tweaks. However it's only up to about f3.5 but is does go down to 1cm on close focus. I have an orchid on a display wall blown up to A1, the original bloom being about 2cm across.

 

It prints out at A2 fine, A1 is OK, sometimes better than others

 

Now apart from all this of my own use I'm the official Faculty photographer, taking all people and ceremonies, and getting stuff used by the University for prospectuses.

 

So before you spend, why do you need an SLR? Would a decent bridge camera give you as much, and be less costly? I though that I'd be changing to an SLR by now, but having seen what this one does, I'm currently thinking "Why bother".

[Oldddudders]

So before you spend, why do you need an SLR? Would a decent bridge camera give you as much, and be less costly? I though that I'd be changing to an SLR by now, but having seen what this one does, I'm currently thinking "Why bother".

I think the OP's point was that he was not getting good results with dynamic subjects, like rather quick trains on WCML. Your experiences don't mention that sort of action photography.

 

I'm happy to use a Samsung compact (with Schneider lens) for round and about photography, but stick by my point - DSLRs will usually take a pic when you want to, not after they've had a bit of a thunk about it first!

[Coombe Barton]

Yes, agreed - my subjects do tend to stay still - they have done for centuries.

[Lord of the Badgers]

For a wedding last year I was loaned the groom's DSLR set. My neck suffered for a week because it was so ****** heavy.

 

 

Have carried nearly 2kg of camera & lens on regular 6 mile hikes, and I'm no body builder I can assure you!

Yes, that's rather heavy, but it's all in the straps. Optech straps are my preferred ones. Yes the camera is heavy, but I'm going to guess the Groom's camera came with it's standard webbing strap (they usually are emblazoned with the camera model) - whereas straps like optech ones have a mix of polypropylene & a load bearing webbing strap above. a mere tenner saves your back/neck I can tell you. You would not believe the difference.

 

But, nowt wrong with bridge cameras, or something like a Tz7/10, if the size of the sensor & IQ difference isn't noticeable to you. True enough, lugging a pro/semi-pro body around a party is frankly daft... it's just that DSLRs give you more room to grow. Horses/courses I believe is the analogy I'm scratching for.

 

Mind you, I wouldn't use a bridge camera for photographing a wedding either... but then I "do" weddings...