1st SLR

gundy74 · Jun 12, 2006

Im shopping for an entry level digital SLR to buy at the end of the summer. But Im on a pretty tight budget. Right now, my main obsession is the Nikon D50 with 18-55mm lens (I'll probably buy a more powerful zoom lens for sports later). Does anybody have any suggestions for a camera or any other tips for a new photographer? If it helps, I'll be a photographer for my school paper so my shots will mostly be portraits and sports. Any info is welcome.

bitteraspects · Jun 12, 2006

the d50 is just about the cheapest entry level slr on the market right now, so if budget is your main concern, id say go for it. id personally go with the canon 350D (rebel xt) which is in the same price range.

magicmonkey · Jun 12, 2006

I'm a 350D user and have no complaints at all, well built peice of kit without spending silly money...

gundy74 · Jun 13, 2006

do either of you know of any good sites to buy the D50 from? Someplace cheap, but reliable, and preferably on the continental US (cheaper shipping + handling).

officersdr · Jun 14, 2006

look on ebay, they have tons

hobbes28 · Jun 14, 2006

Any one of our sponsors are great places to buy cameras from and all have really low prices. (Not saying that because they're our sponsors, rather they're our sponsors because we like buying from them.

)

bitteraspects · Jun 14, 2006

agreed. i buy glass from b&h often. i would suggest looking there for your camera.

benhasajeep · Jun 14, 2006

Since I am a Nikon guy and jumped ship and bought a Canon 20D for my first dslr. I still wanted a Nikon digital to use my good Nikon lenses I already had.

I bought a refurbished Nikon D50 on ebay. The only way you could tell was the box said refurbished. It looks absolutely new. I have not used it extensivily but all appears to be working as promised. It came with a 1 year Mack warranty (90 day Nikon also). Body only, was $400 plus shipping. Thats 1/3 of what I paid for the 20D!

gundy74 · Jun 30, 2006

YAY im getting my D50 tomorrow!!! i have one question for D50 owners. When the top LCD screen reads a number with a subscript zero in the shutter spor, does that mean thousandths of a second. For example, if it reads 4, i know that means 1/4 sec shutter speed. is 4 with a small zero 1/40, 1/400, 1/4,000 or what. when i tested a D50, i didnt notice any more than one small zero at a time (but i was in a rush so i could have missed it). Any answers?

Unimaxium · Jun 30, 2006

I'm a Canon guy so I can't speak from experience but I would have to guess that the little zero refers to whole seconds, or perhaps decimal seconds (rather than fractions). The way it works on my Canon cams is that for fractions of seconds it just reads 250 for 1/250th, 10 for 1/10th, etc. until it gets to what it reads as 0''3 which means 0.3 seconds. Then after 0''8 it goes to whole seconds like 1'' for 1 second, up to 30'' for 30s. Hope that helps. I'm guessing that Nikon just uses a little circle instead of the '' mark.

Of course, the easiest way to find out is to play around with shutter priority mode and see how long the shutter stays open for when you change it to different settings ;-)

EDIT: Now I see what you might be talking about. If the display looks like this, then the little zeroes are just zeroes. In that image the shutter speed is reading "1/8000th." I guess nikon makes them smaller than other numbers on the LCD for some reason.

fotogenik · Jun 30, 2006

gundy74 said:
YAY im getting my D50 tomorrow!!! i have one question for D50 owners. When the top LCD screen reads a number with a subscript zero in the shutter spor, does that mean thousandths of a second. For example, if it reads 4, i know that means 1/4 sec shutter speed. is 4 with a small zero 1/40, 1/400, 1/4,000 or what. when i tested a D50, i didnt notice any more than one small zero at a time (but i was in a rush so i could have missed it). Any answers?

Honestly I have never noticed any subscript numbers. When I am on 4000 shutter speed the dial says 4000.

I went and got my camera and looked at it just now and I think what you are referring to is just the way the LCD shows 0's they are all small so if the display reads 4o then you are on 140th, 4oo is 1/400th and 4ooo is 1/4000th. Thats the way I am reading it anyway.

Cheers,

Adam_Safar · Jul 2, 2006

Hi,

I probably will ask a stupid question, but this is the beginers place and I just bought my Canon30 camera yesterday.

- When I upload the pictures, it upload in the large size (3504x2536) BUT 72 DPI, is that good enough?! Where can I change it if it's not the best?!

It's a brilliant camera by the way, I love it, but there is a lot to learn.

Thanks for your help.
- A

gundy74 · Jul 5, 2006

ok didnt get my D50 (somthing about mom not wanting to mess up her credit). i have half of the money saved up for it though.

new predicament: a store near me is selling the Olympus Evolt E-500 for the same price as the Nikon D50.

The advantages of the E500 are
-auto sensor cleaner
-1.9 meg resolution over the D50

Disadvantages
-slow start up
-no info LCD (aperture, shutter, etc must be accessed on the main LCD which probably murders batteries)

everywhere i looked, the olympus cost more so it was automatically disqualified, but now its fair game. anyone with the Olympus tell me more please.