absolute beginer

[clickflash]

hi,

I am new to this forum and also absolute new to the world of photography. i don't belongs to photographic art field or any other, but recently while i was reading a book a chapter about photography make me interested in this. so i came to this forum. So any guide to where to start off will be helpfull and i will will appriciate that very much.

what i concluded that i need a camera first to get started. I dont have any camera now for photographical purpose. so i like to know about it too. how to choose a camera for beginner in an affordable budget.

Thanks for reading.

 

[cgipson1]

We would need to know what you consider an affordable budget.. that varies for all of us. Also.. many of us may not be familiar with prices in your area of the world, but we do have members that should be able to help.

 

[clickflash]

I know i should have specify the budget. I just don't have any idea how much range is the price for camera used in specific photography use. in general guide about cameras would not be bad. so that i can guess the things.

 

[sovietdoc]

Digital SLR buying guide - CNET Reviews

Oh and what are you trying to do with photography? Just buy a camera and try things out or do you have a plan of what you want to do?

 

[clickflash]

nothing any specific may be in web design later. i did not think about it yet. i do programming and web developing so i have no idea about it. some days ago i read through a book of web designing (it is not my field either) book where there was a dedicated chapter about photography and i browse through some stock images site for a personal project and i don't know what happend it makes me interested. I liked the photogarphs and how they convey messages through it.

and ohh thanks for the link. i will check it out.

 

[EDL]

Read some of the specific forums here and see examples of other's work. Find what you like and go from there.

I like Macro, and as a result of this site, HDR now too, so I tend to frequent those sections of the forum the most. I am able to see what others are doing and they are always willing to tell you how they do it, so you can get an idea of the equipment used and why.

Deciding on what you want to photograph will be the starting point for deciding which equipment to buy. It will really pay off in the long run to decide that now since this is by no means a cheap hobby. You'll learn that the camera body isn't your main consideration. The lenses will be at the top of the list and you will want to buy equipment and a camera to use the brand of lens you want/need to do the type of photography you want to do. Fortunately, there isn't a huge difference across the major brand names for the most part. Only a few examples of brand specific lenses that are specialized, so be sure that if the type you want to do might use one of those lenses at some point, plan for that now.

 

[clickflash]

it was helpful.that is what i wanted to hear.thanks. is it possible to mount any lenses to particular camera? or it is depends on cameras? what does makes different in the price? is it possible to upgrade existing camera later?

 

[clickflash]

i visit the macro forum. i did not what it is called but that was one of the type i am interested. and also like to capture landscape,nature,people,cityscape photos

 

[Solarflare]

1. There is sadly no general standard about lens mounts.

So if you buy a Nikon camera, you'll need Nikon lenses. Or if you buy a Canon, you'll be stuck (mostly) with Canon lenses (*).

Those are the two "big players". There are many more. Fujifilm choose their DSLRs to be compatible with Nikon, but they stopped doing them. Sony took over Minolta and is compatible with their old lenses. But these cases are exceptions.

See for example here for a list of formats and a (not fully complete !!) list of available lenses for each of them.


2. Difference in price comes from quality, obviously.


3. You cannot upgrade an existing camera. There are much too many things improving at the same time that this would be possible. You can however reuse your "old" lenses with the new camera if you buy the same brand again.

Alternatively, you can sell these lenses to people who still use that type of camera, for a price near the one you bought it, because lenses dont lose value very quickly - some of them might even raise in value if they are discontinued and in high demand.

Digital bodies howeve lose in value quickly, because technology is progressing so fast in this area. However, for example the new Nikon D800 is of such high resolution that only the best of the best Nikon lenses still actually seem to be able to capture it. So it seems we're close to hitting the wall. After this, only larger fotochips and thus larger lenses will still offer improvement, and larger lenses quickly get very expensive.



(*) As the Canon format has more room than the Nikon format, there are Nikon to Canon adapters. However, with those there is no autofocus, so you'll have to focus manually, and thats not an easy thing to do with many digital cameras.

 

[KmH]

There are 3rd party lens makers, like Tamron, Sigma, and Tokina, that make lenses with Nikon, Canon, Sony, and other camera maker lens mounts.

 

[morganza]

Read some of the specific forums here and see examples of other's work. Find what you like and go from there.

I like Macro, and as a result of this site, HDR now too, so I tend to frequent those sections of the forum the most. I am able to see what others are doing and they are always willing to tell you how they do it, so you can get an idea of the equipment used and why.

Deciding on what you want to photograph will be the starting point for deciding which equipment to buy. It will really pay off in the long run to decide that now since this is by no means a cheap hobby. You'll learn that the camera body isn't your main consideration. The lenses will be at the top of the list and you will want to buy equipment and a camera to use the brand of lens you want/need to do the type of photography you want to do. Fortunately, there isn't a huge difference across the major brand names for the most part. Only a few examples of brand specific lenses that are specialized, so be sure that if the type you want to do might use one of those lenses at some point, plan for that now.

I suggest you to listen to this.

 

[slackercruster]

Get some photography books and dvd's from the library. Here is a thread with some suggestions...

Reviews of Photography Books and DVD's - PentaxForums.com

Check out Pentax used gear. VERY affordable way into get into dslr's.

Once your set up...start blasting away and get some feedback on what you shoot.

Good luck!

 

[EDL]

Here's my "journey" to purchase my camera... I only just got my first DSLR....2 days ago...literally. I ultimately decided on the Canon T3i. The T4i that just came out sounds nice, but is out of my price range. I went with Canon (after much reading, looking, posting some questions here on the forums and even changing my mind on what to get several times) because macro is what I want to do and Canon has a pretty sweet macro lens in the MP-E 65mm (a purpose built, macro only lens that does 5:1 magnification). Pricey at $1,000 for the lens, but you can only use it on Canon. In addition, as was touched on, you can get an adapter that will let you mount and use Nikon lenses on Canon bodies (you can't do that with a Nikon body and Canon lenses). That opens up possibilities to use older Nikon lenses that you might find for a bargain. This could be useful for macro if I were to do a reverse lens setup as nearly every Nikon lens has a manual aperture ring and the older Canon lenses don't.

I will shoot other things too, but for me, that one lens is my goal, so Canon it is for me. I also get the benefit of the Nikon lenses as I'll probably look to buy an older one and reverse it for macro until I can afford the MP-E 65.

Outside of that, money is my limiting factor. I just simply can't afford a high-end camera or several high quality lenses all at once. So for me it was either wait a lot longer, save up the money and buy high-end stuff right off the bat...or, go entry level and build slowly. I chose to go entry level because my T3i is capable of a lot more than I am at this point. I get the benefit of having a decent camera now and lots of time to learn and practice. Heck, it's entirely possible I may decide down the road that this is good enough for what I want....who knows.

 

[WilliamDSLR]

Whatever you do, don't spend too much on equipment at this stage. A basic camera would do for the mean time until you find your 'style' so to speak. Take literally hundreds and hundreds of pictures. By this time you will have developed what style of photography you wish to take, whether its portraits, landscapes etc.