Hi all

 

I have been developing interest in photography and I have decided to give it a go. Just a hobby, really, nothing more.

 

I have made some researches, but to be honest, I have no idea what to look for in a camera.

I have found this one, for example http://www.amazon.co.uk/Canon-EF-50-1-8-Lens/dp/B00005K47X

Good? Bad? What shall I look for?

 

Any advice will be much appreciated Thank you.

I swear by Canon cameras and camcorders. I used to have this one http://wdf.co/hW (or similar model - bought abroad). Depends on your budget really. A lot of photo friends are fans of Nikon, but Canon for me all the way. If you're looking to get into photography, I recommend a point and click as well. It's easy to get carried away with what megapixel they are, but it doesn't really mean much. The camera I use most is the Canon Powershot S95. The next model up is a much better but looks like it's from WWII

Thanks, I have looked at both As for budget - I see there are a few paying options (that won't shock the SH lol).

What else would you say I would need to get to go with the camera?

Well, I am not really looking to get into photography as a profession, just a hobby for now. Too bored at the weekends, I guess

What will you be talking pictures of ?

 

I like taking landscapes for me a tripod is a must you can get cheap ones to begin with, also a couple of filters a polarizer and some grads

 

if you lived closer to me you could have borrowed my camera and gear I don't use it very often these days

Thanks, I have looked at both As for budget - I see there are a few paying options (that won't shock the SH lol).

What else would you say I would need to get to go with the camera?

Well, I am not really looking to get into photography as a profession, just a hobby for now. Too bored at the weekends, I guess

 

Personally I would go with a point and click with manual settings (hence going for the s95). The problem with the larger SLR's (as good as they are) it's lugging them around which is a nuisance. You can get surprisingly good results with a point and click as well. I have a good friend who's part of a photo community and he recommended me this site http://photo.net/. Good for inspiration, reviews - the usual. I'd start small then if you get an itch for photography, go up a couple of models and get an SLR

What will you be talking pictures of ?

 

I like taking landscapes for me a tripod is a must you can get cheap ones to begin with, also a couple of filters a polarizer and some grads

 

if you lived closer to me you could have borrowed my camera and gear I don't use it very often these days

 

Well, I would love taking pictures of people, really Nature is good, too, and we have beautiful views here.

Thank you very much for your offer, if I lived closer, it would have been much appreciated

 

 

 

Personally I would go with a point and click with manual settings (hence going for the s95). The problem with the larger SLR's (as good as they are) it's lugging them around which is a nuisance. You can get surprisingly good results with a point and click as well. I have a good friend who's part of a photo community and he recommended me this site http://photo.net/. Good for inspiration, reviews - the usual. I'd start small then if you get an itch for photography, go up a couple of models and get an SLR

 

Nice site Thank you for your recommendations, I will really look into that. Need to get to know more about the terms, as at the moment that tells me very little, but I will get there eventually (hope so), so just bear with me for now.

I picked up my first ever slr camera a few months ago, I picked mine by going on pc world website and out of the cameras I went on Amazon And picked the one with the best reviews lol probably a bit of a unorthodox way but its a camera that has got me started on my photography adventure and its hard picking your first one.

 

No matter what camera you pick there is always a bigger dog that is better,so read reviews and get plenty of advice which I am sure wont be to far behind and a budget you are happy with, any photographer friends that may let you borrow their camera to try?

 

I want to learn about food photography and stock photography myself, I love the idea of working with a good photo and adding another niche to go into my portfolio at some point.My little one has started to take an interest and if she sees a nice spot with flowers I will get dragged there and she loves to take control of the camera.

 

It is a Nikon D3100 I have, and learning very slowly.

 

best of luck Scott

Thank you spweb

Certainly hard to pick a first camera, I agree. No photographer friends, either

How long have you been into photography? Food photography sounds like something I might try, too, sounds very interesting.

I find people fascinating atm, so my first attempts will be in this direction, but food is great, too.

Just a few months not practiced as much as I would like, I am a complete beginner out of every 10 pictures there is a decent one

I watch videos on Lynda and can play with the camera settings of auto and hopefully more time will bring more knowledge, I know a guy who was getting up at 6am and doing a lot of preparation to take a photo and his best photo was one he took at random.

 

 

I made myself a diy light tent i bought some artist canvas panels and made a box out of them about 20 x 16 inches and only paid something like £10 at most, it works and gives even light, and Photoshop is good for telling you in the information what settings you have used If your camera doesn't tell you which is good for keeping track of what aperture or shutter speed etc you used.

 

Me and my daughter went to cheap toy store as well, she has a creative streak and one of our projects was make up a mock website

For the toys we bought, only 8 but she likes to get involved and it keeps her creative mind going.

 

People are interesting, and snapping them in every day motion is good, i am a fan of snapping when they are living life normal, getting them in for a portrait shot to me it feels a tad fake and set up. what I find amazing about photography is that it grounds you

To earth it slows you down to look and appreciate things in life, to easy to walk past something but photography when lining up a shot

You look at things in a different light

 

Here is some of my faves I have took.

 

This was using my light tent, went outside on a sunny day

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/n12tc8csjokssc1/2013-05-25%2016.33.52.jpg

 

And my photographer friend let me in his studio one day I'm sure he said low key lighting.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/i451xsipfqn3bgc/2013-04-29%2022.20.16.jpg

 

And my daughter I like using trees as a background.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/48151n37p2n554h/2013-06-08%2015.36.09.jpg

 

And at one point when visiting my Grans grave Off all places I took this lol.

 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/5o9ma7dv5g7xg07/2013-05-14%2012.20.46.jpg

Edited June 25, 201313 yr by spweb

spweb, you are certainly passionate about photography

I like your pictures, especially the one of your daughter - sweet picture. I love the flowers, too and the picture of that blond lady

Probably what I will be aiming at is portraits, just I like to see people's faces

Thanks a lot for sharing these.

point and click is great for convenience but a base model SLR will give you a way better picture in most cases - just the quality of the lens, and the image it produces is far better - crisper. i have a powershot sx200 is that has manual settings and does pretty good macro photos too! but compared with a 'normal' SLR it's just not in the same league

 

if i can show off my amateur but enthusiastic pics as an e.g. the middle pic here of my daugher was taken with my pocket canon (oops that sounds rude, sorry

http://gekkoweb.com/portfolio/valokuvaus.php most of the others were taken with a canon d500 or d600.

 

i guess camera prices are pretty reasonable in the UK now so you could start with a pocket cam, then move up to an SLR if you think you'll have the budget? you can use both anyway, like the pocket camera is handy to have for video as well as 'snaps'

I got an Olympus Tough, I'm satisfied with the picture quality (though my friends Nikon is superior but five times the price), but my one is great for me because I work on a building site I can drop it a lot and it's fine. It's even waterproof up to 25 metres I think.

 

Very happy with it.

Very good hobby, i like it too! As photo reporter in the past i would choose fast shutter camera with good color balance

This might be handy for any beginners http://dryreading.com/camera/index.html

Thank you very much everyone for the recommendations

I will make sure to post what I end up with

Thanks

Teodora, have you chosen a camera yet? If not, I'd like to weigh in; how advanced are you looking at going, ordinary digital camera or a digital SLR? I've owned a couple of digital SLRs (which for intents and purposes are superior to conventional digital cameras if you're looking for 100% control over your shots), although they might not be what you'd consider cheap (depends on your budget?). The first one I owned, which was fantastic as a newbie to the DSLR world, was a Nikon D40X, which sell for around £250 (both new and used). If you're looking more advanced, the next stage up for me was my current camera - a Nikon D5000, which has a flip-out screen. It's not cheap, around £500 still I believe, but I forked out the extra cash for this model because the flip-out screen's usefulness cannot be justified with mere words - it's that brilliant.

 

Anyway, hope my history with DSLRs has helped, somehow.

I have a couple of Sony DSLRs plus some great 'G' lenses but they are really heavy to lug around. I recently purchased a bridge camera - the Panasonic Lumix FZ200 and I am amazed with the results.

I would highly recommend this camera to a beginner. It has a 24 x zoom lens - equivalent to 25 - 600mm with F2.8 across the whole zoom range. This makes it fantastic for wildlife photography (particularly good for birds).

Have a look at the DPreview - http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/panasonic-lumix-dmc-fz200

Thanks very much for the advice everyone My photography plans are on hold atm, but I definitely plan to go ahead with it later on, when I get more time