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General discussion

Camera Advice?

Apr 6, 2005 12:02AM PDT

I have been wanting to get into photography for a long time. I really enjoy taking pictures and when I have the opportunity to borrow a friends camera, I take some great pictures - some have even been published or used in small publications.

I have about $1,000 to spend right now on a camera setup but I am new to this so I am not sure what I need. I would like to be able to take all sorts of pictures, ranging from outdoor nature pictures on a sunny day to pictures of friends in a darker room at a restaurant.

It seems that there are TONS of options and I have asked my friends who are into photography and all have them have different answers for what I should do. And it's for me hard to decipher the difference between all of the features that the various cameras have to offer.

Keep in mind that this $1,000 is for EVERYTHING... the camera, a case, memory card(s), battery(ies), tripod, etc. etc. I have heard Nikkon is a great product, and have used a Nikkon 5700 and liked it. But then I looked at the Nikkon 8800 (in my price range with all of the accessores) and I don't understand what the features are of it.

Basically, I am not nearly advanced enough to buy an SLR. So I need a Point and Shoot camera that can take great pictures that I could do alot with, ranging from trying to sell them as stock footage to taking pictures for people at private parties and posting them on a website.

Any information or suggestions that you have would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Discussion is locked

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Try...
Apr 6, 2005 12:15AM PDT

"I have the opportunity to borrow a friends camera, I take some great pictures - some have even been published or used in small publications."

There's your answer. Since you've had great luck with what you borrowed, why not buy the same thing?

Bob

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Cameras
Apr 6, 2005 12:54AM PDT

You may not be able to find a new Nikon 5700 any more.
It came out in May of 2002 and was replaced by the Nikon 8700 in January of 2004.

The price is the same.

If you liked the 5700 you will love the 8700.

.............

While you are looking at that class of camera, here are three more to consider:

Canon G6
Olympus C-8080
Sony V3

Here is a side-by-side look at the cameras:

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/compare_post.asp?method=sidebyside&cameras=nikon_cp5700%2Cnikon_cp8700%2Ccanon_g6%2Coly_c8080wz%2Csony_dscv3&show=all

............................

All of these camera can be used as point-and-shoot, and when you find you need something more, they have all the manual controls you could want.

Something that will grow with you.

...
..
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How about this?
Apr 7, 2005 6:41AM PDT
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Advice
Apr 8, 2005 3:46AM PDT

If you're just getting into digital photography on a amature level, there's really no need in spending $1000 dollars unless you want something super-high quality. If you're just going to be taking regular picuters like everyday people do, then you probly arnt going to want much more than a 3 or 4 Mega-pixel camera (which is how many millions of pixels per picture). I've got a Cannon Powershot A75. It's a 3 megapixel camera and it takes great pictures. It's got all sorts of scene-asist modes, different settings and it can be used as completly manual, from the shutter speed all the way to manual focusing. It's a great camera and it's point and shoot, takes compact flash memory cards. It comes with a 32MB card, but i'd suggest buying a bigger one right off the bat, it depends on how many pictures you'll be taking and how often you'll be at your computer to download them and delete them from the camera. The Camera i have is around $300 and memory cards range from $10 to as much as $100, and cases are pretty cheap. The Cannon camera is basically ready to go right out of the box, it comes with everything you need.

It really all depends on what you want to do with your camera, but for someone that's buying their first digital camera, i wouldn't pay more than you need to, and it doesn't sound like you need to pay $1000 dollars even with accessories.

The digital camera market is pretty idiot-proof these days. Just get on the computer, look at different point-and-shoot cameras, read reviews, see what other biginners think and settle on one that you like.