My 13 year old has been saving his paper round money for a decent camera, he has about £250 to spend.. He's been reading reviews and come up with a Nikon D3100.

Has anyone experience of one of these? Is it a good buy for that price range - or any other reccomendations

Thank you.

I have no specific experience with the D3100 but plenty with the D7000. Based on my own experience and that of two semi pro photographer friends of mine, I recommend going for Nikon. Both my friends change from Canon to Nikon as Nikon seems to be a bit better than Canon at the moment.

I recommended my dad to go for Nikon iso the Canon he was looking at and I recommended the D3100 based on the reviews I read.

So in short, the D3100 would be an excellent starting point for him working towards the future, assuming he wants to upgrade over the years, the lenses can be used until he would go full frame (very expensive that step). MY 2010 5.0 SC Galway green and sand interior!!
Have the Faultmate MSV2 Extreme to be tinkering with the settings etc. !!

Thank you

just been reading this, http://snapsort.com/compare/Nikon-D3200-vs...ifferences

and wondering if the 3200 is the way to go

I suppose it's like anything else, and there's always something a bit better for a bit more money

have a read here John, some interesting points made,

http://www.fullfatrr.com/forum/topic18709.html ... - .- -.




Y. O. L. O.
.

Well, I've used Nikon for decades now, right since the F1 in 35mm.

Anyway, Nikon / Canon. Meh. Both very good indeed and what keeps folks loyal is the cost of the glassware. I could afford a Canon body but replacing 3 rather expensive lenses is not trivial.

Your lad won't go far wrong with Nikon TBH and whilst there are very credible alternatives out there, for example the Sony series are very good indeed, but then there's naff all for sale in the way of s/h glassware when you compare to Nikon or Canon.

In terms of specifications, well come the end it doesn't really matter. I have friends with Nikon gear and they take dreadful pictures. But then again, they wouldn't take good pictures with a Sony either. It's the guy or girl pointing the camera, what he sees and at just the right moment decides to press the shutter button who decides if a picture is any good. Specifications will only determine the quality of the image, not the greatness of the photo.

As he's starting out, the D3100 is fine as will be the rival Canon. His imagination will be the determining factor and if he loves the hobby, upgrades to the body are easy if you have a selection of decent glassware in place. That's not so easy with Sony or the other relative newcomers to DSLR and neither do they have quite such a healthy resale value come trade-up time.

Look at it another way. Anything in that league is going to produce vastly better results than a phone camera.

Thanks Stan, never thought of using 'search' for camera posts

mzplcg - you say "In terms of specifications, well come the end it doesn't really matter. I have friends with Nikon gear and they take dreadful pictures. But then again, they wouldn't take good pictures with a Sony either. It's the guy or girl pointing the camera, what he sees and at just the right moment decides to press the shutter button who decides if a picture is any good. Specifications will only determine the quality of the image, not the greatness of the photo. "


I think (but then I'm biast ) that for his age he does see a nice shot, he took the pics below with his little pocket camera

Click image to enlarge

Click image to enlarge

Johnte, if your lad can do that with a pocket camera, sell your FF and buy him a Hasselblad Medium format digital 10 grand ought to get you started with a decent lens as well

Rather more seriously, take a look at places like Grays of Westminster and their second hand selection. A decent S/H body and a versatile zoom lens will serve him very well and cost you similar money to a lesser "new" item. Like I said before, it's the photographer who sees the photo and the camera which makes the image.

Take him with you to decide on his preferred brand and you will keep the lenses forever. In other words, get the body choice right first time, and speaking personally I would let this be his choice. He will know what feels comfortable and what's right for him.

Dom.

I'd look at buying second hand. I use a D300S and picked up a used D90 (with the stability motors in the body) for £100 as a back up body. Regards
Mark

2009 D4; 1993 Classic 3.9 VSE

I recently dropped the D7000 and the Nikkor 18-105 lens bajonet broke (just two slivers of plastic came off ). So I decided to go one step up to a 18-200 Nikkor. A brand new one was quite steep (compared to the fairly cheap (18-105). So then I found a D80 with the 18-200 with only 4000 clicks on it.

Got that, bought a brand new 18-55 and sent that to my dad (D80 trumps the D3100 in specs more or less) and I have a very nice 18-200 for less overall than a brand new one.

Now comes the twist, my dad (being a very stubborn man, not that I'm anything like him mind you ) bought a new Sony (instead of at the end of the year as he promised). So now he is going to compare them side by side and if he decides to keep the Sony, I have a D80 with a 70-300 Nikkor (I already had that lens) for the wildlife shots for our next vacation (South Africa, Kruger and other parks coming up in December).

Anyway, bodies like that (who are more "capable" than the bottom of the range cameras) can be found for decent prices, even with warranty if you go to a shop. Since he seems quite keen and quite handy with a camera, that could indeed be a good way for him to go. MY 2010 5.0 SC Galway green and sand interior!!
Have the Faultmate MSV2 Extreme to be tinkering with the settings etc. !!

A really very good Nikon (if you can find one that is!) is the D40. I know its old BUT it has a flash sync speed of 1/500th of a second (usually all cameras are synced to 1/60th). This means you can 'freeze' water splashes!!

have a look at this guys site for Reviews and such, Ken Rockwell ( http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/d40/d40-specifications.htm )

I bought me neice a D400 2 years ago for her birthday and she loves it! It cost around £150 off eBay with the kit 18-55mm and a 55-200mm lens.

For lenses, I can highly recommend the Nikon 10-200mm lens with Image Stabilisation, its a cracking all round lens!

The other good thing about Nikon is that all the lenses are interchangeable with most of the cameras, even back to the 35mm film (obviously AF doesnt work with some), unlike Canon where in a lot of cases you have to invest in new lenses!

Read through Ken Rockwells reviews of the Nikon cameras though. I have a D80 with 18-200MM Nikon and 150-400MM Sigma lenses

Also, regarding Mp (megapixels) sometimes more isnt better! This from Ken Rockwell:

Personally, I set my D3200 down to its lowest resolution, 6 megapixels, for all my photos. 6 MP is more than enough for great 12 x 18" and 20 x 30" (50 x 75cm) prints, if you know what you're doing. If you don't know what you're doing, you'll get soft images regardless of what camera you use.

http://kenrockwell.com/nikon/d3200.htm

http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/d3100.htm

mzplcg wrote:

Take him with you to decide on his preferred brand and you will keep the lenses forever. In other words, get the body choice right first time, and speaking personally I would let this be his choice. He will know what feels comfortable and what's right for him.

Dom.

Thanks for the sdvice.. normally I would agree, but he would be the first to admit he doesn't know enough about the subject yet to decide what he wants, he just needs a bit of guidence on what would be good to 'learn' on

Does this look OK ?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/261288332708?ssP...1423.l2649

Oh and a word of advice. Although Sigma lenses are made with getting up to date info from Nikon, they don't always work as well as the Nikkor lenses. And that is based on my experience as well as info I found online.

So I'd suggest to go for a Nikon body and Nikkor lenses and let him slowly build up his kit.

If you estimate the chances of him getting into real top pro-photography then DX lenses will not be a great investment as he will ultimately switch to a full frame. But having said that, non-DX lenses are very expensive.

My feeling is, you are doing well to let him start with a good starter kit like the D3200 in the Ebay add or something like it. Then some good training (online or real classes) and then time will tell how he progresses. There may not be a lot of money in photographing (or so I'm told) but a really good photographer can make a decent living and allow for investing in better and better equipment.

One of my co-workers is growing his hobby into semi-pro (he doesn't want to give up his "day job" anytime soon) and will probably be able to start at least break even (and he can only work half the year as the other half he is working offshore). But even that is great if your kid could go to that level and get a few shots per week sold to keep the hobby going.

It is not all about the equipment, the creativity and feeling for the job is the most important part (I have some quite decent equipment but only get great shots by being lucky, not being clever or creative). Once the creative side works, the rest will follow eventually  MY 2010 5.0 SC Galway green and sand interior!!
Have the Faultmate MSV2 Extreme to be tinkering with the settings etc. !!

Johnte wrote:

Does this look OK ?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/261288332708?ssP...1423.l2649

Missed it

But will carry on looking for something similar

As others have said, it's the lenses, not the body, where the $ is. If you already have some lenses around, your decision has been made. I've got a Canon, which I like a lot, but I bought it because it was the best deal at the time. Don't dismiss getting one second hand - there are lots of nice, older cameras.

Any decent DSLR should give him the flexibility and creative control he wants.

Kids (AND OTHERS) have been known to drop or loose things. Get one that's cheap enough that he can use it without worrying about it! Not that he gets a licence to abuse it, but really, if you were buying a FFRR for serious off roading, would a 2014 Supercharged Autobiography be the most appropriate choice?