New camera needed for hobbie.

magic_tree

Hey everyone.

Im sorry to post such a newbie question.
I have just been asked to submit monthly articles to a wildlife and nature magazine. I was delighted to say the least. My first mission is to get a new camera. I only have an old digital Samsung which has a cracked LCD screen and is well out dated.

I need something that can zoom in and capture detail on wildlife yet can be used for close work on insects and also catch minute detail on them. I would love to have the continuous shooting setting to catch motion pictures and also it would be great to have a 30 sec shutter speed option for rivers etc..

My budget is €300 or there abouts, but the camera HAS to be available from Argos as that is the only place in my local town that sells cameras.

Thank you for any help any of you can offer me to get started.

CabanSail

What sort of Wildlife are you hoping to photograph?

You do realise that your budget is probably about 10% of the lens required, without the camera or tripod for a lot of wildlife photography.

I am not saying this to put you off but you have decided to get involved with one of the genres which requires expensive gear, along with Sports.


The next thing is to gain the knowledge of ho to use the gear.

magic_tree

I have a very good tripod and bag. It will be birds and small mammals like rabbits and squirrels. Basically back garden wildlife. Yet it will need to be able to zoom in for deer and for longer distance shots.

AnCatDubh

maybe go second hand. for example a nikon D60 kit on adverts. €360 asked but put an offer on it somewhere > €300. (not mine by the way, i've no connection with it).

You'd get the Nikon D60 camera body, charger, battery grip, kit lens 18-55mm VR lens, and for your wildlife the sigma 70-300mm plus a Lowepro case to put them all in. The 70-300mm sigma will give a bit of reach in terms of zoom. It's not massive as I understand what might be needed for wildlife but within your budget it will be quite good. That's not a bad bit of kit for the asking price tbh.

Don't worry too much about it being second hand. Have a look before you buy and if in good physical condition then its likely to be ok.

note - this would get you started and then when you outgrow it you can trade in, or upgrade to better lens, upgrade to a new body piece by piece. It depends on how serious your wildlife photography will get.

Hope that helps.

Cheers.

darragh o meara

Argos had the lumix gf3 for sale a few weeks back for around the €300 mark which would have a lot of the manual settings but the four thirds system is limited enough lens wise. A friend of mine who does a lot of photography has one as a carry around camera and he's got some fantastic results with it and he has compared them to his canon 1d mk3 and the quality is quiet close.

To be fair your bit gonna get into wildlife photography cheaply, a decent lens for wildlife can cost at least 4-5 times your budget. My 70-200mm was €1200 second hand and that's before the body costs.

Second hand is your best bet, a cheap dslr body will set you back at least €300 and save up for a decent lens as the lens really makes the difference, oh and learn how to use the camera manually and learn what each setting does. Auto is ok for some shots but since I learned the ins and outs of the settings my shots have improved 10 fold.

cnocbui

You are going to need a long lens for the wildlife and a macro lens for the close ups. Argos is not going to have what you need and as has been stated, your budget isn't sufficient.

Perhaps find other peoples images on Flickr and the like and ask permission to use them?

magicbastarder

magic_tree, do you have experience of taking wildlife shots - is this why you were asked to take them for a wildlife magazine?

darragh o meara

I did a bit of looking around and the best deal new seems to be a canon 1100d with 18-55mm and 75-300mm with bag and canon training session for €699. Both lens should be good to get you started.

magic_tree

I dont need it to zoom in across a field or valley for pictures ! Its just for back garden wildlife photography. I have no other ways of buying the camera other than argos unfortunately. There was a camera shop in town but they closed after a short time.

cnocbui

I'm in the midwest and had no problem buying a camera over the phone/internet from a store in Dublin.