Buying My first DSLR, Any suggestions?

[.XL]

And my friend has a ton of lenses he would let me use.

This is the main reason to go Nikon for you if nothing else. Abuse his generosity

[YetAnotherDeveloper]

Plus you look more leet.  Not like all those soccer moms with Canons.

just more like ashton kutcher  

[EverythingIBM]

Okay. It is official. I am buying the Nikon D3100. One of my photographer friends let me play with his and I was amazed. Plus he is 100% pro Nikon, anti Canon and Pentax, so me buying a Pentax would jeopardize our friendship. Just kidding just kidding xD, thats not the reason I'm getting a Nikon. I just think it's a better investment. And my friend has a ton of lenses he would let me use.

Bahhh... Canon kicks Nikon's ass. Don't feel like going into the details though.

And is your avatar changing slightly? I didn't notice the blood veins in the squirrel's eyes before, or the extra gloss layers.
Unless I am seeing things.
EDIT: I forgot, I was checking the forums at school; and those ACER LCDs are HORRID for colour; so, I'm using a monitor with proper colour now.

[eunjea]

seems late but how about this. translucent.
http://uwimg.net/6o

[eunjea]

seems late but how about this. translucent.
translucent

[instantkamera]

Bahhh... Canon kicks Nikon's ass. Don't feel like going into the details though.

That's because you are trolling, and have no "details".

[keyb_gr]

And my friend has a ton of lenses he would let me use.

That settles it then. That is, provided they all have built-in AF. The smaller Nikons don't have an AF motor in the body, so a lot of older lenses are manual focus only.

[Lethal Squirrel]

And is your avatar changing slightly? I didn't notice the blood veins in the squirrel's eyes before, or the extra gloss layers.
Unless I am seeing things.
EDIT: I forgot, I was checking the forums at school; and those ACER LCDs are HORRID for colour; so, I'm using a monitor with proper colour now.

Yeah, I did change it. Nice eye
I was looking at the eyes and thinking they looked to plain so I made them bloodshot. The whole thing was originally made on paint like 2 years ago and had no detail at all

[mike]

In contrast, Nikon and Canon are the worlds largest optics manufacturing companies. They spend and make many, many billions of dollars a year in selling high quality digital imaging products to high end customers like government and hospitals, as well as satellites and telescopes. All the biggest optics needs are done by these 2 corporations. They are the fastest to innovate, and their consumers reap the benefits.

The size of Nikon and Canon is deceptive - much of their size comes from selling consumer grade products in massive quantities. And not all of Canon's products are optical.

As to the market in high-end optics, it's a good deal more crowded than you imply - there's room for ancient behemoths such as Carl Zeiss (with a yearly revenue of nearly 3 trillion euros; almost entirely high end optics such as the Master Prime lenses for cinematography costing in the region of $40,000 each), to tiny minnow such as Cooke Optics - a tiny remnant of a once thriving British camera industry. Even (Hoya) Pentax (a trademark once owned by Zeiss) are present in various parts of the high end optics market.

[digitalleftovers]

I own a nikon D80.  If you can't spend enough to get to the D90 (which you can find used for reasonable prices), then I would look at canon's offerings.  The main reason being that Nikon's entry level models (3100/5000) do not have internal motor drives, so you can't go out and get used lenses, or borrow others to try out.  You are locked into their integrated-drive DX family.  I suppose you could use the lenese in manual mode, but thats up to you.

If this is a first DLSR for you, I HIGHLY recommend looking into used options.  You'll get much more for your money, and with lens compatibility, you won't need new lenses when you want to upgrade to a new one, just a camera body.  That will open up your options for both canon and nikon.

I also recommend dpreview.com for good equipment reviews.  good luck.

[digitalleftovers]

Also, something to consider.  Nikon doesn't make sensors.  Nikon designs sensors, Sony builds them for Nikon.

[NKRO]

I own a nikon D80.  If you can't spend enough to get to the D90 (which you can find used for reasonable prices), then I would look at canon's offerings.  The main reason being that Nikon's entry level models (3100/5000) do not have internal motor drives, so you can't go out and get used lenses, or borrow others to try out.  You are locked into their integrated-drive DX family.  I suppose you could use the lenese in manual mode, but thats up to you.

If this is a first DLSR for you, I HIGHLY recommend looking into used options.  You'll get much more for your money, and with lens compatibility, you won't need new lenses when you want to upgrade to a new one, just a camera body.  That will open up your options for both canon and nikon.

I also recommend dpreview.com for good equipment reviews.  good luck.

Sensor technology has improved considerably in the last year or so, particularly at the APS-C size. If you plan on shooting medium-to-high ISO I would not recommend a previous generation camera at all.

You are not limited to DX lenses, but some older lenses will not AF. For most people this is not an issue.

Yep.

Lab rats love Nikon
http://www.classicoptics.com/polarized-light/nikon/nikonpol.jpg

Sport shooters it's Canon baby!
http://www.new-b-photo.theoneaboutus.net/wp-content/white.jpg

Like I said, no-one does big primes quite like Canon does. And NASA are now using unmodified Nikon D3s cameras on the ISS. (previous cameras had to be modified)

You won't go wrong with either Nikon or Canon but Nikon would certainly be my general recommendation between the two, unless you had specific requirements where one system is better than the other. I.e. Shooting video or using them in space.

Well, to be precise...From Thom Hogan.


Meanwhile Canon is losing market share as people wise up that bigass megapixel sensors isn't the goal.  Good pictures is.

I'm not sure how accurate that is. Testing at DxO seems to indicate that Nikon is still using the same sensors that Sony use and supply to other manufacturers, but perhaps with their own color filters which alters the color response somewhat.

[Pylon]

And about the whole camera thing:

Good photographer + good camera = good, artistic images with high image quality
Good photographer + bad camera = good, artistic images, with bad to okay image quality (however, he/she might exploit the faults to his advantage, e.g. use noise or blur in an artistic manner, like people do with Holgas)

Bad photographer + good camera = poor images that have really good image quality.
Bad photographer + bad camera = bad pictures. Period.

[RoboKrikit]

Bahhh... Canon kicks Nikon's ass. Don't feel like going into the details though.

Canon kicks Nikon's ass in the poor ergonomics, weak flashes, and E-Z print button departments for sure. If you really really need to print RIGHT NOW and don't need useless things like mirror lock up buttons or nice flash setups, go straight for Canon.

[Qwerty]

Bad photographer + good camera = poor images that have really good image quality.

That's not really true... If you don't know the fundamentals of lighting, aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc... No amount of equipment will ever compensate your ignorance. At least not consistently...

[YpoCaramel]

Problem with new photographers: you don't really know what you're doing with it yet, so you don't really know what you want (for example, is the type of lens you want available on that system? Wait, you don't even know the kind of photography you're doing, so how do you know which lens). A camera is a tool, you know which quirks you want when you're good with it.

Potential solutions:
1) Borrow, rent or second-hand a camera while you take a course or some workshops. For example, by the end of it of Photo I at  college, I had have a much better idea of what I wanted.
2) Just buy a mainstream, well-regarded camera and a kit or prime and learn the basics yourself. But seriously don't buy anything niche or hyper-expensive yet.

(edit) I could care less which brand/system is 'better' but once you're invested, you're invested. *shrug* 'cept if you're really (choose 2 of the following) rich, hardcore or professional, then you might have a few systems.