A friend recently asked me for some advice on a DSLR purchase, ideally for under $1000. I put my thoughts together and this (slightly edited) is what I came up with. Since I took the time to write it out, I figured I might as well post it here in case anyone else is interested. There are plenty of other reviews of entry level DSLRs out there, and I recommend you do some more research before you take my word for it. I haven’t actually used any of the cameras that I discuss here (aside from my old D40).
First, I really only know the Nikon lineup since that’s all I’ve owned. I think it’s quite likely that all of these cameras have equivalents in features/price to something in the Canon line. I use Nikon now because it’s familiar to me, and in the beginning I sort of selected it at random. That said, having used a few friends’ Canons, I don’t really like the way their controls are laid out, but it’s hard to say if one is really better or if it’s just my familiarity….
All the prices I’m quoting below come from bhphotovideo.com, a good and reputable camera store in New York City that has a nice website. Beware of places with much lower prices: there are a lot of digital camera scam sites. There are also a few good camera review/comparison sites, dpreview being one of the better ones.
Anyway, there are a few cameras Nikon makes that are under $1000 and some of them are much cheaper than that. The two sort of “entry level” Nikon DSLRs are the D3000 and the D5000 and they both look pretty good to me. You can get the 3000 with a basic lens for $500 and the 5000 with the same lens for a little under $700. These are fairly similar cameras, but I’ll go over the key differences.
First, the D3000 has around 10 megapixels and the 5000 has about 12. This difference is almost eaningless. The megapixel war is more or less over. 10 MP means you get images that are about 3800 x 2500 pixels, and if you print that at 200 dpi you’re talking something like 12 x 19 or so, so either one of these cameras will make image files that are plenty big for most purposes.
The 5000 has a CMOS rather than a CCD sensor and it also has a higher max sensitivity setting (ISO). This means that you’d be able to take pictures in lower light, and for pictures taken at the same level of light you might see less “ISO noise” which is that weird grainy colored noise you see in pictures taken in low light. How much this matters to you might depend on what you plan to do with the camera.
Another big difference that might not matter to you is it looks like the D5000 will shoot 720p HD video, and the D3000 won’t. I don’t have much more to say about it than that. I’m not sure I’d use a video mode if I had one, but some folks might be interested in that.
Smaller differences between these two cameras: the D5000 has “live view” and the D3000 does not. This is the mode you see on P&S digital cameras where you can use the lcd rather than the viewfinder to compose and shoot. I have his on my camera and I never use it.
The D5000 shoots at most 4 frames per second, and the D3000 shoots only 3. I’d say this difference doesn’t matter a ton. Either one is fast enough to get a few quick shots of medium-speed things going on, and neither one is really fast enough to deal with, say, a sporting event where the exact timing of the shot really comes into play.
The D5000 has a few other bells and whistles that you might not use: a dedicated button to lock the exposure settings, which is useful in a some specific cases, exposure bracketing (the camera will automatically take a few rapidfire shots at similar settings), which is sort of a novelty thing on digital cameras since you get instant feedback (in the old film days you would bracket your shots to make sure that you got the right exposure). The D5000 also has a swiveling lcd screen, which works with the live view mode…I guess this would help frame a self portrait? My lcd doesn’t swivel and I don’t miss it.
Now, for some similarities and general info:
Both cameras use SD cards and have an 11 point autofocus system, which is plenty. AF points are the spots within the viewfinder that are capable of looking for areas of contrast to focus on. The more you have, the more finely you can control what’s getting focused on. The camera I use now has 51, but that’s a bit of overkill, I think. My first DSLR was the Nikon D40 (which more or less got replaced by the D3000) and it had only 3 AF points, which felt like too few. 11 should be fine.
Both cameras are usually sold with the Nikon 18-55 VR lens, which while being a lens they just throw in with the cameras is quite nice. I used the precursor on my D40 and it was fine. If you go on my flickr page and look at my older shots, like from France in 2007, all of that was shot with a D40 and an 18-55 kit lens. VR stands for “vibration reduction” which means there’s fancy motors inside the lens that help counteract our inability to hold a camera perfectly still. This allows you to drop the shutter speed to a lower level than you’d normally be able to get away with, and will let you take a clear picture (of things that aren’t moving) in slightly less light than you’d otherwise be able to.
Both cameras have the same adequate but not great built-in flash. We can talk flashes another time. What’s built in here will get the job done, but won’t really avoid red-eye (too close to the lens axis) and can’t be swiveled to bounce.
Now, just a brief bit the main thing that these cameras don’t do.
Neither one has a motor inside the camera to drive the autofocus system of older lenses. Modern camera lenses have a motor inside the lens to focus the lens. This means the camera needs only to tell the lens how far or close to focus and the lens does the rest. Until about 5 or 10 years ago, the motor was usually in the camera and there was just a screw that the camera turned to focus the lens. There are a lot of lenses out there that will work fine with these cameras, but there are also a lot of older, nice lenses that won’t autofocus with these cameras. It’s hard to know if this is going to be important to you when you’re just starting out. Some day you’ll want different lenses (one of the main features of the DSLR is the ability to change lenses, after all!). I think at this point the line of modern lenses with built-in motors is pretty complete, so this probably won’t be too much trouble. It was one of the things that made me eventually upgrade, though.
If you want a camera with an internal motor you’d have to step up to the D90, which goes for about 800 without a lens, so that will push a bit over the $1000 limit. Aside from the motor, the D90 is _not_ that much of an upgrade over the D5000…it has the same sensor, shoots a half a frame per second faster, shoots slightly higher res HD video, and probably has a few more bell and whistle sorts of things. I would definitely classify the D90 as a mid level rather than entry level DSLR, and it is probably not worth the extra money for someone looking to get their first DSLR.
So, I’d say if you just want an SLR to figure out what it’s all about and don’t know what you’d be using it for, the D3000 is a great camera. If you think you’ll be shooting lowish light and might like to take movies then go with the D5000. If you’re sure you’re going to be getting into photography for the long term and want to explore more of the older lenses that Nikon has to offer, then take the leap to the D90.
Recent Comments