This is a fantastic thread!
I'm a former DSLR owner. (D70) I sold it on ebay because I never could get it to take decent pictures. I'm sure it was me and not the camera. I'm now restricted to iphone and our Canon point and shoot. With my two little boys growing faster than imaginable I'm afraid that we are not going to have any decent photos of them. There seem to be some very knowledgeable photographers on here so I thought I would ask what you guys would reccomend for a decent used DSLR? I should mention that my Dad is an avid photographer and he has all Nikon equipment and a bunch of different lenses. It might be best for me to stick with Nikon so I can barrow his lenses.
Awesome pics everyone.
Thanks.

yes stick with nikon for two reason, first you already had one so you already kinda know the layout, and secondly yes you can have a greater access to lenses. i shoot canon only because thats what i was most familiar with back when i got into it, but all my friends shot nikon... i found that they would "network" and never buy a duplicate lens... so they had about 4 times the lens selection available to them that i did... it was a huge disadvantage to me. its funny now because all but two of them have jumped to canon. not saying one is better than the other. its all in preference and what you know and in this case lens selection

I'm not the most knowledgeable but it seems like a lot of the guys here are Canon guys so I'll give it a shot.

If your dad is a Nikon man you can borrow his stuff, I'd look for maybe a D90 if you're trying to keep from spending too much. Unless he has a bunch of DX stuff (which I doubt any serious photographer would), you want something with a motor built in to the body so it will autofocus with non-DX lenses (i.e. ALL other nikon lenses). I'm not 100% but I think the D90 is the cheapest option now, although any mid-pro level Nikon will do it. If you can find a D7000 or D600 it'd be great, but you're not likely to save a lot since those aren't too old.

D40, D40X, D60, D5000, D3000, D5100, D3100 all rely on motors built in to the lens (DX) to focus, so you'll have likely have to manual focus with any of those and his lenses.

But then again why aren't you asking your dad?

Same with me the only reason why I stick w/ canon is I already have lenses and I'm comfortable w/ the interface. I've used nikons and didn't like the interface on their digitals. But in the end it's what you're comfortable with and get the best results out of. Film based I can use both w/ out issues, other than really I prefer the Hasselbad my mom has.

I agree with all of the above.

I have a Nikon D90!

I actually sent him an email this morning asking his opinion. No response yet.

Thanks for the info. I'm going to get on ebay and see what's available.

If you don't care about video, you can pick up a Nikon d300 for cheap on ebay. That would be the most bang for the buck. I think I sold my gripped d300 for $650. That way if you ever plan on upgrading, full frames the only way to go.

Pretty much that. I really only used it for the fine-tuning of a photo for photos being used for web or print. Outside of that, all my work is done in Lightroom.

Same here, I've grown to use less and less photoshop. Only use it to crop/watermark/resize/cloning. But Lightroom makes tweaking the color so much easier.

Raw image straight from the d800. Love this camera.



More auto stuff.

Send me an offer for this! http://www.toyota-4runner.org/sale-n...dslr-lens.html

it's easy to take decent pictures with!

Anyone have any experience with a local lens repair shop in their area? My 70-200mm got knocked out of whack and I need to get it recalibrated. Don't really feel like sending it in to Nikon. It's out of warranty anyways.

Many of the things I do in PS can be done in LR, but I've used PS much longer than LR, so I've just gotten used to using it.

Most photos unless I add Photomatix to the workflow, only see level adjustments, pop the color a bit, add some unsharpen mask, and add my stamp. One of my fav plugins is Silver Efx Pro. IMO, PS & LR can't come close to the "feeling" or final result for a b&w.

Here are some others:

So, what is the general consensus on the best Nikon for the buck? I've heard the Costco bundles are pretty decent starters.

Me? I'm a college student and fell in love with photography after shooting my girlfriend's dad's D4 (I know, it's nice to know a Daddy Warbucks ) and was considering doing Wedding photography as a side gig when I acquire the experience and equipment.

What's your budget?

That's an amazing photo!!! Really @ 100 ISO only? Incredible!