Good glass or Good body?

[Shutterseeker]

i have a D50 that works fairly well, but i mainly use my dad's D70. i have been doing some looking and now have a question. should i invest my money in good lens or a better body?

[natek313]

The way I see it is the camera sensor only sees what the lens lets it see. So, if you have a "bad" lens, you'll get "bad" photos regardless of what camera body you have. Sure, better camera bodies can make things easier, but you can still get wonderful photos from consumer camera bodies.

You say your D50 works fairly well for you, so why upgrade? Do you really need to? That is, are you finding yourself restricted by the limitations of the D50? If you answer "No" to either of those last two questions, then I would say look into getting a new lens or possibly a flash unit.

[Nicole]

What Nate said.

I wanted to upgrade my D50 because I was running into the limitations of the camera (e.g. I wanted to do off camera flash and wasn't looking to spend heaps on good radio triggers, I was interested in the live view, and I was interested in the better high ISO performance... just to list a few things). However, before that happened, I started investing in lenses that would help along the way. A good lens or two that does what you need will probably serve you better in the long run.

That said, what lens(es) do you already have? And what do you want to shoot?

[jdepould]

A good lens will make any sensor better. A bad lens on a good body will probably look worse than a bad lens on a cheap body.

[RolandAA]

Definately upgrade the glass first. If for no other reason the lenses don't change much and hold their value. Camera bodys are constantly evolving and depreciate pretty quickly. Besides in a few years you'll want that new can't live without it feature your now old body doesn't have.