Buying a DSLR

[beckywithasmile]

Hey all,

I'm about to buy my first DSLR and I'm wondering what else I should be buying with it.

I'm aiming for the Canon t2i with the double kit lenses. I have a camera bag that should work fine.

Besides that what should I be adding to this?

Right now, I'm intending to get an extra battery and at least a UV filter to stick on the front so I don't accidentally bump my lens.

On Japanese Amazon (I live in Japan). The camera is going for about $740. I want to stay under $800-850. Are there other things as a DSLR beginner (but not photography beginner) that I should be adding to this?

[3bayjunkie]

ok, I don't really want to assume what equipment you have. You say you are not a photography beginner so does that mean you already have gear? do you have a tripod, flash, or any other accessories from past cameras or are you starting from scratch with digital?

Here is just a list of basic things you might want to have:

ballhead Tripod
strobe flash
ring flash
polorizing filter
wireless or a cable shutter release
neutral density gradient filter
a double level that slides into your hotshoe (great for landscape photography)
photoshop is a no brainer for doing post processing
Epson P-4000 or better portable digital backup to store photos


don't skimp on your lenses, get the most expensive lens you can afford. you will notice an obvious improvement in sharpness with your photos.

There are many other things you could add to your kit, but these are just basic things you can think about. Not everyone needs all of these, but they can be useful depending on the type of photography you want to do.

[dlambert]

You're doubtless going to end up buying a bunch of accessories, but without knowing what sort of photography you're going to be doing, it's tough to specify exactly what you're going to need. You're very likely to want to get a tripod of some sort and a flash of some sort, but I think you'll get better advice if you can give us a little more detail about your needs.

[Michael_2010]

Memory cards and some type of lens cleaning kit. Keep it simple and shoot, shoot, shoot. You will soon discover what additional gear you need to accomplish specific goals.

[inkista]

Aside from at least one spare memory card, one spare battery, a card reader, and post-processing software of SOME kind, I think the best thing to do is wait until you have the camera in your hands and are using it before you think of outfitting yourself with anything else.

Chances are good you're going to have your hands full with learning how to use the dSLR, and its differences from a P&S digital camera for a while. And 90% of the time, what you're going to think are gear issues (not a sharp enough lens, or something) are likely to be technique issues, rather than gear ones. My one piece of advice to you for the first two months is assume it's you, not the gear.

A P&S camera takes good sharp colorful photos for a number of reasons: the small sensor and ultra-short lenses mean a very deep depth-of-field: it's nearly impossible to get something out of focus. In addition, in-camera processing sharpens and adds saturation to all the images when it converts the sensor data to JPEG.

By default, a dSLR does not add a ton of processing to an image. Most dSLR shooters prefer to tailor the processing on a per-image basis, rather than do a one-size-fits-all solution. dSLR shooters often use the RAW image data instead of a processed cooked JPEG. These are not sharpened. They have no saturation added. In short, the images may look grayer and fuzzier than you're used to with a P&S. And you can certainly get things out of focus. This is the flip side to being able to blur the background beautifully--that blur means the background is out of focus.

Learning to accurately focus the camera is a new skill you're going to have to pick up. Setting up your camera to do the file cooking, or learning to cook the files yourself is another. And then there's having a good handholding technique to avoid camera shake blur, and knowing what's an appropriate shutter speed to use.

Wait until you know it's not technique. Wait until you KNOW you need to buy something to get past a specific frustration. Everybody shoots different subjects in different ways. What's going to be best for you, individually, is something only you can say.