Im quite new to photography and am planning to buy the Nikon d40. I would appreciate some knowledge on the camera and what items to buy with it.
For a start, what does a lens filter do? Will a filter make the images better in some way, or does it just protect the lens?
Would there be much difference between the performance of a brand new Nikon d40 and say an 18 month old second hand one, which has had regular use but no obvious signs of damage?
I know that the standard lens for this camera is the 18-55mm, and i think the next one up is 50- 200mm(?) What do bigger lenses do? Are they there to zoom in for further away shots? And roughly how much would a new 50-200mm lens cost in the shops?
(I would appreciate any more advice you’d be able to give on accessories for this camera)
Thanks very much
: )
Thank you for your answers
If everything on the 18 month old one is working fine and theres no dust on the CCD or inside the lens or in general has dust anywhere inside then it should be fine.
but I prefer to buy my electronics new because you can never know what will go wrong with electronics.
A lens filter both protects the lens and helps you take better images.
The UV filter blocks UV rays and makes the image more vibrant.
The bigger the focal length the further in you can zoom. To me, having a 18-55mm and a 50-200mm lens would be too much of a hassle not to mention the 50-200mm doesn’t have VR! the 18-55mm does. VR is vibration reduction and helps reduce the camera shake from unsteady hands. If you want to zoom in really close I suggest a Nikkor 18-200mm VR lens. They’re roughly $650.
If you do indoor photography or protraits you may want to invest in possibly a standard prime lens OR a SB-400 flash. A prime lens produces sharper images and the Sb-400 flash is a pretty portable flash that has the ability to do bounce flash. Bounce flash gives off a more natural looking light than a direct flash which all point and shoot camera’s have and all DSLRs come equipped with. A new Nikkor 50mm f/1.8 is less than $150 and so is a SB-400 flash.
I like your choice in the D40 as a starter camera, it’s a great camera for what you’re looking for and it’s not quite easy on the wallet.
Filters:- The two most commonly used filters are probably the’Skylight’ filter which is fairly cheap and doesn’t really affect the picture much.
So you say why? – because with a skylight filter on you won’t scratch the surface of your lens
Next a polarising filter, I used one of these a lot on film cameras but not so much on digital, you can do this in a good photo manipulation program. If you use one, particularly when photographing water or windows that could cause a glare, rotate the filter until the view in the viewfinder eliminates any glare.
Other filters each have their effects but you don’t want to run before you can walk, learn the basics first
Lenses:- the figures on a lens relate to the distance between the rearmost element in the lens and the CCD. so an 18 to 50 is a short zoom that is 18mm at its widest and 50mm at its narrowest.
That is the theory BUT…
Most Digital SLR cameras don’t have a CCD that is the same size as a frame of 35mm film (which is what lens references are based) so you need to find the difference (I have a Canon350D and that is 1.6, you will need to find the calculation for a Nikon) so you have to multiply the lens length by that so an 18 to 50mm lens comes out as roughly 28mm to 88mm. The difference is somewhat immaterial as you will be composing the image in the viewfinder.
You can get some good info about the D40 here:- http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/specs/Nikon/nikon_d40.asp
Enjoy your photography
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