what camera?

After looking over the comments and speaking to my brother-in-law (a photographer for a leading motor magazine), I’m probably going to go with a Nikon D70 and one of these.
It’s realistically the most viable option given my budget (I’ve had to raise it to around £210, inc. lens).

Does anyone see any major issues? Thanks for your help.

EDIT: Oh, and my brother-in-law also introduced me to London Camera Exchange (despite the name they actually have branches all over the country) – they sell really cheap second hand DSLR bodies. Plus all products are cleaned and checked for damage before being published on the website. I’ll be saving around £25 on the D70 over the cheapest one on ebay.

http://www.lcegroup.co.uk/

If you decide Bridge, I’d go with Panasonic. Their stabilisation is 2nd to none.
But a 2nd hand DSLR is better. I chose Canon simply because it felt better in my big mits. (I’d shortlisted down to a Canon and a Nikon at my budget level then went into shop to play).

Mentioned above, Bridges do have a shutter lag, and in that time the object has moved – a lot of Bridge cams don’t have predictive focus to take account of that lag.
Avoid the claims of some Zooms. “Digital zoom” is a semi-useful gimmick. It only enlarges the image, just like you would zoom in on a PC. Useful as a telescope! Put it on full 48x zoom, take picture, see what it is and then delete it!

Matt, if you can stretch your budget to around £200 i’d stick with a bridge camera for now, theres loads available from all the major manufacturers.
Have a look here- http://www.wexphotographic.com/digital-cameras/b3064?price_en_gb=100.0%26lt%3bprice_en_gb%26lt%3b200.0&sortby=2&showall=1
Ignore the first five on the list though, not very long zoom lenses

-Dazza

D300 for £100-£150 range ???

According to ebay, whether they’re fully functioning is perhaps another matter?

D300 for £100-£150 range ???

Very!!….though if you’ve a steady hand you should have no problem at 1/125th or certainly 1/250th but weather is often against you.
I’m a real fan of Panasonic compacts and bridge cameras and still have a couple but I really don’t believe the GH series is best suited to our hobby.
Nothing against any of the others you list though I’d have thought a 50D would increase your budget massively.The 40d’s as good for what I do.
Your lens will be more important than the body to a large extent and 10mp camera is adequate IMHO
Tell us what you do,please

B

Thanks again for all your help;

I’ve narrowed down my short-list to:
Nikon D300
Canon 400D
Canon 50D
Sony Alpha α290L
Panasonic Lumix DMC-G2

Although out of those I’ll probably go with Nikon or Canon given the extensive range of lenses.

Just a question, how important is shutter speed while photographing aircraft?

Just to add to the responses……..bridge cameras are great for static shots but there’s nearly always a tiny shutter or upload lag and even slowly taxiing a/c can be a problem.
I’m a Canon and Pentax user and feel the latter are really underrated.My mate was really impressed with the Sony A200 which is now a bargain used with a twin lens kit.
Simply because of the range of used lenses etc.I’d probably go for a used Canon 400D (has bigger screen and dust reduction over the 350D)….MPB Photography on the net have several @ £179,plus a used 70-300,18-200 or 28-300 lens.

Barry

If it helps, my photos were taken with a Canon EOS1000D with a Canon 75-300mm lense stuck to the front:-

http://www.flickr.com/photos/indiaecho/

Thanks for your quick replies, I didn’t consider going down the second hand route – but there appear to be quite a few DSLR bargains on ebay. Perhaps this needs some more consideration on my part.

I would echo the comments above – if you can get a DSLR go down that route rather than a bridge.

My first digital was a bridge, and I found it very unsuitable for aviation photography. Firstly, the focal length (which determines the ‘zoom’) was increased or decreased using an electronic control rather than your hand like on a DSLR. I found this not just very fiddly, but it was very difficult to get the right focal length when the aircraft you are trying to photograph is moving.

Other things to look out for include how good the autofocus is on aircraft coming towards you – the autofocus on my camera was often easily confused in such a situation. If you buy from a shop you may be able to test this by taking photos of fast moving cars outside.

The length of time that it takes for the camera to process the image and save it to the memory card (there is a technical term for this) is also important to consider as well. You will often want to take a few photos in very quick sucession – if this process takes a second (or more) per photo, even though this doesn’t sound long, it can soon prove to be very stressful.

Mine is several years old, so more upto date ones may not have these problems. It still gives me good service as a back up on holiday for sightseeing type trips, but for decent aviation photography you need something a little higher specced because you can often find yourself shooting in less than optimal conditions, so as Chris says, if money is tight, I would recommend a second hand DSLR.

And be careful – this hobby is very very addictive, and you will soon find you will want to travel elsewhere to photograph different aircraft, so don’t specify your equipment exclusively on what would work for Heathrow.

Think I would go for a second hand DSLR, I have a back up 350d Canon and its still a good camera, should eaisy get one from evil bay for 100-150 with a few spare batteries etc.
Then maybe a 75-300mm lense to go with it, second hand £60-75.

These were done by me with my 350d and 600d with the standard lenses and a 75-300

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrwizz/sets/72157626169175379/

Hope this helps

Check on eBay, your money will go much further, and many people must have the latest and greatest, selling their 6 month old previous toy for no money…
I have just bought a Panasonic FZ5 for £137 (£250+ new), the previous owner had decided to upgrade to the FZ7 after 6 months, only to find it was not much better, if at all!

Whatever type of digital camera you buy, it will be out of date the following week.

A digital SLR is probably the best for aviation photos, as you will be able to use supplementary lenses such as long telephotos. Spending more money doesn’t necessarily mean a better camera.

Hmm… Knowing the Fuji S5500 very well I have to say it falls way short of even some of the cheapest DSLR’s in almost every respect. You’re absolutely correct in saying spending more doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get a better camera, but if that new camera happens to be even the cheapest of available new-ish DSLR’s it will almost certainly be superior to the S5000/S5500 consumer mega-zoom types.

Pilatus… If you can find a second hand and well looked after Canon EOS 350D and Canon EF 75-300 lens you’ll have a wonderful tool for aviation photography that will NOT be out of date the following week! I know people who are still shooting with Canon D60’s and 10D’s purchased 4-5 years ago and they’re still producing beautiful photos. The 350D doesn’t quite have the substantial build of these cameras, but if looked after should provide you years of trouble free service.

Paul

Cameras

Whatever type of digital camera you buy, it will be out of date the following week.

A digital SLR is probably the best for aviation photos, as you will be able to use supplementary lenses such as long telephotos. Spending more money doesn’t necessarily mean a better camera.

I have a Fuji S5000, not an SLR, but it does take superb pictures. This is apparently down to the shape of the pixels, which are hexagonal on Fuji cameras. Other makes use round pixels, which have ’empty’ bits on the corners (think about it!).

The only trouble with my camera is that the controls are badly designed by people who don’t seem to have actually used a camera! Knobs on top are easily rotated by accident, so check for functionality.

Some manufacturers have poor quality screens that you can’t see on bright days. So check the camera outside the shop. If they won’t let you do that – walk away!

Menus can be very complicated and take too much time to set up – so you miss that plane flying past! Take your time in the shop to check through the menus – after all you are spending quite a lot of dosh!

Bri:)

sorry i put this in the wrong section!