What camera for Daughter taking Photography at School

[geoffz]

My Daughter has chosen Photography in her options at School and they have also set her some course work for over the summer holidays.

I was wondering what camera I should get her, with preferably not spending too much money.

[senu]

Budget?
Daughters age / Class?

What needs to be learnt at the end of the course?: composition , ; If so no need to be to bothered about manual controls
My daughters ( 13 and 8) use my Canon 350D DSLR and reasonably well . The 13 year old is happy to fiddle with P mode juggling the aperture /shutter speed combinations

[mudstuff]

Yeah, I was going to ask the same. If it's a film class, you can pick up a good manual SLR off ebay for under £50 with lots of accessories and a couple of lenses - Pentax K1000 is popular for such courses. If it's digital, I assume they'll need control of the manual features and while there are a few decent "point and shoot" cameras out there with manual control, you can't beant an entry level DSLR which would be in the region of £200-£300 with a couple of lenses and accessories.

[geoffz]

Was just looking for ideas, as I am going to have to phone the School next week and see if they can advise.

If I was to believe my Daughter then she needs my Canon 450D .

For the Summer Assignment, they have to take 10 photo's for each of these Genre's,
PORTRAITURE, STILL-LIFE, DOCUMENTARY, & LANDSCAPE.

I'd like to get her a good camera, but with her history I don't think it would last long.

[senu]

Originally Posted by geoffz

Was just looking for ideas, as I am going to have to phone the School next week and see if they can advise.

If I was to believe my Daughter then she needs my Canon 450D .

For the Summer Assignment, they have to take 10 photo's for each of these Genre's,
PORTRAITURE, STILL-LIFE, DOCUMENTARY, & LANDSCAPE.

You could get her a second hand DLSR and tell her its not hers.. just lending it to her , ( yeah .right...)
She will either keep it very carefully
or
Get bored and hopefully hand it back to you
The advantage of a decent cheap DSLR is that she just might get interested enough to develop it as a life skill

I had an old heavy and very manual Zenith for A level biology/Chemistry projects and in University , later "advancing" to Canon A1 / AE1-Program Film SLRs ..
My experience with the digital " bridge" cameras is that the manual controls were lacking in how much difference they made to the picture
This may have changed and decent higher en DSLR may be all she needs but shutter lag and consistent underexposure are not uncommon in the cheap compacts
Also it is near impossible to achieve shallow DOF as the lens focal length, speed and sensor size are optimised for " idiot proof" sharp picture all the time
This might limit any creative endeavours but for learning composistion and working with light itis probably the case that any camera canbe used to teach these
In truth what happens is that pupils learn from thier own efforts being critiqued ( just as we do on here)

I'd like to get her a good camera, but with her history I don't think it would last long.

.. or not She might surprise you

[geoffz]

I was thinking on the lines of a 2nd hand DSLR , probably a canon but depending on price , not that it would mattter as I have no extra lenses yet.

I wasn't sure on a bridge camera as never used one but it may possibly be suitable for her.

When I was at School doing photography a few decades ago, I bought a Zenith E and yes they were heavy.