steeevvvooo
Novice Member
Hi all. I am an amateur photographer but major gadget/tech fan in need of some guidance. After purchasing a D3100 a few years ago and using sporadically I recently purchased the Nikon 50mm 1.4 fx lense and have the photography bug all over again. I am using in aperture priority mostly but am learning more about manual shooting through sites like this and various other resources. I love the improvement this has given me over the kit lense and now want to take the next step.
Assume I have about $1000 to spend on gear.... what should I do to improve my set up alongside learning more about the art? (I know some will say to spend the money on education but I want to spend it on gear and learn as I go). I am more concerned with quality over quantity and don’t really want to have a ton of lenses and gear to carry around. Most of my shooting will be family portraits and events (1 month old baby, and I want to capture the moments along the way) as well as some travel and street scenes. My wife will also be using my set up and whilst I am teaching her about aperture priority and Bokeh she is a lot less interested in the tech than me and may end up in auto mode quite often.
A few options I am considering:
I appreciate this is a crazy long question but I would appreciate any thoughts from the seasoned shooters here.
Assume I have about $1000 to spend on gear.... what should I do to improve my set up alongside learning more about the art? (I know some will say to spend the money on education but I want to spend it on gear and learn as I go). I am more concerned with quality over quantity and don’t really want to have a ton of lenses and gear to carry around. Most of my shooting will be family portraits and events (1 month old baby, and I want to capture the moments along the way) as well as some travel and street scenes. My wife will also be using my set up and whilst I am teaching her about aperture priority and Bokeh she is a lot less interested in the tech than me and may end up in auto mode quite often.
A few options I am considering:
- Do nothing. Keep the D3100 and 50mm 1.4. “The camera is currently better than your skills...” etc
- Buy a 7200 for about $7-800. Sounds like I would gain better autofocus, increase MP, higher ISO and in body focus as well as some other features and two scroll wheels. All sound worthy of the upgrade cost to me? If I sell the D3100 kit I could consider another lense but worry that to stay in budget I would only be buying a DX lense that could be a false economy if I go FX later?
- Buy a D610/D750 and offset the cost a little by selling the D3100 and kit lense so it won’t be too much more than the 1k budget. This opens up the FX lense I have to its full potential (and it will behave like a true 50mm), should be a major step up in performance and should mean the last upgrade to my kit for a while while my skills catch up with my equipment. Downsides are additional size/weight and obviously a little more expense.
- Switch to mirrorless. I have actually bought a Sony A7 FE 28-70 kit, Fuji XT1 18-55 kit and Sony 6300 with 16-50 and 55-210 kit all for about $1000 each. All are on credit card from b&h and I can return with no problem. I bought all three so I could compare at home and figure out which to keep but I just can’t shake the feeling that maybe I should be sticking with DSLR as I always technically want the best quality rather than a “cool” trendy thing. I understand that these mirrorless cameras will probably perform almost as well as a DSLR in my hands but by the time I add decent glass they are almost as big and almost as expensive as a proper DSLR which is making me reconsider. I get that the A7 is full frame and technically probably the best IQ, the 6300 I believe is the fastest and the xt1 seems to get rave reviews from DSLR switchers without seeming to beat the other two in any major features.
I appreciate this is a crazy long question but I would appreciate any thoughts from the seasoned shooters here.