Quote (FlayrFlak @ Fri, 6 Mar 2009, 07:36)
Not sure why there's even a suggestion of a 40D in a thread asking for a cheap entry-level camera. This would leave him with 200-300 dollars left to spend on glass, which is Far more likely to be the limiter in terms of image quality.
Buy a used Canon Rebel XT/XTi/XS [350D, 400D, 1000D] or a Nikon D40, D40x, D60 and spend the rest of your money on lenses. You'll outgrow the camera body eventually but the glass will hold its value and be useful for years and years. Buying a new camera body doesn't really make sense if you're on a really tight budget because the moment you open the box on a new body, you lose a bunch of value [just like a new car].
$400 or so for the body leaves $600 for a lens, which is enough to get a nice walkaround lens, upper 3rd-Party or medium range Original-Manufacturer. Take a look at the Sigma 18-50 f/2.8 [2nd Gen Macro version], Tamron 17-50 f/2.8, or the Canon 17-40 f/4L [Canon only].
Don't just buy an Olympus because its financially convenient to do so now. If you buy into the Canon/Nikon systems, you'll have a much more broad range of available lenses for your own little niche. 3rd-Party manufacturers like Sigma, Tamron, and Tokina are far more likely to make lenses for these two brands, since they're the most popular. That being said, if you think that the Olympus lens systems suits you, by all means, go for Olympus.
Just getting a DSLR with all its manual abilities and the opportunity to control DoF will keep you busy learning how to use them correctly that you won't need the Live View gimmicks and such that newer models have.
i was also reading and of those 3 main ones i was considering the it looked like the olympus had the fastest frames per sec capture, and i know this has with my p&s been one of the things holding me back from skate photography... which i'd like to give a shot
Quote (TheBlackRose66 @ Fri, 6 Mar 2009, 10:34)
looked at this absolutely no reference to the olympus camera's also my dad has an olympus slr which i think the lenses would be cross compatible with (will look into) which is another reason i'm leaning towards this, because he doesn't use his camera much at the moment so i could borrow the lenses for a bit probably without him minding to much ...
i didn't goto uni today so i'll have a look around for some second hand stuff and post what i find and see what u guys think