Photography

sjy

hi im in year eleven and im going to some open days at college and i might choose photography to study.

has anybody got any advice or studied this? please can you tell me what its like.

Sam

downfader

The general rules are that pretty much any camera will do, as long as you can set it up manually (the control dial may have letters like "PSAM" which means program/auto, shutter priority auto, aperature and manual).

You dont need to spend a fortune. Get a couple of basic books on photography for beginners (try charity shops, I've seen a few there) and perhaps have a swot up on some of the old masters.

Photography is pretty interesting, and theres so many different directions it can take you in.

Also you can have a gander at the Amatuer Photographer website and forum. Loads of helpful peeps on there Its a good subject to study, not much chance of making a fortune out of it sadly but a lot of fun.

sjy

thanks that was really good advice and i want to be a mountain bike photographer.. obvs lol

Sam

Anonymous

If your budget doesn;t stretch to a digital SLR camera, then I can highly recommend a Fuji Finepix S5700 (or it's later models) as a fantastic starter camera. You can pick them up for around £120, it has auto mode for quick snaps, or fully manual if you want to get creative. It also has shutter priority, and aperture priority mode. It has an ISO range of 64-1600, and plenty of aperture f-stop settings.
Also, for night time photography, it can have a shutter time of as slow as 4 seconds.
It has a 48mm thread (if memory is correct) to take various filters and extension lenses if you need, and it even has a handy live histogram display which helps in setting up the right aperture and shutter speeds.

Oh, and most importantly, for MTB photography, it has a very, very low shutter lag (the time between pressing the shutter button, and it actually taking the picture) so you can always catch the action.

Excellent if you're just starting out.

PS
if any of those terms seem too technical for you, don't worry, you'll learn what they mean soon enough

downfader

yeehaamcgee, i beleive the s9xxx model is the latest incarnation, I forget the exact digits but its compared quite favourably to the lower end slrs

What an slr will offer is change of glass, addition of pro flash and studio flash use, lower noise and bigger sensor... I could go on. You dont need to spend a fortune on an slr either, lots of second hand ones (Mifsuds, Ffordes, etc all sell refurbished) that are perfectly usable

I have to confess to still using my D70, bought it new when it was released and have had photos accepted to alamy (a photo library).. I am saving for a new pro slr though, possibly a D3 by the end of the year (or what ever replaces it :oops: )

EDIT: nearly forgot - theres a fair few how-to videos on the basics of photography on youtube and google video. Worth having a gander

carlosthejackal

I'll second that for the slr-style Fuji's. I had one before my slr and they produce some wonderful photo's. One tip, make sure your film setting's set to "chrome". The colour saturation's awesome...