[HappyHippy]

I'm looking for a decent camera to take photos - close up's, landscapes and 'action' shots of pigs (I say action shots as they never seem to stay still and the camera on my phone can't cope with movement - even if I adjust shutter speed)
I don't want to spend 100's of pounds (even if I had 100's of pounds to spend - I could think of more needed purchases  ) so would be looking for budget ones or second hand probably.

I'm thinking probably Canon, would like a bridge camera and digital but other than that I'm stuck - any photographers out there to offer advice ? 
Thanks

[VEG]

Do you have a camera on your mobile phone (if you have one)

[PipSqueak]

I don't know much about bridge cameras as I am very into my DSLRs, but I can thoroughly recommend MPB (http://www.mpbphotographic.co.uk) for second hand cameras. I have literally spent thousands with them with not one problem.

[cloddopper]

I am doing a photographic course ( total length of all units 6 years or more ) at a one day a week night school , I'm now into my second term .  I did B?w 7 colour film donleys years ago and took up with a £400 Olympus 1.2 MP back in 1999 had several compact since ..all canons .
 Currently have a compact Canon IXUS 8.0 15 ..  magnification range 3x15  it must be around five years old .. it's a great quick point and shoot jobby but can if you want and have the time to do it preset a few things . It has anti shake , can do a short movie with reasonable sound ,  has macro as well as telephoto  and most important for me a proper view finder as well as the standard screen  for i like to used the finder to frame a view instead of wasting the battery pack it has a standard SD memory card ..I have two 4 gig cards one for pictures and the other for movies .


In late 2013 I got an EOS 7D & found I needed to do the night school courses  to get the best out of it for I didn't just want to use it on auto ( it gives outstanding colours & detail etc ) I wanted to learn how to quickly set it up for bracketing shots , do things in RAW etc. and set white balances quickly .
Fumbling through the 274 pages of the manual took too long , by the time I'd managed to tie up the different sections related to one action I was starting to lose the will to live .

 At the camera group two of the members have canon bridge cameras with a zoom of something like 45 magnification from the integrated lens .

 Both of them have some fantastic pictures , most of which are untouched .
 Both of them say that the bridge jobby is ideal as it has all the instant use of a compact with much of the capabilities of the much heavier digital TTL that have god only knows how many lens changes available .
 The tend to use their  bridge cameras one handed as the other is usually holding onto a dog  or a walking stick .   They are so lightweight  compared to the EOS 7D
 

I think the PC world price is kicking in at about £ 340 but I strongly suspect that in a month or so there will be big price drops  at the on line camera stores when the new camera ranges that are arriving on the scene have been put through their paces in the camera mags and folk start wanting to buy or PE their year old models for them .

 My EOS 7D mk 1 can apparently now be had for just over £600 with three lenses and all sorts of other buy me now incentives which is a heck of a lot less than the £ 1,500 some places were selling it for two year ago ( without lenses )

 The professional photographer who is  giving us our lessons has frequently said he no longer buys the latest model of camera or lenses ,   he's quite happy to buy new unused two yr old high end stuff instead .

[pgkevet]

I bought  a canon TTL digtal some few years ago and spoilt myself with one of their L lenses (that cost as much as the rest of the kit). It's the glass that makes the difference!

In my initial enthusiasm I took loads of pics. Most notable was one of a squirrel eating a peanut I gave him. The definition was so high that enlarged to a crisp A3 print you could see fine dust on his whiskers.

The only downside to that sort of kit was the amount of stuff one ended up carting about - hardly the kit for a quick holiday snap. That and the fact that the first thing to get permenantly borrowed was my L lens and then my camera when daughter lost use of the one she'd borrowed to take pics of the jewellry she makes and sells.

I hardly ever did any post processing with it.. except perhaps for cropping a section out or needing to use noise ninja when taking really long night time exposures.

It comes down to the type of pics you want to take. For the handy cam for an opportunist pic it's hard to beat a decent phone camera thats always in your pocket. For studio work it's a  different ball-game

[farmvet]

Its worth looking at your broadband speed too. Photos from my SLR take about 10minutes each to upload so I rarely get any printed etc. My compact is 8megapix and that's fine.

[pgkevet]

Back when the BVA HD scheme wouldn't accept Dicoms we had to invest in a decent A3 photo printer and paper.. a useful tax deduction that printed many a snap for me.

And it's suprising how good a photo you can print on an ordinary inkjet so long as you use half-decent photo paper and push the resolution.

[Buffy the eggs layer]

I would recomend a digital SLR camera with a tele lens of 12 x magnification. I have a Lumix and I can hold it in one hand, use it in simple mode so it auto adjusts shutter speed etc dependant on conditions. It also has a burst feature which takes nine shots in close succession to capture moving subjects or action shots. If you want to take your photography further you can switch it from auto to manual and learn how to adjust it as required. It has a range of different auto modes for night time, indoors, stary sky, portraits, candle light etc as well as a video camera.


The only thing you cant do with it is add bigger fancy lenses but I simply use the macro feature for close ups of flowers, insects etc and simple for shots of chickens, sheep, cats etc. I use my photos as the basis for my pastel portraits so the detail has to be high. I also publish my pics on my blog and in the newspaper etc s it suits my needs. The cameras on internet devices do not have a high enough resolution for publication or enlargement / magnification.

[farmvet]

Thanks pgkvet I'll give that a try