I try to find out exactly what will so and so be photographing because there are so many directions you can go. Is it for pleasure or are they planning to start a business? Is it indoors or outdoors, is it portraits or action? The one thing you want, just my personal opinion, when your looking to get a camera or your giving a camera as a gift is ask yourself a few questions.
What do I want my camera for
Am I doing it for fun
will I be using it outdoor days or indoor nights
The last one is a big one, if your buying a camera just for fun you can get by with a starter kit that most camera stores, Best Buy, Walmart, etc offer during Black Friday. The kit lens that comes with the camera is perfect to start out with. Get to know that camera and if your interest stays with you then you can progress. Most of your money will be in the lens you add to that first camera. You can buy as low as $100 and spend as much as $10,000 it just depends on what you want.
I highly recommend if you decide to keep going to rent; rent locations at Arlington Camera, Competitive Camera, Borrowlenses.com Lensrental.com. Those are amazing if your thinking of buying a lens but your not sure you want to drop a lot of money, rent it for a few days or few weeks to try it out first. I do this a lot before spending money on a lens. At the profession I am at I have spent up to $3,000 on a lens, thats not easy to turn loose, so you do want to make sure its going to work for you and you will get a return on your investment.
Cameras, you can do a lot with just any starter camera, when I get messages on what to get I always recommend a DX or Crop Sensor, it's smaller and lightweight, you get about an extra 80mm of reach vs the big FX that I use for portraits and commercial work. Their more affordable. The camera I use for all of the action photos is a DX, I like the extra 80mm of reach on my 200mm lens and its lighter, even though I use a monopod Most jobs you can get fatigues just holding up a large kit. Look at Megapixels are you just printing 5x7, 8x10 or are you looking at build boards? do your research, the one thing you want to avoid is buying something a year later because you didn't do your research. New gear comes out faster than new car models, but you WON'T get a good trade or cash in on camera gear, it depreciates very fast.
YOUTUBE for research, I've watched a lot of videos trying to narrow down a purchase, my newest camera the Nikon D850 boasted a hefty $3200 price, I saved for a year and watched video all year to make sure that was the one I wanted. It was in such high demand you couldn't get it for the longest time nor could you rent it. When my name came up on the wait list, I bought it and it was a great investment. I plan to keep this camera for quite a few years - its my only camera body for weddings, senior portraits, sale horses, stallions and such. I don't use it for barrel racing, it cost to much to get dusty.
There are some great stores that sell refurbished. B&H and Adorama, they are 100% photo and video related stores so they receive a lot of gear, I send all of mine to Adorama to trade for new gear, they give me the best value, offer free shipping and no sales tax. as a business every penny counts and thats who I choose to do business with.
One last thing to remember is if you just want a carry around camera don't forget the advancements of the iPhones or any phone. Most now have 4K built in, they have so many great lens on the camera and you can buy additional lens that attach to your phone. You would be surprised what high quality is out there just for a carry mourned lens. I bought the iPhone 10 and I've started to play with the camera and settings and I'm pretty blown away, when I do my scouting trips a lot of times the photos I am taking to do my research and map out sessions is from the photos I have taken from the iPhone.
Just do your research before you pay, remember that gear is pretty amazing, but it doesn't hold the value thats why we keep our gear as long as we can until we just can't do without that new shiny model and have to have it
www.JoHPhotography.com
