budding photographer

wrote:
HI All,

Hoping I can lean on your experience a bit. I have a young daughter
who has been a bit of a freak when it comes to cameras. Whenever she
picks one up and takes a photo they always come out, well "Wow" is a
common phrase used to describe her shots. I used to put it down to
luck but it happens too many times and have had too many comments from
people.

Anyway, I want to encourage this talent/luck/skill and buy her a new
camera for Christmas. I did some research and as a complete
photography Neanderthal didn’t make much headway in narrowing down
choices. Going to the local stores revealed an extremely high number
of units available coinciding with a complete lack of knowledge, other
than how much you want to spend, and then a camera appearing at the
upper end of my range. (One salesperson even going so far as to say
you can’t go wrong with these canons, unfortunately, it was a Nikon he
had delivered to me)

My plan is to get her a P&S camera and get her into it a bit more. In
the future if she is still keen I will get her a DSLR type
arrangement, which if I am reading right is more accessory oriented
with things such as lenses etc. and requires more technical knowledge.

I will be taking her to the local store and will let her handle
various ones but need to come up with a list of options to start with.
My requirements don’t seem to meet the commercial methods of marketing
such as how much or how many MP's so will give my requirements the
only way I know how.


I second your idea. It is important to foster good "seeing" when they
are young, the technical skills can come later. Young kids frequently
see things differently and uniquely, and that is what they should be
concentrating on. If photography catches on with them, they will then
want to do fancier things that demand more manual control, including
perspective and such.

Is there a camera club in your area that you and your daughter can join?
That way your daughter can see what others are doing. Youngsters soak up
this kind of thing in a big way.

wrote:
Thanks to all for the advice. It was very useful. I will look out for
the 470IS model. And check out the Nikon specified.As an FYI, the
three I had already identified as options are the, Canon A490IS, Sony
Cyber-shot W150 and Panasonic Lumix LZ8. Your input of course is worth
more than my attempts.

BTW: I'll upgrade myself from Neanderthal to a Photography Cro-Magnon.
Since the A490IS was one that was at the top of my list for a while.
The 2 things that always nagged me about it was some people saying
10secs recharge time after flash (although most review sites indicate
half of this) and the fact that it is so cheap ~US75$ at the moment.
Some of my fears are eased.

Where is the 590IS $75? I'll buy five! The cheapest I've seen it in the
U.S. is $102.

wrote in message


[...]

Re actually learning photography. My daughter has asked about clubs
however, those we have checked out dont cater to kids. (If anyone does
know of clubs in Sydney where teens are welcome let us know).

You might have better luck asking in aus.photo.

wrote:
[]
Re actually learning photography. My daughter has asked about clubs
however, those we have checked out dont cater to kids. (If anyone does
know of clubs in Sydney where teens are welcome let us know). So we
are kind of stuck for now with library books, internet forums and her
getting actual experience, which this camera will help her do.

That's a shame - I'm sure I went to our local (Amateur Radio) club from
about age 12 onwards....

By they way, I have both compact cameras (e.g. Panasonic TZ3) and DSLRs
(Nikon D60), and the picture quality from the DSLR is quite noticeably
better. IQ doesn't make me a better photographer, the but better
viewfinder, higher ISO capability, and much faster response of the DSLR
certainly helps!

Visited Sydney earlier this year - what a super city!

Cheers,
David

On Thu, 4 Dec 2008 15:51:26 -0800 (PST),
wrote:

Thanks to all for the advice. It was very useful. I will look out for
the 470IS model. And check out the Nikon specified.As an FYI, the
three I had already identified as options are the, Canon A490IS, Sony
Cyber-shot W150 and Panasonic Lumix LZ8. Your input of course is worth
more than my attempts.

BTW: I'll upgrade myself from Neanderthal to a Photography Cro-Magnon.
Since the A490IS was one that was at the top of my list for a while.
The 2 things that always nagged me about it was some people saying
10secs recharge time after flash (although most review sites indicate
half of this) and the fact that it is so cheap ~US75$ at the moment.
Some of my fears are eased.

Re actually learning photography. My daughter has asked about clubs
however, those we have checked out dont cater to kids. (If anyone does
know of clubs in Sydney where teens are welcome let us know). So we
are kind of stuck for now with library books, internet forums and her
getting actual experience, which this camera will help her do.

Again, thanks for your input.

Do any of the schools over there have classes in photography, or do
they sponsor clubs designed for her age group?