Buying the "Right" Camera for yourself

We are almost in the middle of Fall 2014, which means that the Shopping season is coming close and many of you may want to buy a new camera for yourself.

But there's that 'big' question ... "Which Camera Should I Buy?" With ridiculously many options, it is easy to get confused and spend your hard earned money on something that you will never need OR something that isn't really sufficient/enough for you. 

In this post, I will try and help you choose the "Right" camera for you. I am not recommending a particular camera. I want to lay out my thought process of how I would select a camera, If I wanted to buy one. So let's get started....

Here's the first question that you should ask yourself - "What am I going to do with this camera?" Now I want you to pick one of the answers below (the one that comes closest to your requirement)

1. I don't photograph much. I just need something that I can use for family events, trips. But that's about it. 
2. I feel like learning photography, but I am not sure if I will 'really' pursue it. 
3. I want to learn photography and I am ready to invest time and money. 
4. I have been doing photography for 'x' years. It is time for an upgrade !

Category 1 : I don't photograph much !!
If you selected the first answer, you are definitely not alone. Many of the people I know are similar to you. The purpose of camera is to record and capture some of the important events of your life. No intention of getting into photography. You just want to point that camera to someone, click the "button" and want a good picture.  Very well, then here's my recommendation for you - 

1. If you are not really picky about 'quality' of the image, do not buy a camera. Use your smartphone instead (or buy a smartphone with good camera). I know it is tempting to buy a Camera during those black friday deals, but don't buy it, if you really don't care about 'quality' of the image.  Save your hard earned money and invest it somewhere else.
2. If you do care for the quality OR if you are unhappy with your smartphone photos, then I recommend that you buy a Point-and-shoot digital camera. Here's the criteria that I recommend for buying the camera - 
1. Pick your Price: You have no intention of learning photography. So do not invest in 'high-end' Point-and-shoots. Pick a budget between $200-300 (for example). Do not go for 'really' cheap camera. They are no better than your smartphone camera (or worse).
2. Pick your Brand: Yes, when it comes to low-end point-and-shoots, brand of the camera does matter. I have had Sony, Nikon and Canon point-and-shoots before I bought DSLR and I have found a significant different in their quality. I recommend Sony OR Canon. 
3. Pick your Zoom: While this may not be really a choice with the kind of budget we are looking at, go for the camera with more optical zoom.

Category 2: I want to learn photography, but not sure !
This is perhaps the most common set of people that ask me the question "Hey which DSLR should I buy?". If you selected this answer that means you are 

1. Interested in learning photography.
2. You like how your friends with DSLR are able to capture great pictures that you are somehow unable to do with your current camera. 
3. But you are also conservative in terms of the budget. You are not sure if you want to invest a lot of money in buying expensive DSLR because you are not sure if you will continue to pursue your interest in photography.  

For you, I would recommend following selection criteria

1. I want "Manual": This is perhaps the most important criteria. Because you want to learn photography, you need to have camera that supports Manual Controls. 
2. I want "RAW": If you want to learn photography and post-production, you will want to shoot in RAW. Shooting in RAW format, opens up a lot of possibilities and trust me you will definitely need this.
3. I want "High ISO": Most of the new camera do support high ISO that allow you to shoot in low light situation. I recommend buying a camera that has usable ISO 6400. Usable ISO 12800 would be fantastic. 
4. I am Flexible in "Zoom":  I think people universally agree that, we really don't need super high zooms (unless you shoot sports or wildlife). For most of the practice scenarios, a 5x zoom is sufficient. I recommend being flexible about zoom and not run after 20x, 30x or 50x zooms.
5. I am Flexible in "Budget":Well this one is a bit tricky. I don't want you to invest a lot but definitely enough to get a good quality camera. A decent budget of $400-$600 should give you a good starter camera

Based on the above criteria, there are couple of options that you can choose.

1. High-end Point-and-Shoot Camera: These would be good for people who are unsure about pursuing photography. They are compact and have good quality.
2. Mirrorless Cameras: They are similar to DSLRs except that they are a much newer technology, much smaller and much light-weight. They have changeable lens system. 

Category 3: Don't know anything about photography, but committed to learn it  
If you are in this category, you will have a lot of choices, especially because you are committed, you want to learn and there are so many choices. Fortunately though the selection can be surprisingly simple.
If you are in this category that means -

1. You are flexible to stretch your budget
2. You do not mind carrying big DSLR and camera bags around
3. You like a particular genre of photography (For example - landscapes, seascapes, portraits, wild life etc). 
4. MOST IMPORTANTLY, you do plan to invest in photography in future (like additional accessories, lenses, tripods etc). 

 As I see it, the choice is very simple for you. Here's the criteria - 

1. Pick your budget: Fix your budget. Period. With DSLRs there are cameras from $500 to $7000 and I am sure everyone would agree that "you will get what you pay for". 
2. Pick your Brand: Yes. This is where you need to do your little research and pick a brand of the camera that you want to buy. This is very important because you would eventually (hopefully) buy accessories and probably upgrade to a new camera and switching between different system will not be a good idea.  My recommendation would be Canon, Nikon and Sony, in that order.  I have two Canon DSLRs and I love using those. 

There are basically 3 types DSLRs that you get in the market 

1. Entry-level DSLR: Canon Rebel series, for example, are the entry level DSLRs. They usually cost under $1000 and have good image quality and are loaded with features. They are CROP sensor camera, so their low light performance may not as great at some of the PRO cameras. But do you really need that? If your budget is less than $1000, then these cameras will give you a good start to digital photography. 
2. Mid-Level DSLR: These DSLR are also CROP sensor but they are loaded with different useful features like - high frames-per-second, high ISO, more sophisticated auto-focus system etc. They cost higher but as I said before you get what you pay for.  Examples of such camera - Canon 7D, Canon 60D, Canon 70D. 
3. PRO DSLRs: These are the expensive ones. They are full frame cameras with excellent image quality and low light performance. They are also loaded with various features I mentioned above. WIFI and GPS are some of the new addition to these cameras. Canon 6d, Canon 5d Mark III etc are some examples of this category of cameras. 

Pick any of the above camera depending on your budget. But if you are just starting photography, I would say you go for an Entry Level or Mid-Level DSLR. 

Category 4: I know Photography, It's time for an upgrade:

If you selected this, you probably don't need to read this article. You have spend good number of years doing photography and you probably know what you want to buy already. Plus I am sure you know about cameras, brands etc and I don't think there is anyone who can give you a better recommendation that you yourself. But below are some of the critical questions/decisions you will have to make. 

1. Your Specialization:
Since you have been doing photography for some years, you already know what kind of photography you like. If you are a landscape photographer for example, you will have a different need from a camera than a Sports Photographer or a wild-life photographer for example. No matter how much you want to say "I photography everything", don't say it. There is always a genre that you like more than other. 
 
2. Your System:
So this is a critical decision, whether you want to continue and use the same system/brand OR you want to change the system? Decision obviously depends on your experience with your current system. If you are unhappy with your system, then you would probably want to change it. But the decision won't be very simple because of all the investments that you have already made with the existing system. So unless you really HATE your current system, I recommend sticking with your current system. 
 
3. Your Sensor-Type:
This will depend upon the answer to your first question, your specialization. Generally speaking - landscape photographers love full-frame cameras while Sports/Wild-life photographers prefer to use crop-sensors with higher fps. Portrait work can be done with either full frame or crop sensors. So ultimately it is your choice on what kind of sensor you want. 


Ok with that, I would like to conclude my post here. Hope there was 'some' information that was useful for you.  

Once again, I really appreciate you reading my blog and keep visiting the page. Thank you for all your support.