Looking to buy a tablet & a digital camera

[crosshair]

Those Lumixes with the Leica lenses are really nice.

The main argument for a casual photographer choosing a DSLR vs something more compact would be if you think you might get more serious down the road. With a starter Canon or Nikon DSLR you can buy specialty lenses, flashes, etc that will greatly expand your capability, and then you can keep them, and use with an upgrade body when your old one becomes obsolete you need better performance.

So it's really down to what you think you'll be doing with the camera, down the road. Purely functional, taking pics of your kids, vacations, etc, the small ones are perfect. If you're a more serious hobbyist or will be using the camera for art, design, or work, you're going to want the DSLR sooner or later so you might as well start there.

I just picked up a badass Canon 24-105mm f4L lens that will be the shit on any Canon body I get in the future, until I break it, which hopefully will be never because it is built like a tank.
My wide-angle I bought two camera bodies ago, and I still use it all the time.

[mistersmith]

If you're looking for the very best stuff at that price range, I'd suggest a used Canon 5D (not the 5DMKII, which is the current model, and will cost more than your budget all by itself).

The reason that I'd go 5D, as opposed to the other models talked about -- which are all good cameras -- is that is has a larger sensor, what's called "full frame" because it's the same size as the part of the film that a traditional 35mm camera would expose. This has two advantages:

First, your lenses will work at the "real" focal length. If you put a 35mm lens on a full-frame camera, it works at 35mm. If you put it on a crop sensor camera (like the t2i, T3i, any "D" camera that's not a 5 or a 1, etc.) you have to do the math in your head to figure the proper magnification of the lens. A 35mm lens on a crop sensor camera functions as about a 60mm lens. This isn't a huge deal -- what your eye sees through the viewfinder is what your lens sees too. But it can limit your lens choices, as everything's "zoomier" than advertised. So you'll have a rougher time indoors.

Second, and this is the biggie, full-frame cameras work much better in low light situations. It doesn't seem to make a lot of sense, but the larger sensor means more light can hit the thing at the same time, meaning a full-frame camera can get away with lower ISOs (less noise), smaller apertures, and faster shutter speeds (freezing motion instead of a blurry photo) when compared to a crop-sensor in the same environment.

So that's why I'd buy a 5D...and as far as lenses, you won't need stuff that costs more than $500. And again, buy used, because this stuff will last forever. I own a few lenses but haven't taken my favorite off in over a year. It's the 28mm USM f/1.8. It's about $450 new, and is amazing for indoor, outdoor, low light, and everything else. It can be a little wide for most people, but it's perfect for me. The 1.8 maximum aperture means it's super fast in the dark. I don't even own a flash and 99% of my pictures are in dimly lit art galleries, bars, etc. The other upside to a lens that doesn't zoom (they're called "prime" lenses) is that there's next to no distortion (barrel distortion, pincushion, etc.) that comes from the glass elements changing position in relation to each other. So the photos are "realer looking" and there's less Photoshop to do. If you go Canon, whatever lens you get make sure it has "USM" focusing. That makes a huge difference, especially in darker environments.

You should be able to get that camera and lens for around $1100-1200 total if you shop smart and probably buy both used, and you'll have a totally solid, no-compromises rig that can do nearly everything. Hell, that body-lens pairing is one of the most common photojournalist setups in the world right now. It won't be good for spying on people from across the street, but it's totally capable and very un-obnoxious in "intimate" settings. And that leaves a few hundred bucks for a tablet...get the HP TouchPad off eBay for $250, that does everything you need except let you spend a ton of money in the app store. Because there barely is one anymore. But I have a TouchPad and it's fine for browsing, watching HD video, email and Facebook, etc.

Here's a link to my photos, I'm no master but they're pretty good. Check out the recent Sketch Tuesday gallery and the Josh Keyes gallery, those are both pretty good and give you a sense of what you can do in a photo-unfriendly situation, and the Adam Caldwell gallery looks really good too...remember, I don't even own a flash, this is all with a used 5D (I paid $700) and a 28mm 1.8 lens (about $400).

mistersmith_22's photosets on Flickr

[Josh Rickun]

micro 4/3 lenses tend to work all across the board with any make of m43 camera. and with an adapter they take slr lenses. i have a screwmount leica lens from the 50s on my lumix.

[Fuehrer]

There's a guy on Craigslist selling iPads and 5D MII's for $500 each...only thing is he is in London, but you can send Western Union to his lawyer and business partner in Nigeria and he'll ship it to you.

Seems legit.

[austininin]

I just got a Canon PowerShot S100 for product photography. Works great, all manual and automatic settings. RAW, white balance, etc. Perfect for the price, size and minimal lens distortion for straight on shots. Though not sure what she will be doing with the camera.