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I'm looking to get a camera with more zoom and faster shutter speed than my FujiFinePix. But I don't understand the mm. The Fuji has a 12x optical zoom.

The 3 I've checked so far are Nikon D3000/18-55mm, Canon Rebel xs 18-55IS and the Olympus E420 14-42 mm lens.

I realize these are likely not the newest models, in fact the Olympus is on clearance at $300.00 while the other 2 run more like $500.00.

Any help appreciated on these or any other recommendations---just don't want to go over 500.00 and hopefully less.
back up a bit...
you have found a Nikon D300 for $500?
~kimi~
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No, Kimi ... don't we wish :evil:
She's talking about the 3000 (that's as in thousand). That's one of their prosumer offerings, a step up (big step up) from a P&S without all the features of a good SLR.

Tennie, all cited are for sale with the "kit lens" They will give you the shutter speed control you are looking for but zilch as far as zoom is concerned. Kit lenses usually don't score very well in reviews for sharpness either.

Olympus makes good products; I am not at all familiar with their specific models. Go to "DP Review" and search on that model to see if you can find anything.

Rusty
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Sure am glad I asked here. Thanks. I will check out DP Review on the Olympus.

What would be a good lens for zoom? (Cringing because I likely can't afford it. :oops: )

edit
Tried to make sense of the review. :? Many who bought it were happy with it particularly with an added 25mm 'pancake lens'. That lens is about $200.00 which would be about the same as the other cameras I looked at-price wise.

So my question is: what would 25mm do for me zoom wise?
25mm is a wide angle, the opposite of zooming. At least, that is how I think of it. I don't know what a pancake lens is.

The larger the mm number, the more zoom. Your current camera with a 12x zoom is a lot of zoom, probably about a 320mm equivalent or better. But I'm just guessing, I'd have to look up your camera to tell you for sure. And to confuse the issue even more, you will notice I said "equivalent." Because of differences between film and most digital sensor sizes, there is a conversion of sorts to talk apples to apples instead of apple to oranges. OK, a digital camera with a 200mm lens is probably equivalent to a 300mm slr lens. Again, I'm just giving rough estimates and I know our much more knowledgeable members can correct me and clear this up hopefully.

Courtney
it is a shame you can't wait a little longer. I am waiting for the next bump up from the D300s.
Then I am going to sell my D80 with my 50mm lens for around, well not sure.
I know I would let the body go for about $450 - $500. Not sure about the lens. Prices have gone up if I decided to replace it.

To be honest. I have an 18-200 zoom on my camera and I rarely take it off.
I have an 85mm that I love for portraits but other than that, the zoom stays on.
~kimi~
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Thanks for your reply, Courtney. Been doing more searching and figuring I'll likely stick with what I have. It is all too confusing for me.

Kimi, I would wait for the camera but buying a zoom lens like you have would be too much for me. :crying:

Thanks everyone.
I have a Nikon D40 and just added a Tamron 70-300 lens. I have just started playing with the new lens but so far I am happy with the zoom I get. It is also a macro lens. All fo the numbers and ratios and all of that stuff are so confusing to me too.
I hope you can figure this all out witht he help of those who understand all of this and are so willing to share what they know with the rest of us challenged brains.
Tina B
For a few years I was using a Canon 12x P&S camera. About a year ago that camera started working poorly so I asked around (for new camera) suggestions. I ended up buying a Nikon D90 with a Nikon 70-300 lens. From what I was told, the 300 zoom would be very close to what a 12x zoom was; however, that turned out to be wrong. The 300 zoom was much better - close to double the zoom that my 12x was. I mainly use that zoom setting for getting sports pictures - mostly of my grandkids. For everyday use I have a Nikon 18 to 105 zoom lens. With the two lens I'm pretty much set and would recommend that combo to you.
Many who bought it were happy with it particularly with an added 25mm 'pancake lens'.


A pancake lens is generally a thinner version of a normal lens. One review I read says they can be extremely sharp as compared to the "normal" sized lenses, but there aren't a lot of different models around.

The 3 I've checked so far are Nikon D3000/18-55mm, Canon Rebel xs 18-55IS and the Olympus E420 14-42 mm lens.


All these would be considered 3X zooms. You take the lowest mm focal length figure and multiply it by the zoom factor to get the longest mm focal length it will go to. In these cases, 18-55 and 14-42 mm are 3X lenses. This does not, however, take into account the crop factor of the DX (in Nikon terminology) or APS-C (in Canon terminology) sensors. I don't want to confuse you here, but the effective focal length for the Nikon (which has a 1.5 crop factor) of the 18-55mm lens would actually be 27-82mm, again a 3X zoom length. The Canon, if my memory is correct, has a 1.6x crop factor, making that 18-55mm lens effectively an 29-88mm lens, still a 3x zoom. Kimi's 18-200 zoom is an 11X zoom. If I had that one on my Nikon, its effective range would actually be 27-300mm. (I think I want one!)
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