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Hi all, not been around here long but already see the wealth of experience on this forum so figured I might avail myself of it ...
Bought a Nikon D3300 last year, immediately swapped the 18-55 kit lens for a 18-200 to give me a more versatile "everyday" lens, also bought a big Sigma 150-600 C for my primary hobby, motorsports photography (figuring the Sigma gave me the most "bang for buck" at the time), and over the last few months I've been pondering where I go next.
I bought a cheap body because I wanted to prove to myself I needed "feature X" before I spent £100's on something I didn't really need. For example the D3300 shoots at 5fps, something I figured would be important for motorsports, whereas the next model up (at the time), the D7200, shoots at 6fps, but was £500 more. Did I really want to spend £500 on 1 extra fps? Of course I didn't do my research properly otherwise I'd have known the D3300 only has a tiny buffer compared to the D7200!
So I started looking at my options. Upgrade the body to a D7200 / D7500 / D500? Get myself a 70-200 f2.8 so-called "pro" sports lens as I've decided the 18-200 doesn't really cut it for motorsports, and the Sigma is sometimes too big (should of gone for the 100 - 400 in hindsight). Get myself a 24-70 f2.8 because I shoot oval track racing as well as circuit and need something even closer than the 70-200?
But then as I added this up I found myself not only £1,000's out of pocket, but with several KG's extra weight to carry around also, and I'm already finding I leave the Sigma behind sometimes as a foot long 2KG lump is not something you chuck in your bag on the off chance you might use it.
So then I saw the Olympus E-M1 Mk2, a top of the range Micro 4/3rds camera that seems to tick all the boxes for me: super fast, light, several top quality (small and light) lenses etc., and here was me thinking I'd go FF from APS-C, not the other way (smaller sensor rather than bigger).
Am I mad?
After a year shooting with my D3300 here's what I've learned :-
Not sure if I'm looking for advice or confirmation, but either way, I've found this forum never slow to come forward with opinions!
Bought a Nikon D3300 last year, immediately swapped the 18-55 kit lens for a 18-200 to give me a more versatile "everyday" lens, also bought a big Sigma 150-600 C for my primary hobby, motorsports photography (figuring the Sigma gave me the most "bang for buck" at the time), and over the last few months I've been pondering where I go next.
I bought a cheap body because I wanted to prove to myself I needed "feature X" before I spent £100's on something I didn't really need. For example the D3300 shoots at 5fps, something I figured would be important for motorsports, whereas the next model up (at the time), the D7200, shoots at 6fps, but was £500 more. Did I really want to spend £500 on 1 extra fps? Of course I didn't do my research properly otherwise I'd have known the D3300 only has a tiny buffer compared to the D7200!
So I started looking at my options. Upgrade the body to a D7200 / D7500 / D500? Get myself a 70-200 f2.8 so-called "pro" sports lens as I've decided the 18-200 doesn't really cut it for motorsports, and the Sigma is sometimes too big (should of gone for the 100 - 400 in hindsight). Get myself a 24-70 f2.8 because I shoot oval track racing as well as circuit and need something even closer than the 70-200?
But then as I added this up I found myself not only £1,000's out of pocket, but with several KG's extra weight to carry around also, and I'm already finding I leave the Sigma behind sometimes as a foot long 2KG lump is not something you chuck in your bag on the off chance you might use it.
So then I saw the Olympus E-M1 Mk2, a top of the range Micro 4/3rds camera that seems to tick all the boxes for me: super fast, light, several top quality (small and light) lenses etc., and here was me thinking I'd go FF from APS-C, not the other way (smaller sensor rather than bigger).
Am I mad?
After a year shooting with my D3300 here's what I've learned :-
- Frame-rate - I need more than 5fps and I need to be able to shoot for more than a second or 2 before the buffer fills.
- Bulk / weight - I have a shoulder bag and a back-pack, the shoulder bag is comfortable to carry around, the back-pack isn't, I'm 55, I don't want to carry a stone in weight of camera gear on my back.
- I've shot 1,000's of images in a year, only 1% are are at > ISO3200, so pretty sure the supposed low light inadequacies of M4/3 don't matter.
- I do this as a hobby, I don't do huge prints, I post on social media, I do some artwork for my son who races on short ovals, I don't need ultra-mega-pro quality images.
- I think I can afford to spend £3k, and Wex will give me £900 for my current gear (I have a prime lens as well I would no longer need).
Not sure if I'm looking for advice or confirmation, but either way, I've found this forum never slow to come forward with opinions!