Nikon D70 pruchase: obscene?

It's a good not-quite-pro SLR-alike set-up.

I would love to have the camera, but I'm just not so sure about the pricetag. I can afford it, but I feel a bit quilty. I suppose I'm looking for someone to say, "Buy it, buy it."

I really shouldn't have bought mine either (it was $1,222 in Australian dollars) but sometimes you just need to do something nice for yourself y'know?

If you buy it, spring for plenty of CF memory, in the RAW+JPEG mode you get ~43 shots/512MB card.

I wish I could afford more than the 18-70 that it gets packaged. I shoot almost entirely on the wide end and barrel distortion is noticeable in long horizontal or vertical lines. (The 18-70 vignettes on the wide end, too, but I'm used to lightly burning in the edges anyway - less work for me.)

I think I'd shoot in JPEG with low compression, because I can live with losing some detail, and I don't want to use the memory.

My other lenses are AI, so they won't work, right?

tell baout the d40?

it's fine, and you should be able to get it very cheap now as it's been replaced by the d60, and now the d5000. only problem is it won't autofocus with older nikon lenses, including the very cheap and good 50mm 1.8. so if you've got any interest in low-light stuff or portraits with shallow focus, try looking at canon's cheap DSLRs as an alternative. (i use nikon stuff but i think they're not such a good entry level prospect at the moment.)

oh i saw one at best buy so i thought the d40 was some new cheaper alternative to the d60. whats the cheapest model that does work with the older lenses, d70?

it's probably the d90? that was the d70's replacement. nice new sensor, handles low light better than the previous generation of nikons, does video (not that well, but...), costs about $900 though.

it's basically only prime lenses that don't autofocus with the cheaper nikons. i think nikon realised than 99 per cent of people who bought them just left one lens on the camera so they didn't bother maintaining compatibility,

Nikon did recently bring out a DX-format AF-S (silent wave autofocus, works on the newer bodies) 35mm f/1.8 prime lens, but it's twice the price of the old 50/1.8. I'm old-fashioned enough to think that an SLR kit should be a body + a fast prime, so a cheap (ex-display? refurb?) D40 or D60 plus the 35/1.8 seems like the way to go to me.

Haven't seen any D40s in shops for a while over here (UK) and the D60 has vanished from all the usual online retailers now.

Turned out to be a great camera BTW.

FWIW，I think with the rate at which digital bodies are coming out now, it's really easy to get a great deal on the used market for a body that's one or two generations out of line, but will still take awesome fantastic pictures. put the money you save towards a good lens - that Nikon 35mm 1.8 looks great. or better yet, buy the lens used too!

I love cheap 50mm's as much as the next guy, but take note that on all of these bodies (Canon or Nikon) they will have an 80mm equivalent FOV, making them into a portrait-length telephoto. in that aspect the 35mm 1.8 is awesome, since it provides a 50mm-ish FOV.