As we approach the holiday season, Rebecca and I are often asked by friends and relatives for recommendations on what camera equipment to purchase for a family member. This year I thought it would be nice to share our recommendations online. Our recommendations will range in price from inexpensive stocking stuffers all the way up to a new digital SLR.
I’ll start out with some general hints and tips for holiday shopping. First and foremost, unless one of your goals is to support the local mom and pop photography stores in your area, you should try to buy your photography accessories online. With competition from the internet, the brick and mortar stores have been forced to “match” the online price for camera bodies. Where they now make their money is in the lenses and accessories. Memory cards are one of those areas that have a tremendous markup in a camera store compared to online. In one of our last photography workshops, one of the participants mentioned that a local camera store had a 16GB compact flash card on sale for $349.00. You can buy a nearly equivalent compact flash card online for $35.00! This is an extreme example; however, the same principle holds true for all photography accessories.
We’ve bought our photo equipment online for many years, and have come to trust several vendors that we can recommend. I’ll list these vendors in order of preference:
www.buy.com (Memory cards, hard drives and compact cameras. Free shipping for orders over $25.00)
www.bhphotovideo.com (For cameras, lenses and accessories.)
www.newegg.com (For memory cards and computer equipment.)
www.abesofmaine.com (For compact cameras, lenses and accessories.)
Frys.com and Supermediastore.com also have good prices on memory cards, and we have bought from them in the past without any mishaps.
When searching for the best prices, we often start our search at
www.edealinfo.com This website consolidates many of the best deals that can be found on the internet, and includes links to other sites such as buy.com and newegg.com. Because of the high refresh rate of electronic equipment, manufacturers need a way to offload their “old” inventory to make room for the newest models. Often the newer models (especially with memory cards, etc.) have only a modest performance increase. You can find REALLY good deals on slightly older inventory. Rebecca and I just purchased Kingston 4GB SD cards for $7.99 delivered. That’s $7.99 total cost, delivered to our doorstep. You can’t come close to that price in a “brick and mortar” store. One warning, often these low prices are due to a rebate. Read all the rebate details and be sure you will be able to comply with these before you make the purchase.
www.Pricegrabber.com is also one of the better search engines for finding the best prices online. One of the features we like about Pricegrabber.com is its “bottom line price” listing. Some online retailers will list an item for a low price, and then charge exorbitant amounts for shipping. The “bottom line price” listing at pricegrabber will show you the item price plus shipping so that you can make an apples-to-apples price comparison across the various vendors.
So with those general tips out of the way, let’s start in with some “stocking stuffer” ideas.
Stocking Stuffers: LED keychain flashlight ($1.70 with free shipping on ebay): These keychain flashlights are wonderfully convenient when you need them. They’re small enough to clip to your keychain or store in a pocket in your camera bag. I’ve found them indispensable when trying to find something in my camera bag after dark (or in a dark venue) or as an emergency light on my way back to the car from a late evening hike. This is an item where most photographers would appreciate having more than one. It’s also another item that has a tremendous markup when bought in a brick-and-mortar store. This seller on ebay is selling a great little LED light (with free shipping for the holidays) for $1.70. Buy a bunch and give them to all your friends. A little light like this helped us find our way back to the car when we were lost out in Canyonlands National Park after dark!
http://cgi.ebay.com/WHITE-LED-FLASHLIGHT-KEYCHAIN-free-shipment_W0QQitemZ200272578104QQihZ010QQcategoryZ16037QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp1742.m153.l1262Double Axis Bubble Level ($3.95 with shipping on ebay): This is another item that has a tremendous markup when bought in a “brick-and-mortar” camera store (typically selling for around $30.00) You can buy from at least two stores on ebay, here:
http://cgi.ebay.com/2-Way-2D-Dual-Axis-Double-Bubble-Camera-Spirit-Level_W0QQitemZ320303764519QQihZ011QQcategoryZ15215QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp1742.m153.l1262 Or here:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Camera-Hot-Shoe-Double-2-Axis-bubble-Spirit-Level-NEW_W0QQitemZ180306509246QQihZ008QQcategoryZ15215QQtcZphotoQQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp1713.m153.l1262PolyPro Glove Liners ($4.99 plus shipping from Amazon.com): Thin enough to allow the photographer to operate the camera controls, yet warm enough for short periods of shooting in cold weather.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0001VRXBM/ref=nosim/?tag=priceg451-20&creative=380333&creativeASIN=B0001VRXBM&linkCode=asnThe optimum solution is to wear a pair of these under mittens that have a zippered opening so you can access the camera controls, like these:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000SOTK6S/ref=nosim/?tag=shopzilla_rev_4-20&linkCode=asnMicro fiber lens cleaning cloth ($5.95): Even if the photographer in your family already has one of these, they will appreciate having another. Rebecca and I have a half-dozen or so of these cloths in our various camera bags, and could always use a few more. It is always nice to have a spare on hand in the event that a cloth gets grungy while cleaning a lens. Most photographers find that these cloths, when kept clean (they’re washable), are much more effective than lens cleaning paper or other solutions. They are very effective at removing that oily film that many lens cleaning solutions can leave on your lens. The one at the link (from B&H) can double as a gray card for exposure or white balance tweaking.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/220482-REG/Microstar_81012_Micro_Fiber_18_Gray_Lens.html#featuresCamera memory cards ($7.99 and up): You can find “current deals” on memory cards at
www.edealinfo.com or
www.buy.com I would recommend starting at 4GB for a point-and-shoot camera and 8GB for a digital SLR. You can find good prices on smaller size cards, but they are less convenient for the photographer. I currently use two 16GB A-data cards in my D3 (the D3 has two card slots). A-data is one of those “off-brand” cards that don’t quite have the same specs as the faster “name brand” cards; however they can be found for a very good price.
www.supermediastore.com currently has 16GB cards for sale for $35.00, with comparable prices on smaller cards. For what it’s worth, the only cards we have had issues with in the past were Sandisk Extreme III cards, which sometimes failed to write an image to the card.
$25 to $50 Range:
Gift Certificate to B&H Photo ($20 and up): http://www.bhphotovideo.com/find/giftCard.jspMountainsmith Tour Lumbar Pack (08 closeout for $ 44.93 at REI.com): We’re often asked for recommendations on a good camera bag. Our favorite camera bag is not really a camera bag at all, but a “lumbar pack” designed by Mountainsmith for day hiking, cycling and trail running. The belt system on this pack is very well designed, and makes it one of the few camera bags we’ve tried that will allow you to carry a large (Nikon D3 size) camera and lens, accessories and two water bottles comfortably. The integrated shoulder strap allows you to unclip the belt and swing the bag around in front of your waist to remove the camera. As an added bonus, it doesn’t look like a camera bag, and so presents less of a target when you are traveling in areas where your camera gear might get stolen. Highly recommended!
http://www.rei.com/product/768081?cm_mmc=cse_froogle-_-datafeed-_-product-_-768081&mr:trackingCode=46027409-4AB3-DD11-9B0F-0019B9C043EB&mr:referralID=NA $50 to $100 Range:Backup Hard Drive ($59 and up): This is one item that many digital photographers will defer until it is too late. When you are storing your digital images on a computer hard drive, it’s not a matter of if the hard drive will fail, but when. The hard drive on my parent’s computer failed, and they could have lost thousands of images (and years of memories). My dad called me up and invited me to come visit him in the hospital, because he was sure that is where he would end up when my mom found out he had “crashed” the computer hard drive. In the end I was able to restore the drive long enough to copy the pictures over to a new drive.
www.edealinfo.com is a good place to begin your search for an external backup hard drive. They are currently listing a 500GB drive for $59.20, and another one for $62.44. The photographer in your family might not jump for joy when they unwrap this present, but they will thank you profusely when it saves them from losing all their images when their primary drive fails.
Adobe Photoshop Elements 7 ($89.99 at Newegg.com): Many photographers new to digital will be swayed by the marketing attempts of other companies producing photo-editing applications. However, most photographers eventually come around to using Photoshop as their primary image editing application. There is no doubt that Photoshop is the industry standard, and there are many, many great books and online tutorials available that will help you learn to use the program. Save the money you would spend on that “off brand” application and buy Photoshop upfront. The “full” program is quite expensive for the hobbyist, so you can buy the “hobbyist” version of Photoshop (Photoshop Elements) for $89.99. Better yet, if you have a student in your family that qualifies, buy the academic version of the “full” Photoshop CS4 for a mere $199.00.
$100 - $150 Range:Canon Powershot A590 IS ($109.95 at B&H): I’ve always liked the Canon A series cameras for their blend of functionality and price. Unlike many of the point and shoot cameras on the market today, this camera gives you full manual control of your exposure and other settings (or very good auto settings if that is what you want). Several relatives of ours own the Canon A720 IS (no longer sold) and I’m always impressed with the image quality and ease of use. The $109.95 price at B&H is a tremendous bargain given the capability of this camera. You can buy more expensive compact cameras with more megapixels (this one has an 8 megapixel sensor) but they won’t give you any better image quality.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/542272-REG/Canon_2462B001_PowerShot_A590_IS_Digital.html$150 and Up: Nikon D60 Digital SLR and 18-55mm lens ($599.95 from B&H). While the Canon and Nikon camera bodies in this price range are very close in price and capabilities, the “kit” lenses that come with the Nikon cameras have consistently been rated as better lenses than the Canon equivalents. I also prefer the Nikon user interface over that of the Canon's. Unless you are a pro-photographer who photographs for a living, this camera is all you need and will produce images as good as cameras costing triple the price. Use the money you save by not buying a more expensive camera body and invest in a good photography workshop or better lenses.
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/542463-REG/Nikon_25438_D60_SLR_Digital_Camera.html#featuresThere are many more recommendations we could make, but I have to stop somewhere. If you have any questions, or would like additional recommendations, please don’t hesitate to reply to this thread.
Keith
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