As an amateur photographer, whats a good digital slr type camera with above 8 mp and atleast 12 -18x optical z

Question

above 8mp, between 12 and 18x optical zoom and user friendly.

Answer 1

I like the cannon xti. User friendly, easy to understand manual and good price

Answer 2

SLR Type?

you mean a point and shoot camera right?

if so, the Canon S5IS should do for you:

http://www.amazon.com/Canon-PowerShot-S5...

if you mean a digital SLR, the Nikon d40 would do, and you can get a 70-300mm Lens, to equate to a nice zoom lens:

http://www.amazon.com/Nikon-Digital-18-5...

Answer 3

I just buyed an Olympus E-510:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=UTF8&...

Although many people like Nikon or Canon, I am very happy with my Olympus choice:

10 Megapixels, dual card slot (xD or CompactFlash), image stabilization, full manual controls but also automatic mode, low noise, great usb speed

In my opinion, it's a very good D-SRL which comes at a very decent price. It comes with 2 pretty good lenses included, which means you won't have to spend a lot of money for lenses right now; one of them is a telephoto lens.

you may however upgrade your lenses later on, and the fact that all lenses follow their Four Thirds Standard should guarantee compatibility with all their future D-SLR models, including many other brands which agreed to the same standard

Answer 4

Any of the entry level dslr cameras would do for you.  In addition you would need at the minimum a 70-300mm lens to cover the focal length of a 12-18 zoom on a point and shoot camera.

Answer 5

SLR-like P&S cameras can be found here

http://www.dpreview.com

If you are looking for a DSLR, then they do not come with lenses that are listed by an "X" factor on the zoom lenses that are available.

Nikon makes a 18-200 mm VR lens and if you do the math, that becomes a 11.1x lens, but no one who shoots with DSLR's refer to lenses that way ... that factor is only important when you buy a camera which has a lens that is permanently affixed to the camera like all P&S cameras.

User friendly is subjective ... I have never found a camera, not to be user friendly except for all the P&S cameras ... none are friendly to me, because they all want to decide how to expose the image and give me no choice in the matter.

Answer 6

amateur? go for canon s5 is. u can upgrade later on to a dslr when you know the nuts and bolts of photography. photography, its not so easy at first, but h**l, its amazing!