Well, let me re-phrase it: if you want to take decent pictures, without extreme color/lens distortions, you have to take into account that you're going to spend quite some money.
I've been shooting with whatever was passing in my hands for years: back in the 90s I had a couple of film SLR cameras that were giving me more disappointment than fun. The cameras them-self, in those cases, weren't the real money issue: I remember I got them for free, so the body was already there, and luckily even the lenses! Buying films wasn't a problem neither: I was mainly shooting outside scenes, so a cheap AGFA, Kodak or Fujifilm ISO100 was all I needed. The real pain was printing them! And what was more disappointing than wasting 4 to 5 times the price of the raw film to print out of focus, underexposed or overexposed pictures? 99% of the cases, those shots were taken over trips, pretty long ones, so there was no way to get back there and re-shot.
In addition you weren't really shooting several frames of the same scene: each print cost, so one shot was all you got.
Due to that and to the fact that my interest quickly shifted towards sports - I mean played sports - I really had not particular time to keep on shooting.
Then digital cameras arrived! I've always been a kind of technology addicted geek, so as soon as they got on the market I got some of them in my hands. There's really no sense to make a list of them: they were almost all from decently-known brands but, paying attention to the budget, I almost always regretted my choices....
I had - as 99.9% of the photographer-wanna-be back in time - a very silly way to evaluate cameras before buying them: how much to I pay for each mega-pixel? And then, out of a bunch I was analyzing, the one with best ratio was the winner.
Ok, the situation was also pretty different from now: I remember I started with something that had VGA resolution (is out there anyone who remembers VGA and SVGA resolution?), then up to 2 and 5 Mp, so the sensor dimension was seriously affecting the overall picture quality. One of the last point-and-shoot was a pretty decent Olympus, with something like 12Mp that let me take usable shots, like this one for example
Might I go back and get a DSLR at that point, I'd do it right the way! Were were I only slightly wiser and not have crappy pics of a 2 weeks trip around the U.S......
At the end of the road, finally, my DSLR arrived! As I already had the chance to write, I'm not at all a pro photographer - I never was and quite surely never will be - but having played with cameras and particularly with SLR for a while I think I had the basic knowledge to start having fun.
And also I have the basic knowledge that let me say "you need good lenses to take good photos!".
And yes, that's why of all this long post: to take good photos you need good lenses --> good lenses = higher cost --> photography doesn't come for free!
Now, when you just buy your DSLR camera, you already put in it a decent amount of money for the body itself. If you got a "package" you have a basic zoom lens (usually 18-55mm) in it that lets you take pictures. Good pictures? Well, mainly it depends on you (as always, roughly 55/60% is on you, 25/35% on the lens and 10/20% on the camera body), but for sure that lens won't let you shoot the sharpest, cleaner and most vibrant picture of your life! So, you have to buy at least another lens. So there you are, ready to put out....What??!! something like the the same price you paid for the camera??!!
That's actually not always true, but for a decent lens expect to pay at least 50% of your camera value: it's funny, but checking the prices for entry-level equipment as well as mid-level and pro-stuff, it almost always applies!
So, just before swiping your credit card once again, you start checking around for the best offer to complete your camera set: it's not an astonishing discovery to realize that best prices are usually on the internet. And there you are, buying your lenses on the net and waiting for the delivery..... Or at least there I am!
Personally I decided to go for two lenses, a prime lens and a zoom (maybe another time I'll write a bit more about their differences, hopefully with the support of some pictures I'll have taken with them by then), saving something like 40/50% on the retail price. Is this long wait worth the discount? Initially I thought so, but now that my plane is almost departing and I might end up on the trip with a not-up-to-the-level-I-want lens, maybe I should have just gone to the photo shop in town.
Really at the end, remember, the best camera is always the one you've with you - as Chase Jarvish says.
So grab you camera, whichever t is, and take shots! In the meanwhile I calmly wait like my Buddha for the lenses to be delivered...
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