LocalNavy433 Photography

Hello how the hell are you? If this is your first time here thanks for stopping by.  In this blog we are going to talk about why buying used camera gear is the way to go when you are first starting out with photography.  The main reason and the most important is money.  The savings that you will get from not buying brand new is so much and why would you buy brand new when you are not sure this is something that you are going to still be doing years later.  The overall cost going this route is about half of what it would be buying brand new. 

The best part about this is buying from a pawnshop the price can be haggled and you will end up paying less if you are willing to walk away if the price is not what you are looking for.  I bought my Nikon d3000 for $80 bucks when I was starting out.  This alone allowed me to get the body and two lenses for less than a hundred dollars.  This was something that at the time I was not sure I was going to be staying with.  At the time I was thinking that I don’t know where this is going to go but I was going to try my best at getting good at shooting.  I was taking photos of anything and everything that I could just to learn how to use the camera.  

At this point I was trying to understand the whole picture of what photography is.  The fact is the older gear was working for the way that I was shooting at the time.  I was posting everyday and growing to the point that I was able to buy a brand new camera because I was selling some of my images.  I saved that money until I had enough to buy that camera I thought was going to help me grow more.  You see the point of buying used before buying brand new allowed me to grow and understand what I needed.  Once I had the new body it was still just a beginner camera but it was Canon and the “Color science” was so good or so I was told.  

The thing was I out grew that body so fast so I needed to upgrade in about 6 months.  I then bought a Canon 60d which was used and I sold the t6 to pay for the 60d.  This gave me a camera with the same sensor but more features.  This was the key in growing as a photographer and the features are what was going to get me the better images.  Again not a dime was spent out of my pocket because I sold the other camera and some more images that I had been posting on social media.  This is the key to getting newer gear whatever money you make from selling your older gear and photos will pay for the hobby that you are now apart of.  This got to the point a year and a half later that I needed better lenses.  

You see I stayed with the kit lens for all my images for the longest time.  In fact I was shooting the kit lenses for about 3 years.  It took me forever to upgrade my lenses because I was working on the techniques of taking images instead of what gear I could buy for getting a better photo.  This allows you to really get good at taking photos.  The better you can use the gear that you have the better your photography is going to be.  I did end up buying a full frame camera at this time because I thought that I needed that to get a look to my images.  The best part is I was again buying the gear used.  I saved up to buy a Canon 5D Mark III and the older pro lenses that went with it.  I was able to say that I had pro level gear and my images still looked the same so I was wrong thinking that I needed to get that full frame gear.  

I ended up selling all that gear and with the money that I used selling the older DSLR and lenses to get two Sony a6400’s this was awesome I was finally at the point that I had the latest gear so I was on the move now.  Then I ran into battery issues while I was out shooting.  I again ended up selling all that gear to buy my beloved Canon 80d and the pro level lenses for it.  Now I am getting all the features that I wanted out of a camera and the battery life as well.  I am still shooting with an older DSLR and it was used and so is the glass that I am shooting with.  I don’t think that I am ever going to buy brand new again because of the cost that alone is something that I just cannot afford.  

The whole point to this ramble is to show that brand new is not going to make you a better photographer.  Taking the time to really learn how to use a camera is what is going to make you better.   Take the money that you will save and buy a class on photography or spend that money on being able to go travel to get the images you want.  Take the left over money and invest it into learning editing software to get the images you take looking good.  The one thing that I am trying to say is brand new gear is great but don’t let that lead you in the wrong direction of photography.