New Canon...

SheilaO wrote:

Thanks so much for the advice, I hadn't thought of it like that - in my innocence I thought lenses stayed the same, but of course they also move on with the improvements in technology. Maybe I will just have to begin again... Tell me one more thing, is it safe to buy secondhand, and how can you know if you are getting good equipment?

Thanks again,

Sheila

It might be too much information from so many people, but hope you manage.

For the second hand things, only thing you can do is: Check for bumps and scratches (especially on the lens elements), cleanliness of the inner lens elements - no dust, not weird stuff, fungus and such..., clean smooth movement of focus ring and zoom ring, if lens barrel is supposed to move during focusing or zooming, it should go about smooth. No crackling sounds or scratching. No big wiggle to the side, but little is allowed.

Check if no "maps" are visible on the device, which might be caused by liquid intrusion.

Check if ellectrical contacts are clean and look "gold", no oxidation....

Test it on the camera, check it if doesn´t make weird noises during focusing and if image stabilization works (it´s relatively subtle, but you should spot it at longer focal lenghts when zoomed in). Especially when you compare it on/off...

Then you should take some image of a "straight thing" like a wall, from a good distance (10-20 feet) and check for general sharpness and corner sharpness. Might not be stellar, but should be EVEN across the frame, especially when stopped down to larger aperture numbers like f/8 or more.

And that´s it. After you checked this (takes like four minutes when experienced) you have to rely on your luck. I bought a lot of used stuff and not a single thing was bad, broke on me, or anything like that.

Wish you good luck!

About mirrorless: It usually is smaller, it´s build more around responsive "digital" UI. So ellectronics viewfinder and LCD. The focusing is "super precise" because it works directly from the image sensor. Yet can be little slower. Also it needs different set of lenses, or it needs the adapter to adapt normal DSLR lenses.

DSLR has usually better ergonomy, more hardware controls, and of course, optical viewfinder - You do not see what you´re going to get before you shoot. You have to shoot and then check. But the viewfinder is nice and "real time" while mirrorless cameras can bring delays, lag and noise to the viewfinder.

DSLRs have dedicated focusing system. generally better and faster, but it might be a draw sooner than later.

mirrorless can be made smaller, but not all setups are smaller. Some are as big as with DSLRs. So it is matter of ones preferences.