Must Have Beginner Equipment?

[Designer]

Michael; I, too, once thought of using some of my older equipment. For instance; I thought "why not get a Sony, and use my old Minolta lenses?". But then, I thought some more, and ended up getting a Nikon D5000 with two "kit" lenses, bag, and tripod as a package on sale (Best Buy on line). The older lenses probably still work just fine, but the new ones have VR (vibration reduction) in the lenses themselves as opposed to the Sony, in which the VR is in the body. I think I got a pretty good deal, and with more "modern" lenses.

[TobyMac]

Definitely the Tripod, it will always come in handy at some point, just make sure its a proper sturdy one not some cheap little thing, and with that a cable release can also help to achieve some really great long exposure shots. Other than that your setup is pretty decent and you'll find out over time what else you need as you grow and learn. One tip though, research a lot before you buy anything, you might find that there are cheaper alternatives or that you don't even need what you'r looking for. And when it comes to lenses, don't cheap out, better glass is always better, I learned this early on after buying a cheaper lens and I hate it now.

[dan marchant]

After camera, lenses, battery, spare battery and mem card the most important beginner purchases are a spare mem card and a cloth to clean your lenses. Don't buy anything else until you actually find yourself shooting images that need that item. As a beginner you will likely make the usual dumb mistakes we all made; remove the mem card/battery from the camera and then go out without checking. If you have a spare in your case the day won't be wasted.

As for the rest? I have had my camera for 10 months. I quickly bought a tripod and a polarising filter but found that I prefer to shoot street photos and sports, nether of which have needed either accessory. After 10 months I have only just found a shot I want to take that requires an ND filter. Luckily in that time I have also learned that I will want to do that shot using a variety of lens sizes so I know not to buy the one size screw on filters. In other-words, make sure you need a piece of kit before you buy it. Just because it is essential for someone else doesn't mean it will be for you.

Classes, books etc.... in large part this depends on how you best like to learn. Before buying my camera I bought a good camera magazine for several months and also read numerous tutorials at camera web sites to work out what the various camera features did. I didn't bother with a course for that because I was quite happy to read through the manual and learn what everything did. However, when it came to composition I went on a course, which dramatically improved my photography. I think this was especially important for me because I am shooting people in the street and sports - both of which give you just seconds to frame a shot and require you to be thinking ahead all the time.

Next up will be a studio lighting course. I have done zero shooting with flash so far but certainly want to try. I am currently working my way through various tutorials/youtube videos so that I at least know the lingo before finding a course.

[inkista]

Actually, one other aspect that tends to get neglected when folks have these beginner gear questions is the software side. We all fixate on the hardware.

But as a newbie, the other half of learning is going to be on the post-processing side. Picasa, iPhoto, or F-Spot probably don't cut the mustard any more, if you're at the point of having purchased a dSLR. Good RAW conversion software, which can just be the free software that came on the disc that was packaged with the camera, commercial software like Adobe Camera RAW with Photoshop or Lightroom, or an open source package like RAWTherapee or the UFRaw plugin for the Gimp can make a larger difference on image quality than a different camera body or lens. And a pixel-level editing tool with layers and masks like Photoshop (CS5 or Elements) or the Gimp is another.

Also make sure you've got a storage and backup scheme worked out.