whoami77 Loc: Woodstock,GA N of Atlanta, GA

My 16 year old Granddaughter has taken an interest in photography and I sure would love to hear opinions from my fellow Hogs regarding the Nikon D3300 that is on sell from Nikon ($250.00 savings). She wants to photograph her horse so she will need the camera to shoot 4-5 frames per second. Thanks in advance for your advise.

stansoper Loc: Topeka, KS

I have a D3100. The D3300 shoots at 5fps, so you should be good to go. Would be a great DLSR for your Granddaughter.

Ched49 Loc: Pittsburgh, Pa.

The D3300 is one of the better entry level DSLR's on the market.

DavidPine Loc: Fredericksburg, TX

I think you did good. I gave my 16 year old (then) grandson a D7100 and an 18-200 lens a year ago and he has maintained his interest in photography.

rbfanman

The Nikon D3300 is a great entry level DSLR. I own one, and have no complaints about it. It will do fine with horse photos. For the money, it is a great bargain on a great camera.

bull drink water Loc: pontiac mi.

in your stock of equipment, do you have something you could loan or give her?

orrie smith Loc: Kansas

also check out b&h photo and adorama for used equipment. the d7100 is a much better camera for her action shots when photographing her horses.

jerryc41 Loc: Catskill Mts of NY

It might be a good idea to discuss this with her and compare other cameras with the D3300. It would be a shame to give it to her and see her face drop because she wanted a different model.

http://camerasize.com/
http://www.imaging-resource.com/IMCOMP/COMPS01.HTM
http://snapsort.com/compare
http://www.dpreview.com/products/compare/cameras?utm_campaign=internal-link&utm_source=mainmenu&utm_medium=text&ref=mainmenu
http://www.imaging-resource.com/cameras/compare/

MtnMan Loc: ID

The D7100 is no better, costs much more, is 50% heavier, AND IMHO more difficult to operate because of a bunch of buttons scattered about.

Impressionist

For a young teenager the Sony a6000 should be considered. It is the way of the future she is part of. The camera will fit in her back pack or big coat pocket. Mine keeps up with my Nikon d7200 though not quite as rugged. Its autofocus is quicker. It is in you price range.

amfoto1 Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA

Most modern DSLRs can shoot 4 or 5 frames per second. Just tell your grand daughter to beware... "machine gunning" like that often doesn't get the shot you want and you end up with a whole lot more images to sort through in the end. Sometimes it's a lot better to work at timing single shots.

OTOH, I do use short bursts a lot (2 to 4 frames), but the main reason is to catch the horse's stride in a more attractive pose. That's virtually impossible to time exactly.

I've also seen the other extreme in action... Such as a guy with a 9 or 10 frame per second camera shooting at an event, almost holding the shutter button down the whole time, ended up with almost 10,000 images (most of which were crap, to put it bluntly).

Another proud father I know shoots 4X as many images as me at events (although he's only shooting his daughter and a few of her friends, while I'm shooting all participants at the event). Yet his wife has been one of my very best customers, buying lots and lots of photos of her daughter and her horse from me over the years. I'm sure he gets some good shots, too. But over-reliance on the automation of modern DSLRs and sheer high volume of shots is no guarantee of good results!

A more important consideration than frame rate is "shutter lag", which all cameras have to some extent or another. It's basically the fraction of a second between you pressing the shutter release and the camera actually taking the shot. The shorter the better.... i.e. the more "responsive" the camera will be.

The most important thing for action equestrian photography is the camera AND lens auto focus system. Both must be up to the task of tracking movement, including changes in direction. Most cameras have an AF system that's capable, thought it may only be the center-most AF point only. Lenses are another thing entirely. I don't know enough about modern Nikon lenses to make any recommendations. But I do know that the D3300 is one of those Nikons that only auto focuses AF-S and AF-I lenses with the focus motor built into the lens itself.... AF-D and some other lenses that rely upon a focusing motor and drive gear in the camera body, which the D3300 lacks (as do the D5000-series... only the D7000 series have it), will be manual focus only on that camera.

While it's possible to shoot equestrian action with manual focus, it's a whole heck of a lot easier and you get a lot more well-focused shots with a high performance AF system (camera AND lens)! It also will be up to the user, to some extent. There are certain techniques to help insure a higher percentage of in-focus shots. Practice makes a big difference, too.

One other thing I would look for to shoot action would be an optical viewfinder, which the D3300 certainly has. This is because electronic viewfinders (such as many Sony use... as well as some cameras from Canon, Nikon and everyone else) just aren't quick enough refreshing to use shooting fast action. While the newer ones are much, much better than the older ones and their AF systems might be adequate, there's still a slight lag so that by the time you see it with any sort of EVF, it's too late to capture it.

Friends of mine use Nikon gear with equal success for equestrian photography, so I know for certain it's up to the task. Unfortunately, I can't get any more specific than that though, simply because it's not what I use. I will leave it to some Nikon shooters to give you specifics about the D3300 in particular, as well as the best lenses to use on it (which are probably NOT the "kit" lenses offered with it). I shoot with Canon gear and am quite familiar with using it for equestrian and other action/sports photography, can recommend Canon lenses and cameras... as well as some techniques using it to best advantage for those purposes.