Camera & Photography Listmania @ Amazon.com

The first thing you need to ask yourself, is film or digital? Film is essentially analog -- you can enlarge your images as much as you need to without revealing the individual pixels, although at some point you will encounter "graininess." This may be important in the most demanding art and sometimes technical photography. You may even need to consider large or medium film formats. Superior quality lenses are also required in these instances, with brands like Carl Zeiss and Hasselblad coming to mind. For the vast majority of applications, though, digital photography will be a more logical choice.

Single-Lens Reflex and their digital counterparts are popular choices for most professional photography, offering a wide selection of lenses and settings for maximum control of photographic parameters. (Single-lens refers to the fact that the viewfinder and image-collecting medium use the same lens through an arragement of prisms and mirrors.) Nikon and Canon are probably the most used, although several other brands like Olympus and Minolta also offer very accepatable picture quality at a somewhat lower price. One photographer I knew swore by Pentax, and although some might disdain his equipment, he certainly had a lot of it!

Most people will be happy with some version of the Point-and-Shoot snapshot camera. The bad news is that you have less control over photographic variables. The good news is that you need not control the photographic variables. Amazon.com doesn't specify a third class of digital camera: the live preview or bridge camera which combines features of the DSLR and Point-and-Shoot types. For many this will be the best of all possible worlds, and at a reasonable price. Example include: various members of the Panasonic Lumix Series cameras, the Fuji Finepix Series, and certain Kodak Easy-Share cameras, to name but three.

Here are some thoughts from Amazon customers who are probably much better versed in photography than I:

Photography Listmania

1. My dSLR Setup
2. The Perfect Canon Digital SLR Setup
3. Digital Cameras & Supplies
4. Minimalist (yet effective!) Midrange Digital Photography Kit
5. Colorado Photographer
6. My Photography Setup
7. Moderate D-SLR List
8. Prosumer Travelographer
9. Average couple's camera set up
10. Nikon Starter
11. Building My Canon EOS 40D Kit
12. Pro Weddings on the Budget
13. John Harrington's Best Business Practices for Photographers
14. Photography
15. Nikon D80 gears
16. A great DSLR Setup
17. Nikon D50 Nice-To-Haves
18. My Photo Gear
19. The Ultimate Digital Photographers Shopping List
20. Nikon D40x basic setup
21. Ultimate Wedding Photographer Essentials
22. My first digital SLR camera
23. The Camera setup that I can't afford but hope someone will buy for me
24. Nikon Professional Digital Wedding Photographer
25. Photography Must Haves
26. Canon EOS Rebel Xti Essentials
27. Photography Equipment
28. Digital Cameras-my favorite 8 megapixal cameras
29. Digital Camera and Accessories for Beginning Photographer
30. Accessories for Canon S2 IS Digital Camera
31. Digital Cameras--my top 7 megapixal cameras
32. My Camera Bag
33. I'm a stupid gear-whore photographer that wants everythign
34. Canon 40D - Sport Photography
35. Tiny digital cameras, packed with features
36. Cameras
37. Comparing the Canon Powershot A-series cameras
38. The Photographic Paradigm
39. Canon EOS 30D - Trial & Error my digital outfit
40. DSLR Junkie
41. Comparing the Nikon D40, D80 and D200
42. My photo gear
43. Camera Ideas for Chris
44. Nikon D40 great setup
45. Favorite Gear for Photography
46. Everything you need to shoot a Nikon d40x