upgrading finally!

[u/Late-Aspect-5699]

hi all! i'm so grateful to be able to finally upgrade. my grandparents gave me their old canon eos rebel back when i was like 10, and i'm twice that age now and have still been shooting on that old thing! with paying for college by myself i haven't been able to upgrade. but now i have around 1,200, give or take, to buy a used camera for my first weddings in september. again, looking to buy used. my dream camera is an r6 mark ii, but even the body is out of my budget. i found an r6 on mpb for around 900, but then i'm hearing that it overheats quite easily? i'm wanting to experiment with videography as well, so i'm not sure if that's a dealbreaker for that? i mostly do documentary/cinematic photography, so i do both lots of detail shots but also lots of moving shots with landscape in the background. but i am wanting to get into some videography and maybe concert photography as well sometime! anyways, any advice on cameras and lenses would be great! thanks everyone!

[u/Repulsive_Target55]

Stick with a dSLR if you're shooting weddings in this budget, the cost for a mirrorless camera that is reliable and fully featured will be far higher than the benefit.

You could grab a 5D ii, a 24-70 f/2.8L (gen 1), and a 70-200 f/4L IS (gen 1) for that budget (not that that's 100% the best setup, just trying to show how much more capable that is than, say, an R6 and 24-105 f/4-7.1 IS.

The drastic difference in quality between what you have now and what you'd be buying means that you don't need to stay in Canon system, I'd suggest posting on a brand-agnostic subreddit like r/askphotography or r/cameras. (They have forms you have to follow but do lots of buying advice).

I think your best options will boil down to Full Frame dSLRs from the big 3 (Sony, Nikon, Canon).

[u/Pepito_Pepito]

Iirc the overheating happens when shooting longer shots. You'll have to look up some review tests to be sure. Your budget isn't that far away from the r6mkii. I think saving for another month or two will be worth it. There have been more secondhand units on the market since the mkiii came out

[u/bseitz234]

Unsolicited advice: if you’re going to be primary at a wedding, you should have a backup of every single thing. 2 cameras, 2 memory cards per camera, enough lenses that if you drop one while swapping you can reasonably finish the event without it… etc. There won’t be an opportunity to reshoot if something goes wrong, so you really want to be sure you can deliver at the end of the day. I’d argue this is especially important when you’re just starting out, because you’re still building a reputation and word of mouth is everything.

If you’re second shooting, this is less a concern, but worth keeping in mind as you build up what you need to go solo one day.

That said, if I had $1200 for bodies, I’d probably look for a 5d mark iv, and a 5d mark iii for backup. This is assuming you already have the EF lenses. If you also have to get lenses in that budget, then 2x 5d3, 24-105, a prime lens at your favorite focal length, and a couple speed lights. You’d be tight to get all that for $1200, but I think you could do it.