Best digital camera for b&w stills under $600

<p>Yeah, I wasn't very worried about it. I might buy an additional one depending on the size of the one they send. I (somewhat weirdly) like the idea of having a couple of smaller ones to force me to shoot in somewhat shorter bursts, like I did with film. That might help me to offload and process the images more often as well as trick me into spending more time preparing for a shot instead of just taking it as soon as I imagine I might have a winner.</p>

<p>Well, here's an update after having not used the camera and lens very long at all yet. I'm very much enjoying the usage range and quality of my lens and I'm feeling very comfortable with the body and it's interface. For low-light photography (which will often be event photography in my usage), I use auto ISO with an upper limit of 6400 but might need to drop that to 3200 soon. I wish my lens was faster/brighter, but I still prefer it as my main lens to faster ones I've read about. I switched to back button auto-focusing, which I hadn't heard of before but am liking very much because it allows me to use manual most of the time with minimal effort to switch back to auto, which is important for moving subjects when not using zone focus.</p>

<p>You can see my results so far in Flickr. http://www.flickr.com/photos/14294499@N06/<br>

I'm much happier with most of the more recent photos than the older ones, because I've become more serious and careful as I've become more comfortable and fluent with my D5100. (My favorites are the onions and the wooden landscape. I'll be deleting most of these after a bit, when my style sets back in and I'm technically competent.)</p>

<p>No need to look at this, but just in case you're interested, I might eventually buy ONE of these items (probably more than a year from now):<br>

http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/11V8TYS21MU9W/</p>

<p>I'd like a fast, somewhat wide angle lens for night photography. Oddly enough, there are very few auto-focusing lenses that fit that description, which actually makes buying an x100 a cheaper option. Maybe I'll decide I'm content without autofocus. That Sigma 18-35mm F1.8 sure looks nice, but it's too expensive (for me.) Right now, they're all too expensive for me - I make more money at my (permanent) seasonal part-time library job than I do teaching as an adjunct professor (which is nothing unusual, but very little income.) Besides, I don't need to get a new lens until I've learned this one thoroughly, which I'll probably feel to be the case in a couple of months or so but will likely discover to be wrong as I adapt more fully to it.</p>