How would you like to profit from photography? Maybe start selling your pictures through an online library or getting them published in magazines, calendars or greetings cards?

It's perfectly feasible. Many amateurs do - and with some success. Some even go on to become full-time professionals. All you need is the ability to take a good picture, a little knowledge of the market, and the right kind of camera.

While it is possible to sell photographs taken with a digital compact, what you really need is a digital SLR - and one with a decent resolution. That's been a bit of a problem until recently; there weren't that many to choose from and the few that were available were too expensive for many enthusiasts looking to take the next step up.

Happily that situation is changing, as prices fall and specifications rise - and some manufacturers are now actively targeting this market. One such company is Nikon, who say their new D200 is 'the perfect camera for the semi-professional and freelancer', and that it will also suit 'professionals looking for a second camera to complement their Nikon D2X or D2HS'.

In theory, the D200 is a replacement for the D100, the camera Nikon launched way back in February 2002 - an eternity in terms of digital photography - which has not really been a viable purchase for some time.

Different

The D200, though, is a different proposition altogether. Based largely on Nikon's D2X, it shares much of the styling and many of the features of the flagship model. Most importantly, with a street price of £1,200 and falling, it's relatively affordable for a D-SLR that captures 10.2-million pixels.

While you want as many pixels as you can get when you're trying to sell your pictures, in practice the difference between the D200's 28.7Mb and the D2X's 34.9Mb is neither here nor there. So a lot of prospective freelancers and even working professionals may decide to pocket a saving of over two grand and go for the D200.

There is, however, one important reason why a professional may steer away from the Nikon range of SLR. The D200 isn't a fullframe digital SLR. There's a lens magnification factor of 1.5x, which severely limits the wideangle coverage available.