Beginner in Landscape Photography: New Camera Advice

Hey everyone, I'm looking for advice on what camera to get to improve my landscape photography.
I've had the Fujifilm Finepix S1 for 5 years now, and it's been a really great digital camera, but I think I'm a bit limited in the fact I can't change the lens. I would like a DSLR camera so that I can take photos with a more wide angle lens.
Basically what I'm most interested in is taking photos of mountains, lakes, and landscapes, and I would also love to do some night-time photography. Night-time photography is something I really haven't been able to do that well with the Fujifilm Finepix. 
Could anyone recommend a decent camera and lens for what I'm looking for? One that doesn't break the bank preferably (>£500). Right now my skills are pretty limited, I know enough to work the camera on manual mode and adjust ISO and shutter speed, but I'm looking to learn a lot more when I invest in a new camera.
I've attached some photos so you can see what kind of photos I like to take.
Thanks in advance for any help!

Hello, and welcome.
I am a newbie to the whole photographic thing.

But I did enjoy looking at those pictures very nice.

From what I see in your pictures, Emma, you are doing quite fine
prior to SR but things, in PP are not supporting your effort and en-
thusiasm, IMVHO.

Most of your shot have great potential but little of it shines through
as it could/should… given your are recording RAW files.

Hey thanks very much for you reply. What do you mean about the RAW file?



I was afraid you'd come back with that question because I
don't know your camera and its features.

Have a look  HERE

Ok thanks, I'll have a read of that and hopefully things will make more sense.

In short, Emma, the best way to improve your photography at
this point is to upgrade to a RAW recording camera and learn
post-processing… and having a good time doing it.

Hey so it turns out my camera can record RAW photos! The only problem is that my Mac doesn't like to open the files. I'm sure there's a simple enough way around this though.

Either the camera maker or Apple will have the necessary
tools/profiles available for download.

G'day Emma

As a new member to the PT family - WELCOME - there are plenty of people here with heaps of knowledge and skills to share with you. Years ago I started my digital photography with an Fuji S-5000 followed by a Fuji XS-1 .... and now run Panasonic superzoom cameras as they have both a sharper lens and a better range of features and therefore suit me nicely

Your images (above) show us that you have some beaut visual skills, and as NS says, maybe a bit of PP editing could lift some from 'good' to 'really good'.

Coming back to your request for dSLR information
The biggest issue with any dSLR is -not- the camera, it is the extra lenses you need to do what your visual-self wants to record. To replace your Fuji zoom lens will need i) a 24-105mm zoom, then ii) a 100 to 400mm zoom, then iii) an 800mm 'long' lens ... all up at about 2000 ~ 2500 pounds > after you have bought the camera! Q- can you afford this?

To me you have 2 other alternatives ... make better use of the existing Fuji via better software, -or- update the Fuji to a similar camera, but one with extra features not found in the Fuji.

Like you, my zoom lens 'only' goes to 24mm at wide-angle mode, but I get around this by turning the camera sideways, then carefully shooting 3 or 4 or 5 images and in the computer, joining them carefully using software. This gives me super-wide angle / panorama pictures (at no cost for extra lenses)

My Panasonic superzoom will shoot hundreds of 'burst' images before stopping, and when doing after dark star pictures, these again are joined by software to give me beaut after-dark images. (ps- I do not know how many images your Fuji will take before stopping)

Here's one from recently ... a 45 minute exposure of 100 images joined in the computer

Please come back with more Qs and collectively we'll see what we can do for you

Hope this helps
Phil from the great land Downunder
www.flickr.com/photos/ozzie_traveller/sets/

Using a Wide Angle Lens to Capture the WHOLE Landscape is important for a landscape photographs.When you aren’t just interested in highlighting details in the environment, a trusted wide-angle lens is the way to go for a landscape photographer.

G'day Emma

Hope we haven't drowned you with too much information - but here's a bit more 

I mentioned above about using your Fuji and creating super-wide-angle images via shooting several images and joining them in the computer, and I thought I would give you an example (coz it is really ezy-pezy)

Here are 4x camera images - you can see that there is a bit of overlap at the edge


and here is the above images joined up in the computer to create a super-image of about 8000pixels wide and covering about 105 degrees of landscape.  This comes in at double your Fuji at 1x-zoom or about 14mm if using a Full Frame dSLR camera


Hope this helps
Phil from the great land Downunder
www.flickr.com/photos/ozzie_traveller/sets/