SLRS have snowballed down in price in the last few years whats the point spending one hundred on a small basic digi cam ( always buy 10 megapixels and higher as its the industry standard) when you can buy a single lense reflex camera for 250 theses days and not only will you learn how to use one but your ready to go if you get work or get into a course in a few years, make it an invesetment piece and keep it in good nic as if you do loose interest in photography you can sell it on so that includes keeping everything in the box or even if you just want an upgrade
anyway its not really the camera you use i got into a course taking photos on a terrible 7megapixel digi but i had to spend 170 on a fuji camera the next year so in all i spent 280 on cameras, if i just spent that amount in the first place i would have been able to afford an SLR
