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You need to decide if astrophotography is really what you want to do - as the others have said, the initial cost outlay is one thing, but there will be additional costs further down the track. It's expensive with time as well, software, processing, there's a lot to it.
If you just want to do solar system astrophotography (planets/moon/sun) then that's a bit of a different story, and a webcam will get you going, and the mount doesn't need to be as good as for DSO stuff (an EQ3 would be fine).
For visual, the 10" dob is perfect and fits within your budget. The premium version IS worth it just for the focuser alone. Regardless of Bintel collimating your scope or not, you will need to learn how to do it yourself when it arrives - transportation can throw it out anyway. If you own a dob, you need to learn how to collimate. It's as simple as that. You have to get good at it if you want good views. It can mean the difference between seeing details on the planet, or not.
Also I strongly suggest you try to get to some of the meets around the brisbane/SEQ area - you'll see the different types of scopes available, get to look through them, and yuo may get to see some imaging going on and you can see what's involved.
Good luck!
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