Have DSLR: Thinking Lenses.

Fallingman

Morning H/A.

I've had my Nikon D80 for quite a while now, and it has done me proud thus far. I'd always meant to get a few lenses as I knew that this is apparently where the the biggest "bang for buck" is to be found in terms of improving the quality - hardware wise.

A friend came round this weekend for a Christmas drink, and she brought her new Canon 650D. She had just bought a 50mm 1.8" lens, and I actually got to see what a difference a non-stock lens can do.

So, this made me think that with Christmas coming up, and the wife doing the old "I dont know what to get you, what would you like?" thing... GLASS!
So what would people recommend for a "Happy Amateur" as a good start?
-
Maybe a 50mm and a 55-200mm to replace my stock 18-135 lens?

bsjezz

i love the 50mm, but the 35mm prime is also great. its sharpest is a bit narrower i've found (best at f/2.8, as opposed to the 50mm which is wonderful at f/2.2), but the focal length is a bit nicer for flexible composition - the 50mm tends to feel too cropped after shooting with the 35mm. i'd get both... but if you want to work on better composition, get the 35mm; if you want to improve exposure and focus (particularly low-light) i'd play with the 50mm.

Fallingman

Low light would be useful... the struggles I have with indoor photos (grrrr, built in flash)

bsjezz

personally, i'd get a 70-300 (tamron version is pretty good and cheap) for telephoto, a 50mm and keep the kit lens on-hand for wider shots. conceivably the 35mm and 55-200mm would do much of that with one less lens to carry around. you'd definitely miss a lot of good shots with nothing on you below 50mm, though

Djeet

What kind of shooting do you do primarily?

Your frustration with respect to indoor shooting and popup flash make me think you're shooting largely indoors and in poor light. If that is the case and you like your zoom range get soemthing like this, which gives you the right range, a lot os speed, and stabilization. Otherwise you could get a good flash with bounce capability.

Edit: Sorry, that is the Canon mount. I'm sure you can find it Nikon mount. Posting from phone is hard.

If you want some novelty you might like a lensbaby or a mirror/reflex lens.

Fallingman

Thanks - cool idea.

For the main, I usually just have the camera during family occasions - which does often mean inside.
I'll have a looksee for something similar.

saltiness

In the total off chance that you live in the SF Bay Area I have that Nikon 35mm f/1.8 that bsjezz linked laying around that I need to get rid of - for a fair price of course.

Fallingman

Thanks for the offer. Wrong hemisphere unfortunately... Unless you happen to be passing by New Zealand anytime soon ;-)

mts

yea, try not to overlap with your lenses

i have a d90 and my lens quiver is

20mm

50mm

70-210mm

Knight_

The 35 f/1.8 is a fantastic DX lens. Might still be a bit long for indoor shooting, but it's a great lens at an unbeatable price. Also it's always good to have a prime or two.

Could also consider looking into an SB-700 if you really do like shooting indoors, plenty of events I've shot where you'd have trouble finding 1/50th f/1.4 @ ISO 6400. A flash you can bounce will save you more shots inside than any lens in the world in this environment.

Aaaand from a 2.8 zoom perspective, I can't in good conscience recommend the BIM Tamron. It's sharp (though the VC model not so much) but it focuses at a glacial pace. It is an infuriating lens. The Sigma 17-50 2.8 is probably a better bet. It's not the best HSM implementation, but it's still fast enough.

mts

yea, honestly, picking up a flash helped the most for lighting, a fast lens will only get you so far

check out the Yongnuo flashes, cheaper than the nikon, but i have not had any issues with mine

EggyToast

Another solution that will give you good bang for your buck is a separate flash. A faster lens won't totally solve your indoor shooting problems -- it'll give you a couple stops closer to where you want to be for a good indoor shot, but it won't fix everything because indoors is much darker than we realize compared to the sunny outside. I really like my SB-600, and if you're always shooting inside, I think you'll be more immediately happy with a nicer flash, rather than just prime lenses.

Ultimately I think both are good ideas, though, as the prime offers not just speeds but a narrower depth of focus, which is "artsier."

Spiritfire

(A very amateur photographer's thoughts)
I purchased a 50mm f1.8 lens last year as my first lens to add to my 18-55mm kit lens. My wife questioned why I'd purchase a lens that did not zoom, but it didn't take long to show her why it was a great choice. It rarely comes off the camera now and we use it all the time. However, this year I'm bouncing between getting the SB-700 external flash or a 35mm f/1.8. The 50mm is great, but it's just a bit too tight to use when trying for indoor group shots - especially when it's dimmer indoors like my family turns down the lights for Christmas. I got to toy around with an SB-600 on my camera and got some really good pictures using the kit lens for an indoor work event. However, it was difficult for me to deal with the additional weight and I also found out that the D5100's grip is just a tiny bit too small for my hands. The extra weight magnified the issue to where it became hard to ignore.

saint2e

18-135 is a good range for a starter... I started with an 18-55mm and a 50-250mm lens kit (on Canon), and then bought a 430EX flash. You'll see a huge improvement in picture quality when you start to get good with using a flash, especially bouncing it off walls/ceilings for indoor shooting, which sounds like your primary use case.

I'm gonna go with the suggestion of a mid-range flash as an alternative to getting another lens at this point. Not saying you shouldn't ever, but I'd go with something like a Nikon SB-700 or SB-910. Something where you can direct the light so that it's not directed right at your subject's face.

Then you can perhaps ask for flash diffusers such as this and this as cheaper gifts for people to give you.

Djeet

@Knight I don't use AF so cannot comment there; basically every AF I've ever used has been ... not ideal. Add to that if any high-contrast object wanders into an AF point there's a good chance that point will be highly weighted during AF. It'd be nice if all the manufacturers would put out non-AF versions of their volume lenses. I didn't suggest it, because most casual photogs are going to use AF, but the Rokinon 35mm 1.4 is a ridiculously nice lens for the normal range on APS-C. It pretty much lives on my camera since I got it.

Spiritfire

@saint2e Is there a significant difference between the in-package diffusers of the SB-700 and the SB-910 versus the ones you linked to?

saint2e

Spiritfire wrote: »

@saint2e Is there a significant difference between the in-package diffusers of the SB-700 and the SB-910 versus the ones you linked to?

I've got Canon gear, so I can't comment specifically to the SB-700/910, but I have a flip diffuser on my Canon 430EX's, which I imagine are similar to what comes on the Nikon flashes, and they don't really make much of a difference in my experience. I actually have the Gary Fong Lightsphere Cloud diffuser that I linked, and I love it. I know others use the Stofen Omni-Bounces and swear by them as well.

Akilae

Try to use a much more structured way of thinking of what you want. A fast 50/1.4 is useless when you consider that on most DSLRs that comes out to around 75mm, which is difficult to use indoors. Do the following instead:

-Go through ALL the keepers you have shot in the past.
-Take note of the most common focal length your shots appear around. You can do this manually, or get a program to do it for you.
-Take note of the lighting situations you tend to shoot in.
-Buy the appropriate focal length that you use, usually as fast as possible, but slower is cheaper and doable if you're not going to be shooting wide open.
-The best bang for your buck is a camera that can handle higher ISOs combined with a fast lens. Flash photography is attractive, but you have to learn how to shoot with a flash to get the most out of it.

Fallingman

Good advice!
I'll go through my albums.

mts

50mm on a crop is definitely not too long for inside. i use my 50 for 90% of my photos.

saint2e

mts wrote: »

50mm on a crop is definitely not too long for inside. i use my 50 for 90% of my photos.

I would classify it as... "restrictive"... for indoor shooting. You need a fair amount of space depending on what shot you're going for.

EggyToast

It's very subjective. The thing I like about primes in general is that since they lack zoom, it forces you out of your comfort zone. You can't just zoom into a shot with lots of space on the edge to fix your composition -- you have to move with your feet, which many starting photographers don't like to do (they stand in one place and snap pictures like a camera on a pivot). You also have to sometimes compromise what you'd like with what you can take, so you may end up with a wider shot or, as I've often found, a tighter shot. I have an 8-16 lens that's amazingly wide, but it's so wide that it's a specialty lens and makes fine details, like people's faces, tiny. I can't just stick it on my camera and get normal snapshots.

I find it to be the same with primes. I have a 105mm that takes beautiful pictures, but if I'm sitting across the table from someone, I get a picture of their nose. So, if I want a picture of someone and I only have that lens, I need to be about 10ft/3m away, and then it's still a "portrait" shot of head & shoulders. Historically, that's not my default for portraits -- I try to capture more of the body. Yet because of the lens, I'm forced to make tighter compositions, which has benefited me dramatically.

In NZ I think the prices are a bit higher, but the 50mm is still dirt cheap, especially if you can find it used. It's a great starting place regardless, and you can get a feel for where you want to go from there.

Akilae

Usually it's better to go wider, since you can crop, but you can't add more to a tight shot. However, you don't want to go too wide if all you ever shoot is people. Ever seen what happens to people's faces on the edge of a 18mm? It becomes so stretched out and bloated that it would be better to just crop them out sometimes. If most of your shots are landscapes, then by all means the wider the better.

One of the reasons 50mm has been the gold standard is that the human eye sees around that focal length. On DSLRs that becomes a 75mm, which is horribly restrictive when you're just trying to shoot across the table. To get back to the standard, you'd have to buy a 35mm or so.

That being said, there's really no reason to get a 35/50/75 if your "eye" doesn't frame pictures at those focal lengths. Similarly, a 50/55-200 combo won't too work well if you predominantly use the 18-55 portion of your existing 18-135.

I would still say get a prime that's around the focal length you're comfortable with, and get used to shooting without zoom. After a while, you can then branch out to other primes.

wonderpug

50mm indoors does get really claustrophobic at times, but the 75mm equivalent length does make for some magical portrait shots, candid or non-candid. If I use it to take candids at a holiday party or something, I just end up with more shoulder and up shots instead of full body shots of the action.

The 35mm fixed is a lot easier to recommend since it gives you a good amount more space, but I don't think the focal length is quite as magical. I have both, though, and they're my two most-used lenses.

I'll also third the recommendation that you think about getting a large flash to go in your hotshoe. Nikon brand, third party, whatever, as long as you can swivel the head left-right and up-down. Bouncing the light off a ceiling or a wall makes such an amazing difference. It's night and day different than what you get from a built in pop up flash.

I forgot to mention that you're absolutely on the right path upgrading your glass instead of your camera body. The D80 is still a great camera body, and better lenses will up your potential immensely.

Second, part of the reason your friend's fixed lens looked so great is that fixed lenses have better optics for the money. No moving parts, not trying to be more than one thing, and also a design largely unchanged for decades. The Nikon 50mm f/1.8 is dirt cheap not because its in any way shoddy, but because of the above.

The large aperture is the other aspect that makes these lenses so appealing. The nature of zoom lens construction makes them much harder to allow wide open apertures, so to get a zoom that can open up as much as a fixed is either impossible or insanely expensive.

I'll also echo what someone said earlier that the restriction of not being able to zoom can help drive creativity. It's the case for me, but it's true that some people just can't stand not being able to zoom.