dr_eyehead
Banned
So it is. Bugger.
Wide angle vs. telephoto lens?
- Thread starter dr_eyehead
- Start date
Pebbleheed
Senior Member
If you want a 70-300 take a look at the tamron 70-300 USD VC. You can get it for around £300-350 but it's a totally different lens to their £99 version. Ideal for nature stuff, unless you can afford maybe a 500 or similar.
I have the above lens after owning the standard 70-300. Huge difference and worth every penny.
As for wider lens, I use the tamron 17-50 f/2.8. I use it for landscape and street photography. I've also done a few portraits with it too. It's a great general lens. Plenty about at decent prices if you go for the non-VC version.
I have the above lens after owning the standard 70-300. Huge difference and worth every penny.
As for wider lens, I use the tamron 17-50 f/2.8. I use it for landscape and street photography. I've also done a few portraits with it too. It's a great general lens. Plenty about at decent prices if you go for the non-VC version.
dr_eyehead
Banned
If only I had that kind of money lying around.
The Nikkor 55-300mm VRII is £172 on amazon UK. You really can't go wrong for that, I have one and love it.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nikon-AF-S-...&qid=1400757490&sr=8-1&keywords=nikkor+55-300
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nikon-AF-S-...&qid=1400757490&sr=8-1&keywords=nikkor+55-300
Pebbleheed
Senior Member
That's a very good price. It won't be as fast to focus but the nikkor will be a good buy at that price.
dr_eyehead
Banned
Might do.
Don't think a wide angle lens will be much use to me anyway the way the summer is going so far. Mega-meteor shower tomorrow night and guess what the forecast is!
Don't think a wide angle lens will be much use to me anyway the way the summer is going so far. Mega-meteor shower tomorrow night and guess what the forecast is!
If you don't have the money, then just STOP shopping for lenses. Use what you've got, save the money, and then buy the lens YOU want to buy, not just the first bargain that comes along. I found out the expensive way that it's always better to buy just once. Buying something while you save for better is more expensive on the long run. So I repeat myself, save your money and only then, buy lenses.
I totally agree with this.
There have been umpteen occasions when I went for the lower cost option and later had to discard the purchase and get what should have been done in the first place. Some examples - tripod, camera bag, 70-300G, electric appliances .... the list goes on. Life is like that, you get what (or less than what) you pay for.
Now a days, especially with lenses, I wait and save for the lens I want, rather than getting a compromise solution, and regretting it. For quite some time I am eyeing the 300mm F4 lens, but currently the finances are tight, so I am saving up for it.
dr_eyehead
Banned
You're all probably right. I can afford to splash out £200 so rather than getting a bottom of the range one of each might be better getting a good one of one and saving for the other. I want both zoom and a nice wide angle lens with a nice depth of field for panoramic landscapes. I've done a lot of panoramics using a cheap 10MP coolpix, and some of them turned out not bad for the technology. Just waiting on the weather to pick up so I can get out somewhere afar with my tent and spare battery and see what I can capture. With a current back catalogue of nearly 50,000 shots over the past few years I'm struggling to find anything new to point a camera at around here. There are lots of good vantage points within easy reach, but none of them I would say offer particularly photogenic views. Maybe some of city zoomed in from various points be would worth taking with a good zoom lens though. There's also the Pentlands. Was up there the other night perched on the edge of a hill waiting for it to get completely dark so I could try a starlapse, but I got cold and tired and hungry and ended up coming back early, but got a taste for how powerful a sensor this thing has. The bit where I was going to take the shot though would have benefited from a wider angle lens I think. No reason why I can't take 4 or more shots and stitch them together though. I hope the weather breaks soon and we get a summer half as good as last year.
If you want a wide angle for stitching landscape photography, choose a lense which has least distortion. Landscapes are generally shot at F8 or more, so there is no incentive to get fast glass. F2.8 to F4 wide angle primes should suffice. Secondly there is no need for AF, so a good manual focus wide angle lense will be an ideal acquisition. Search the net for reviews of the AIS lenses - 28mm, 20mm and wider, and home into one that has least geometric distortion at F5.6 to F16.
This is something I'm trying to live by. I was initially going to buy body only and get one decent lens but ended up going for two kit lenses instead. I already regret going for the 55-200mm, not because its that bad but I know I want more. Thanfully I have a friend willing to pay virtually what I got it for. The temptation now is to upgrade it to the 55-300, but having done lots of reading I think I'll go for the Tamron 70-300 VC. A 35mm prime and macro will have to wait.
Browncoat
Senior Member
Don't buy cheap lenses. As long as they are taken care of, your lenses will be with you for life. Long after that D3200 craps out and you've replaced it with 3 or 4 other bodies, those trusty lenses will still be there.
1) Spend the extra money now and buy FX lenses. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
2) If you're into "general" photography, for the love of all that is holy, RENT lenses before you buy them. Check your local pro shop, and if you don't have one, there are rental sites on the internet. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
3) Most used lenses are a steal. Have patience and check around, don't settle. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
1) Spend the extra money now and buy FX lenses. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
2) If you're into "general" photography, for the love of all that is holy, RENT lenses before you buy them. Check your local pro shop, and if you don't have one, there are rental sites on the internet. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
3) Most used lenses are a steal. Have patience and check around, don't settle. Don't be an idiot like many of us and spend money twice.
Though it may seem a repetition, avoid zooms with large range. They are simply not upto it, especially at the long end. Get them only if you have money to spare, so that they serve you when you want to travel light and are bothered more about getting that shot rather than quality (typical requirement for tourists who want to just record and print 6x4). If you want FL of 200mm or more, save up for primes. They will remain with you for a long time. The professional zooms are even more expensive.
What would you define as a large range? Would 70-300mm fall into that bracket? Unfortunately a 300mm prime is well out of my price range for the foreseeable future.
Definitely.
Unfortunately getting 300mm with reasonable IQ is quite difficult. In zooms either the price is too high or the IQ below F8 pretty bad. I have found that rather than shooting images with a soft 300mm, use the 24MP resolution of the sensor to shoot at 100mm and crop. You will get sharper results.