Pls advise -not happy with the kit lens

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d131979

Senior Member
I purchased D600 with kit lens a couple of months back, but I am not at all happy with the kit lens, vignetting and distortion is a major problem.
I was thinking of selling this kit lens and going for a 85mm1.8G as my lens, and also buying a 50mm for general photography. Portraiture is my main field of interest.
What do you suggest!!!!!!!!

Thanking you all
Regards
Deepak
 
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BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
Interesting. While it's not the "greatest lens I've ever used" I find myself more than pleased with the lens as a walkaround, basic lens. I have plans ongetting a 24-70 f2.8, but need to raise funds first. For sure, it's not what I would select for doing portraits, but I have not found it problematic. I use the lens profiling feature in Lightroom, which I find quickly removes the issues you are talking about, so if you haven't tried that then perhaps you should? If I have any knocks it's that it gets a little fuzzy in the corners, but it's not that bad that I want to replace this before getting some other lenses.

As for portrait lenses, there are others around who can offer better advice than I.
 
Marcel

Marcel

Happily retired
Staff member
Super Mod
For portraits, an old manual focus 105 f2.5 AIS is just great. Not too expensive on the Bay and just amazing for portraits with an FX camera. I find 85 a little short for portraits on the 600.
 
nikonpup

nikonpup

Senior Member
i am happy with the kit lens that i got with my d600, any thing bad is more my fault. Please post some of your bad pictures so we can see if there is a solution for your problem.
 
AC016

AC016

Senior Member
I assumed the kit lens he was talking about was the 18-105 since that was the only "kit" lens listed in his profile. So take the below as an honest mistake.

"i find it interesting that they are pairing up an FX camera with a DX lens. If they are going to kit this camera up for people to start out in the FX world, would it not be more appropiate to kit it with lets say a 24-85mm G ED VR? Retail, the lenses are only a few hundred dollars apart, but i am sure Nikon can close that gap when pairing the 24-85 up with the D600 and selling them as a kit."
 
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BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
AC016 said:
i find it interesting that they are pairing up an FX camera with a DX lens. If they are going to kit this camera up for people to start out in the FX world, would it not be more appropiate to kit it with lets say a 24-85mm G ED VR? Retail, the lenses are only a few hundred dollars apart, but i am sure Nikon can close that gap when pairing the 24-85 up with the D600 and selling them as a kit.
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The 24-85mm is the lens I got - and the kit lens every D600 should have come with. At least in the deals I saw in December.
 
nikonpup

nikonpup

Senior Member
if some how he did get a dx lens that would explain the vignetting. He could switch the d600 to dx mode. A temporary fix till
he can get some fx glass.
 
BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
I see that he also has a D90, and I would expect that the 18-105mm may have come with that camera. I can't see Nikon ever shipping the D600 with a DX lens. An unscrupulous dealer may, but not Nikon.

To his credit, I do see some minor vinetting and distortion (curvature) at some focal lengths with the 24-84, but these are corrected immediately by simply turning on the lens profiling in Lightroom. Without it turned on you get some slight darkening at the edges, and barrel distortion at the wider settings, but that's not unusual, and easy to correct. If I can post some examples with and without profiling enabled I will do so this afternoon.
 
AC016

AC016

Senior Member
BackdoorHippie said:
I see that he also has a D90, and I would expect that the 18-105mm may have come with that camera. I can't see Nikon ever shipping the D600 with a DX lens. An unscrupulous dealer may, but not Nikon.

To his credit, I do see some minor vinetting and distortion (curvature) at some focal lengths with the 24-84, but these are corrected immediately by simply turning on the lens profiling in Lightroom. Without it turned on you get some slight darkening at the edges, and barrel distortion at the wider settings, but that's not unusual, and easy to correct. If I can post some examples with and without profiling enabled I will do so this afternoon.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I only saw the 18-105 in his profile, so i assumed that was the kit lens he was talking about. So, what kit lens IS he talking about? He was not very clear on that. Anyhow, hope he gets it straigtened out. Thanks in advance for posting any examples you spoke of.
 
BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
As I've said, the only kit lens I've EVER seen sold with the D600 is the 24-85mm G. I've never seen anything different, and don't come up with even a mention of anything else when I Google "Nikon D600 Kit Lens"
 
P

PapaST

Senior Member
nikonpup said:
if some how he did get a dx lens that would explain the vignetting. He could switch the d600 to dx mode. A temporary fix till
he can get some fx glass.
Click to expand...

How exactly do you switch to DX mode? All of my lenses are FX but if there are physical steps to do so I'd like to know for future reference. I always assumed using a DX lens would signal the D600 to automatically switch to DX mode. :confused:
 
BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
If the lens is properly equipped with sensors to identify itself then the D600 can automatically realize it is a DX lens and adjust to use only the cropped portion of the sensor, in which case no run-out vinetting should occur (where the lens no longer casts an image on the sensor). All modern Nikon lenses will do this, as should your other major manufacturers. You can override this with menu settings and see the actual vinetting and crop it out as desired as well. For other lenses, like my Rokinon fisheye or other manual lenses, you just need to manually adjust the camera to operate in DX mode using the menus if you want it to appear correctly.
 
R

Rick M

Senior Member
I started out with the 24-85 "kit" lens on the D600 and was satisfied until I saw the results using primes. You mentioned the 50mm and 85mm 1.8g's, they are fantastic and you will see great results. I use them and the 28mm 1.8g exclusively now and love the results.
 
D

d131979

Senior Member
First I would like to apologies to all of you for not updating my profile, which created lot of confusion in this thread.
I only have a Nikon D600 with 24-85 3.5-4.5g ED VR kit lens. My problem is I work in an office, Sunday is my only free time, and I want to make some money with photography using portraiture which is also my main interest.
For general photography I was thinking to go to 50mm 1.8D and for portraiture 85mm 1.8G as i have a very tight budget - My first choice was 105 macro lens or 135 f2D lens, but it is very expensive so i came down to 85mm 1.8G.
24-85 is a good walk around lens - due to my time constraint and a Family guy i dont get chance to much of travel photography either, were i live there is no good landscape, what ever was there already photographed.
 
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joe22

Senior Member
for what it is worth, I felt the same about the kit lens I got with my D7000 and wasn't really happy until I had replaced it..the truth is, I achieved nothing really by replacing it, so my advice is ride through this one and make your kit lens work for you..it will!
 
BackdoorArts

BackdoorArts

Senior Member
Rick M said:
I started out with the 24-85 "kit" lens on the D600 and was satisfied until I saw the results using primes. You mentioned the 50mm and 85mm 1.8g's, they are fantastic and you will see great results. I use them and the 28mm 1.8g exclusively now and love the results.
Click to expand...

While I've gotten some very good, dare I say great results with the kit lens, I have been digesting this post for a day now and have decided that moving to the trio of prime lenses you have mentioned in your signature is likely a better alternative to the center part of the "holy trinity" - the 24-70mm f2.8. For walking around a zoom is nice, but if I'm "happy enough" with the kit lens then why replace that with something that will run my almost $2K when for 2/3 I can get a lovely trio of primes for "real work", and keep the kit for when I'm in the car? I contemplated grabbing the 14-24mm before my trip to FL next month, but decided that I've got little to no reason to want/need low light at that spread, so my Sigma 8-16mm DX lens will cover for me if I need it and I sank 1/2 the money into the 28 & 85. I'm going to have to decide what stays and what goes in my one carry-on (2 bodies or a walk-around lens?), but it's a nice problem to have.
 
R

Rick M

Senior Member
BackdoorHippie said:
While I've gotten some very good, dare I say great results with the kit lens, I have been digesting this post for a day now and have decided that moving to the trio of prime lenses you have mentioned in your signature is likely a better alternative to the center part of the "holy trinity" - the 24-70mm f2.8. For walking around a zoom is nice, but if I'm "happy enough" with the kit lens then why replace that with something that will run my almost $2K when for 2/3 I can get a lovely trio of primes for "real work", and keep the kit for when I'm in the car? I contemplated grabbing the 14-24mm before my trip to FL next month, but decided that I've got little to no reason to want/need low light at that spread, so my Sigma 8-16mm DX lens will cover for me if I need it and I sank 1/2 the money into the 28 & 85. I'm going to have to decide what stays and what goes in my one carry-on (2 bodies or a walk-around lens?), but it's a nice problem to have.
Click to expand...

Without a doubt the 24-70 2.8 is a great lens and it is very convenient. The downside is having a big heavy lens on the camera. I would rather carry 2 small light lenses and one on the body (this comes down to personal choice of course). The other huge plus to me is that the primes are simply sharper, faster and have better IQ than even the much hailed 24-70 (I better start running now :)). I think keeping the 24-85 for casual stuff is a great Idea.
 
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