How to take wide angle shots ? Please advise

I have Nikon D5100 and I have 18-55, 55-200 & 33mm lenses.

I would deeply appreciate if anyone can please answer my few questions:

Question 1) Do I need a specific lens for wide-angles ? if yes, which one ?

Question 2) Are fish eye wide angle add-ons are good ?

Question 3) I was told that fish-eye wide angle lens degrade the quality. Everybody who is posting pictures here for wide-angle shots are using fish-eye lens ?

Question 4) Is this lens good ? ---> 52mm 0 45X Soft Fisheye Wide Angle Macro Lens for Nikon D3200 D3100 D5200 D5100 | eBay

Question 5) Can I take any wide angle show with my D5100 with any of my current lens ? any specific settings I need ?

1. There are various favorites, but I like the 11-16mm Tokina. The 18 is wide, but it's not what I would call a "wide angle" that gives you the cool effect of a wide angle.

2. Fish eyes are a wide angle, but they have the distortion that gives them the name "fish eye." If it's the effect your looking for then get a fish eye. However, it is different from a wide angle.

3. It's not degrading per se, it's giving an effect. No I would not use it for portraits unless I was trying to do something goofy.

4. My wife bought me those screw on adapters a long long time ago. My personal opinion, don't bother.

5. The D5100 or any dslr will take wide angles just fine. It's all about the lens, not the camera.

On a crop sensor camera, such as yours, anything from 35mm and below is a wide angle lens. A really good one for you would be the Tokina 11-16mm wide angle lens.
As for the fish eye lenses....that comes down to a personal preference on your part. Try one out at a camera store to see if you like the effect. I personally have no use for fish eye lenses, but you may decide otherwise.

Thank you for your advise / feedback and answering my questions.

So, my 35mm is good for a wide shot ? What exactly I need to do in the settings in order to take a wide angle shot ? I am new to DSLR cameras

Fisheye lenses are designed to give a widely distorted, often hemispherical image. This is, most likely, NOT what you are looking for. As has already been said, Tokina AT-X 116 PRO DX-II 11-16mm f/2.8 would be more what you're looking for. If you want the camera to auto-focus this lens you'll need the DXII version of this lens with the auto-focus motor built into it since your D5100 does not have an auto-focus motor. The DX version of this lens is cheaper, but has no auto-focus motor.

I've owned one of these lenses for some time and it's a superb wide angle.

super said:

So, my 35mm is good for a wide shot ? What exactly I need to do in the settings in order to take a wide angle shot ? I am new to DSLR cameras

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The lens itself determines how wide or zoomed in your shots can be. 35mm is "sort of wide"; it's wider than 50mm but less wide than 28mm. It's all relative. Lower focal length numbers mean a wider image while higher numbers mean you're zooming in. 50mm is considered a "normal" focal length in that it roughly equates to how we see things with the unaided eye.

So, if 50mm is normal, then anything less than 50mm is getting wide, and anything greater than 50mm is getting into zooms. The numbers tell you how MUCH more so.

....

Just Google for instruction. Here's a start:

Nature and Wildlife Photography Articles

On my DX camera I use the Tokina 12-24 f4 lens and I am very happy with its performance.

FM Reviews - Tokina 12-24mm f/4 AT-X 124 AF PRO DX SD

Here are some examples of the D5100 with the Tokina 12-24:

http://nikonites.com/wide-angle/209...n-sea-tokina-12-24mm-f-4-a.html#axzz2vfGcNqwP

Thank you everyone for your advise - Since I am new to DSLRs and I already have 3 lenses. I am not looking to spend so much on a wide lens as these Tonina lenses are very expensive which is why I was also looking to understand if I can accomplish similar to wide angle results with my current lenses and some sort of settings that I need to do in order to take the shot.

The general rule of thumb was always that anything below 50mm on a film camera was considered "wide angle", and anything below 28mm was more or less considered "ultra-wide angle". On a cropped sensor (DX) camera like yours, that means anything below 35mm is "wide angle" and anything below 18mm is considered "ultra-wide".

So, you have "wide" covered, but not the ultra-wide, which is where you start getting into the perspective-bending and distortion that most folks associate with the idea of "wide angle".

Unless you're looking to play with weird distortions and odd clarity issues, I'd stay away from anything that mounts on the front of another lens. They can be cool for special effects, but are not something you would want if you're serious about a nice sharp photo.

The primary difference between an ultra-wide angle and a fisheye is the amount of barrel distortion. Most ultra-wides will attempt to correct the curved lines you get with wide views, where fisheyes do not. And with fisheyes there are two types, circular, which as the name suggests gives you a black circle around the image, and non-circular which are essentially ultra-wides without perspective correction. I shoot them all for varying reasons, and if you look through my various 365 posts and my Flickr account you can see examples of each, both on FX and DX cameras.

There are many, many, MANY tutorials out there, so I highly recommend you read through the wide-angle section of this forum, and google the heck out of "wide angle and fisheye primers". You'll find more recommendations than you could ever use in both places, so before you make any decisions make sure you have a good look at what people are producing with various lenses. I would grab a good ultra-wide zoom to start - the Tokina mentioned above and a couple Sigmas tend to be the favorites. From there you can decide if you want to venture into the world of the fisheye. It's not for everyone.

super said:

Thank you for your advise / feedback and answering my questions.

So, my 35mm is good for a wide shot ? What exactly I need to do in the settings in order to take a wide angle shot ? I am new to DSLR cameras

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On a DX Crop sensor your 35 is the equivalent of a 52.5 mm and that is not a wide angle lens.

You can look up my shots taken at 18mm with 18-55. The lense is quite good. As pointed out to me, be careful to level the horizon, else it tends to tilt one way or the other.

Another method of making really wide shots is to stitch multiple shots taken horizontally. There are plenty of programs bot free and licenced to create panoramas. Just search the net. The one by Microsoft works in most of the cases.