Lens recommendations please.

[Paul]

Looking at purchasing a good all round lens for my camera, any ideas?

 

[Hoogle]

what is your budget you can find a good all rounder lens with good glass will cost 4 x what your camera did in the first place and up.

I tend to my 70 - 200 lens a lot but then I am not doing lots of portraits I am going to assume you have a 18- 55 mm and a 70 - 200 as part of the kit you got with your camera or something along those lines they are good lenses but then you can get same focal lengths that cost on the thousands and have superior quality images.

you say you want an all ronder but if youhave the above lenses you have the good basic all rounders already. of course you can get 18 - 300 focal lenghth lenses which would be a good all rounder or you could get a nice 50 or 35 mm lens and maybe that is what I would be looking at if I was in your situation a family guy with kids constantly sunny weather then I would be looking at portrait lenses that will also give super sharp images as they are are in the 1.8 to 2.4 range depending on what you get and a 50 mm digital dx lens is equivalent to the old 35 mm film lens and give really nice images even for none portriats, they focus really fast and just really fast glass.

I am sure tom or others alike will disagree with my choice but this is something that you need to really decide what you want your all rounder lens to do. I just love my 50 mm even if it was only £200 but it produces stunning images and really nice focal length for portraits and crystal sharp landscapes when I use it wide open. ANd the beauty is it is not a long heavy lens and can be used to turn your dslr into a point and shoot camera.

I also say this because if you start getting extension tubes etc then you can put this on top of your 70 - 200 lense and have a really nice macro setup without a macro lens.

 

[Paul]

Yeah thanks for the info H, i do indeed have those two sizes of kit lense (which are great), i do indeed want a 50mm lens as when out the other day i got talking to a guy on the jetty who had my camera but with a different lens attached, i asked what sort of images he as been getting compared to the stock kit lenses supplied, he said loads better but i wanted to ask here first before actually shelling out the hard earned.

 

[Hoogle]

it is true the sub $1000 cameras kit lenses are really good to get you going but you sure do notice the difference when you buy specific lenses for specific things. even if you spend the money on a $700 version of the 70 - 200 focal length lens then you will see the difference.

The problem is do you face the photographers dilema do you get the kit to do what you want or do you rely on post production. as long as you can get a lens that takes perfectly sharp images you can post edit any image to look how you want in fact I have a plugin that lets me mimic virtually any high quality lens.

but if you want some cool images and on a budget search ebay for some of the old film lenses, yes you have to learn manual focus (no bad thing and easy once youget use to it) but you can pick up lenses for $20 that in there day would have been $500 + and they are good glass just expect some vignetting around the edges. Retro is cool again.

 

[Paul]

So buying an older lens could give better image quality potentially anyway, would they fit my camera or would i need a convertor ring thingy lol?

 

[Hoogle]

you can get amazing lens for pennies these days and most of them will fit as long as the lens was made post 1960 the only issue is with dx frames they cant auto focus as the af mechanisms are in the lens itself old lens didnt have auto focus. However with the more modern fx cameras they have the af in the body hence they can have auto focus on old lenses.

But yes many photographers do buy old lenses for that reason you can have high quality lenses for a fraction of the cost of new lenses. however you will see there are pros and cons auto focus being the main 1 and make sure you you check the condition before you buy.

 

[Tom Mann]

You might be surprised to know that Yoda spoke directly to this issue. He said, "Look deep into your failed photos you must. Already know you that which you need, but clear your mind must be."


------------


In plain English, slowly review a couple hundred of your old photos, say, spanning several years. For each and every one, ask yourself if you think a new lens would have really improved that image, or is the problem "the Indian, not the arrow" on this specific image?).


If so, to get a better image, should the lens have been longer, shorter (in FL), have a wider aperture, have fewer aberrations, have VR / IS, be lighter in weight, focus closer, (AF) focus more quickly, be cheaper so you wouldn't hesitate to use it in dicy situations, etc. etc. Keep notes on each image (...maybe in the form of a spreadsheet with columns for each desirable change). I can almost assure you that if you are completely honest about the areas of improvement, you'll quickly get a sense of what type of lens(es) would benefit you the most.

T / Y

 

[Paul]

Yeah i have to admit all of this photo jargon is playing havoc with my choice of pre shoot set up, it's all hit and miss at the minute with me.
Ideally i want to capture clear and bright images with a twist, i like colourful images that show depth and have a certain grit to them, i do understand it will take a lifetime to master if at all, but i am willing and hooked.

 

[Paul]

It's an option thanks JD, like you i couldn't grasp 3D graphics to complicated for me and not what i like anyway - horses for courses and all that.

 

[Paul]

To clarify Paul, I don't have problem to grasp 3D, I just feel detached.

An artist grabs his paper and pencil when he has a great idea, the musician grabs his guitar, the poet grabs his pen, etc....and off they go. With 3D it's like hitting a wall, it takes forever to reach your goals and you might lose interest or lack time to reach the end.

Have a look at our forum and the art people make. How many people with moderate skills still manage to get some message or emotion across with a piece that doesn't take days or weeks to make? Now look at 3D galleries, how many dead objects void of any emotions or story do you see? How many times have you seen a phone in a 3D gallery? It's not because most of these artists lack the skills to express their ideas, it's the tool holding them back, unless they're willing to spend many, many hours on getting everything under control, the tool, lighting, textures, etc.

I only use 3D right now as an addition to 2D and video, but it will never be my main focus.

Oh yeah mate, i was refering to my skill level within the 3D area, sorry.

 

[smoke]

thees days there's so many things which compensates each other like raw formats and Photoshop on my recent holiday one day i was to lazy to drag my photo rucksack with few kit lenses and external flash, so i took only my recent buy - 50mm to capture just portraits and maybe some interesting details. I was sure I will not take pictures of landscape and i was wrong. we where visiting some ancient castle remains and i noticed a perfect composition had to improvise as lens was not wide at all. locked my exposure, shot 8 snaps, and prayed the protoshop photomerge option afterwards.

and the few for what this lens is designed for :

and on max aperture f1.4


my main idea is that theres always the way even if equipment is so limited.

 

[MikeMc]

18 x 135 great all around lens.

In 35 mm my "kit" was a 24mm , 90 macro, 180edif 2.8, 300 edif 2.8

I could shoot just about anything.

Now a 18 = 135 with a 2x extender will cover most

the biggest issue with modern glass is speed....If you want f2.8 you will pay $$$ many great optics today are slow, but the price is right

 

[Steve]

Hi Paul.
If you buy a prime lens be aware it will probably be designed for a full frame camera.
It will work fine on your camera which I assume is a cropped sensor camera.

So a 50 will be actually be an 80+/- on your camera.

 

[Tom Mann]

But, for all we know, Paul is a specialist in shooting romantic soft-focus shots of 'roos facing away from the camera, so what he really needs is not a new lens, but a Zeiss Softar II + a reversing ring for his existing lenses. LOL.

All joking aside, what I'm getting at is if we don't know, and if Paul doesn't know exactly what types of photography he most wants to improve, the only recommendations we can make are our own favorite lenses (eg, a 50 mm prime), and such recommendations might be of no use to him.

Specifically, in an earlier post in this thread, Paul mentioned, "...clear and bright images with a twist, i like colourful images that show depth and have a certain grit to them...". Here's how I would parse that statement:

"clear and bright" - almost any modern lens is capable of this. This is more a requirement on metering, not the lens.

"with a twist" - I don't have a clue what this really means in technical terms. Some people might interpret "with a twist" to be a lens with some classic technical flaw such as vignetting, or soft focus or lens flare. Others might think that a tilt and shift lens that can be made to produce images that are intentionally OOF on the top and bottom would be an interesting twist.

"show depth"- this one is easy. You have two choices: (a) big aperture (ie, f-number of 2.8 or under) and long so that the depth of focus is very limited; or, (b) very wide so that objects far away are much smaller than nearby objects. Both are considered classic ways to "show depth".

"a certain grit" - this one is also easy. I think of grit as grain or sensor noise. This has almost nothing to do with the lens. Just intentionally underexpose, and brighten the resulting image a lot in PS and you'll have a gritty image. I have a great example of this. If I can find it, I'll post it.

T

 

[Tom Mann]

Here's an example of what I would consider "grit". I took this on a little P&S camera by intentionally underexposing by 3 or 4 stops and then brightening it up in PS. Almost nothing else was done to this image.

T

 

[Paul]

Thanks for all the replies guys, one big factor you must understand is, i have no photography savvy at all.
All i have read is the operational booklet that came with my outfit and some basic camera set ups for certain situations, my main area of photography will be family images in varying surroundings, but i don't want the bog standard school/college portrait stuff, i have a good imagination and some ideas for different shot situations, but what i need help with his the camera set up and what lens would suit that application best.
I also like taking images of my new natural surroundings, i love gnarly trees with shadows falling through them, this is where i get my 'grit' word from what i mean by it is i like the natural textures and want to strengthen the natural lines via depth and light techniques.
I tried with this effort a while back.
obscure but natural was the intent.
My ultimate mission is to then take certain aspects of some of this type of image and transfer into photoshop for me to create weird and believable new images.
Just think i need some indepth (normal speak) help as far as camera set up and what specific lens would suit my attempts best?

 

[Tom Mann]

Good info, Paul. Let me sleep on it and get back to you tmmrw.

T

 

[Steve]

Another thing about prime lenses is they're much faster.
A basic 50mm is an f1.8 which makes it helpful in low light than a fast zoom at f2.8 or so.

The narrow depth of field can make for interesting shots too.
I took this with a 50mm f1.4 @ f1.4.
These bolts on an old train are only an inch or so apart.

 

[MikeMc]

I will give you grit....Most images if exposed close will get gritty when contrast is up and then over sharpened....I like paint peeling.



short slow zoom,@ 24mm 1/30th , f13, ISO400

18 - 55mm Pentax f3.5 / 5.6

quick grab shot. Its not so much what lens will work, its the light and what you can see.

 

[Paul]

When i say grit i don't mean texture wise i mean powerful/depth/heavy/hard.