Do you advocate a 50mm lens?

[Overread]

The reason I want to buy this lens is because people say that you learn your photography with standard lenses only.

I didn't really start to learn photography till I got my 70-300mm sigma lens - nothing fancy - but for me with my interestes it was the right lens. A 50mm would not have been of much use to me outside of faimly snaps - far too short for wildlife and I wasn't a macro addict at the time so using tubes and such with it would not have crossed my mind.

50mm f1.8 lenses are popular for being high optical quality and cheap - though their overall construction is also very cheap as well. For many they do become a sort of standard, but it really depends where your interests in photography are as to if its the right lens for you.
Like others I'd say learn what you can on the lenses you have and then start to see where your priorities and interests are andwhere you need more/better lenses to focus on.

 

[table1349]

Being "Old School" yes I do like the idea of learning with something like a 50mm prime. You could start with a cheaper f1.8 version. The important thing is to take it out and shoot it, shoot it, shoot it. While you are shooting with it learn from it with what you are shooting. Keep shooting it until you have used and learned everything you can from it in virtually every situation. The photographic knowledge you can gain will be invaluable no matter where your interests lay.

Not trying to be mean or belittle anyone on the forum, but some of the posts I read amaze me these days with the proliferation of digital photographers. When I started in photography 40 years ago, the term professional photographer was interchangeable with the term accomplished photographer. That is no longer true, and is evident by some of the posts on this and other forums.

When you have a firm understanding of the technical side of photography the creative side will flow much easier and allow you to produce the results you are looking for.

Granted, it may not be as much fun as just grabbing a camera and shooting, but I have yet to find anything worth having to be easy to achieve. Good luck which ever way you decide.

 

[jbnhl]

I was in the same boat about two weeks ago, and my birthday came up. I had my eye on a 50mm for over a year and talked myself out of it until recently. Well, when I looked at the Pentax 50mm 1.4 a year ago it was $200, i bought it two weeks ago for $350, the darn thing went up in price! I could kick myself for waiting, but I just didn't feel like I wanted it enough at the time. It really is going to come down to how bad you want it.

I can tell you I have had a lot of fun with my lens since I got it. It is also my first prime lens for my DSLR and I was shocked to see how much the depth of field shrunk when getting the f-stop below 2!