I'm a beginner: Help me decide my first lens

[858Smith]

thanks, nathsfromlg!

what about 40mm f2.8??

AF-S DX Micro-NIKKOR 40mm f/2.8G

 

[shefjr]

thanks for your replies, everyone!!

i have no idea what that means lol I see in the pics below, the comparison of the tree, but is that "design" in the back the blades?

anything less than 1.8 shows blades as shefjr said, does that mean I should only use 1.8? doesn't that defeat the purpose?

um, of food & stuff I shoot nothing at all. seriously. I whip out the camera to practice lol

What to look at in the two quick sample photos is the shape of the colored circles. Notice how at f1.8 they are round and just by stopping down 3 stops the shape has already changed from circles to something of a stop sign.
So the point that was being made is that you can still stop the lens down however, the bokeh created won't be circular.

 

[nathfromslg]

thanks, nathsfromlg!

what about 40mm f2.8??

AF-S DX Micro-NIKKOR 40mm f/2.8G

Isnt that a pancake lens? I really dont know anything about that

 

[TimGreyPhotography]

50mm f1.8 or 35mm f1.8

 

[858Smith]

50mm f1.8 or 35mm f1.8

thAnks!

thanks, nathsfromlg!


what about 40mm f2.8??


AF-S DX Micro-NIKKOR 40mm f/2.8G

Isnt that a pancake lens? I really dont know anything about that

i don't know what a pancake lens is

thanks for your replies, everyone!!


i have no idea what that means lol I see in the pics below, the comparison of the tree, but is that "design" in the back the blades?


anything less than 1.8 shows blades as shefjr said, does that mean I should only use 1.8? doesn't that defeat the purpose?


um, of food & stuff I shoot nothing at all. seriously. I whip out the camera to practice lol

What to look at in the two quick sample photos is the shape of the colored circles. Notice how at f1.8 they are round and just by stopping down 3 stops the shape has already changed from circles to something of a stop sign.
So the point that was being made is that you can still stop the lens down however, the bokeh created won't be circular.

I get it now! that sucks.

 

[Mike_E]

Forget the 50mm for now, it's far too limiting for an only lens. There's no point in getting tired of the camera because you have only the one focal length. (with the crop factor it's a short telephoto anyway)

Either the 18-55mm or a used 18-105mm would give you the best experience. Another lens is the 18-70mm, a good performer that's going cheap on the used market. I'd go for the 18-105mm as you really wouldn't need much else for most things.

After you've gained experience you'll have a better idea what to get next.





BTW, go ahead and PRINT some of your shots. Geeking out and only viewing them on a monitor will limit your experience as well.

 

[CAlbertson]

i'm looking for some serious bokeh
it has to be under $300, which i know is very limited, but i want to start off small
i don't care if it's prime or not
ETA: i have a nikon d5100. duh.

If what you want is the ability oto put the background out of focus then to 50mm lens will do that more so than the 35mm lens and the 85mm lens will do it even more. This is "physics" and applies to every lens of those lengths, Canon, Nikon or home made. The 35, 50 and 85 are all nearly in your budget. You can get each of them in either f/1.4 or f/1.8 The f/1.8 is seriously less expensive. How to decide? The 85mm on the DX format body is a "head and shoulders" lens or you can use it for sports like gymnastics if (and only if) you have access to the floor. The 35mm can be used for full body shoot indoors in a normal size house. The 50mm is a great all round people lens and you can see the angle it shoots by setting your zoom to 55mm (or set it to 35mm to see that)

Yes. Even if you have that focal length in the zoom it will not make those thin DOF shots and it will not work in low light with no flash.

Also, look inside your photo library at the lens data. If you find that many shots are taken full 55mm zoom that this is telling you that you could and would have used more focal length had you had it available. But if few of your shot push the zoom to full range then having a longer lens would be a waste. I always say Shoot 1,000 frames then look to see what photos are missing, buy the lens that would have gotten those shots.

One more thing that word "bokeh" refers to the quality of the out of focus parts of the image, not just to a narrow depth of field. The ideal lens Bokeh would not make little circles in the image. This is called "very poor bokeh" the desired look is more like the Gausian Blur filter in Photoshop. It is smooth. Very few lenses do this well. Most even expensive lenses don't

Here is a good semi-technical description Bokeh
His example if "bad bokeh truly is bad. The bad kind simply replicates the hard edges of hard edged background objects. The good kind blurrs the edges away.

But all this is "fine points" and I think what you are looking for is simply a shallow DOF. Physics does that

 

[Duckysaurus]

When you are asking a question about lenses, always provide the body that you plan to use the lens on.

Get the Nikon 35mm 1.8G.

It'll be like a 53mm 1.8 equivalent because of the crop-factor. Don't do the 50 1.8G. Will cost roughly $20 more, but you'll be walking around with a 75mm focal length equivalent, which means you cant take any pictures of anything within 10 steps.