Now this truly is a newbie question. Given the number of used cameras I've been collecting I should really know more about lenses, since they're probably more important than the camera body. Unfortunately I know very little about lenses; in particular I have no idea how to tell if a lens is good or not - apart from shooting a roll of film with it and looking at the results, and even then I'm not someone who can look at a 7x5 print and assess the quality of a lens from it. I assume that a "prime" lens is one that costs more to make and a lot more to buy, but that's about all I know.
So far when buying used lenses (mainly Pentax K-mount) I've tended to look for names I know - Sigma, Vivitar, and.. er, well anything that sounds vaguely Japanese (Takumar, Sunagor etc) to be honest As I understand it though, pretty much any lens manufacturer is capable of producing great quality lenses and equally capable of producing useless paperweights. So I also tend to look for lenses with a wide range of apertures - I have no idea if this gives any indication of lens quality however.
At the moment I'm buying a used Minolta Dynax 5 (albeit with non-functional flash) to replace my slightly rubbish 404si, and I'm wondering if I should be getting a new lens to go with it. I guess what I'm looking for here is not advice on a specific lens to buy, but some idea of how to tell the quality of a lens. At the moment I have a Tamron 28-200mm F/3.8-5.6 lens which is apparently "LD Aspherical (IF)" - which could be Martian for all I know - and is described as "Silver Super", which I can only assume means it's better than the bronze but not as good as the gold :meh: Minimum focussing distance is 0.8m at 200mm, and "Max. Mag. Ratio" is "1 : 4.8" at 135mm. Which also means nothing to me. I also have a Tokina 19-35mm F/3.5-4.5 lens, for which I have no manual and therefore no idea what the minimum or maximum anything is. I've taken some perfectly good photos with both lenses, but having nothing to compare them against I have no idea if I could be getting much better results. Finally I have a Sigma "Mini Zoom Macro" 28-80mm F/3.5-5.6 lens which is also "Aspherical" and has macro-focussing at 80mm. I bought this new for only £50 (shipped from US) which seems very little for a new lens, and the exterior appears to be entirely plastic, yet I've taken some great close-up shots with it. Again however I have nothing to compare it against.
So basically what I'm looking for is any advice at all on how to tell whether a lens is good quality or not; what on earth "LD Aspherical (IF)" means and whether it's better than simply "Aspherical", the significance of how curved the lens elements are... pretty much anything you can think of Thanks in advance, and also for the help you've all given me already in my other posts :hail:
So far when buying used lenses (mainly Pentax K-mount) I've tended to look for names I know - Sigma, Vivitar, and.. er, well anything that sounds vaguely Japanese (Takumar, Sunagor etc) to be honest As I understand it though, pretty much any lens manufacturer is capable of producing great quality lenses and equally capable of producing useless paperweights. So I also tend to look for lenses with a wide range of apertures - I have no idea if this gives any indication of lens quality however.
At the moment I'm buying a used Minolta Dynax 5 (albeit with non-functional flash) to replace my slightly rubbish 404si, and I'm wondering if I should be getting a new lens to go with it. I guess what I'm looking for here is not advice on a specific lens to buy, but some idea of how to tell the quality of a lens. At the moment I have a Tamron 28-200mm F/3.8-5.6 lens which is apparently "LD Aspherical (IF)" - which could be Martian for all I know - and is described as "Silver Super", which I can only assume means it's better than the bronze but not as good as the gold :meh: Minimum focussing distance is 0.8m at 200mm, and "Max. Mag. Ratio" is "1 : 4.8" at 135mm. Which also means nothing to me. I also have a Tokina 19-35mm F/3.5-4.5 lens, for which I have no manual and therefore no idea what the minimum or maximum anything is. I've taken some perfectly good photos with both lenses, but having nothing to compare them against I have no idea if I could be getting much better results. Finally I have a Sigma "Mini Zoom Macro" 28-80mm F/3.5-5.6 lens which is also "Aspherical" and has macro-focussing at 80mm. I bought this new for only £50 (shipped from US) which seems very little for a new lens, and the exterior appears to be entirely plastic, yet I've taken some great close-up shots with it. Again however I have nothing to compare it against.
So basically what I'm looking for is any advice at all on how to tell whether a lens is good quality or not; what on earth "LD Aspherical (IF)" means and whether it's better than simply "Aspherical", the significance of how curved the lens elements are... pretty much anything you can think of Thanks in advance, and also for the help you've all given me already in my other posts :hail: