Costs of different areas

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casfan

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This is thread is to go with my what to get for xmas thread.

What I'm wanting to know is what whats the cost of getting into either wildlife or macro photography.

From experience i know that my lens is not were near long enough to get good pics of animals or birds.

And for macro id need ring flash and other stuff.

So whats going to be the cost to get good photos in each catogary.

I know its a broad question
 
Different strokes for different folkes I'm afraid.
Only advice is to try and buy cheap to see if you like it before spending the heavy money.:thumbs:

Wildlife tripod £500 ish

Long lens £600 to £6000 ish :eek:

Gimbal head around £500.

Without bits and pieces.:'(

Macro much cheaper.
 
Macro can be as cheap or as expensive as you like:

Macro filters / adaptors - £30 - £60
Extension tubes - £20 - £100
Dedicated lenses - £200 - £2000

As per towershots advice, try before you buy and decide if it's an area you REALLY want to get into or just dabble and set yor budget accordingly. Don't be rushing to to buy a 200mm Nikkor Micro lens just yet!

Carl
 
How longs a piece of string......how big's your budget

Good macro lens £300/400 for a tamron 90mm f2.8, tokina 90mm f2.8 or sigma 105mm f2.8, others sigma 150mm f2.8 £500, canon 100mm f2.8 £450, 50mm f1.4 £300 ..... extension tubes Kenko £90-100, Ring Flash £150-500

http://www.mplonsky.com/photo/article.htm
http://www.beautifulbugs.com/beautifulbugs/howto.htm

Wildlife photography, decent tripod, decent long lens, maybe zoom 100-400mm, but a prime(s) the way to go, probably several lenses 300mm f2.8, 500mm f4 or 600mm f4. A Hide, wimberley head, Teleconverters

On a budget canon 400mm f5.6, 70-200mm f2.8, 300mm f4

Again How Long is a Piece of String
 
I can beat that price for macro - you can get a lens reversing ring for ten quid http://haodascreen.com/reversing.aspx then you can get step-up or step-down rings and use lenses with a filter size other than 58mm - those rings cost a couple of quid each.

It will work best if you have a lens with a manual aperture ring, otherwise you will be stuck with shooting at the widest aperture.

You don't need ring flash. Any ordinary off-camera flashgun and a reflector will get you a long way. You don't always flash, anyway.

If ten quid is too much, you could make your own for the price of a tube of superglue: http://www.diyphotography.net/diy_reverse_macro_ring though I would be a bit worried about the risk of the lens falling off.

Another method is to join two lenses together with a coupler between their filter rings. http://www.dpchallenge.com/tutorial.php?TUTORIAL_ID=40

Both these techniques can give higher magnifications that you get with so-called macro lenses (which generally don't deliver true 1:1 magnification, which used to be the accepted definition of "macro").

You can get an outstanding secondhand macro lens, the Micro-Nikkor-P Auto, 55mm f3.5, for about 30 quid. It fits Canon cameras with a cheap adapter and offers 50% magnification on the sensor. It needs to be Ai'ed to fit modern Nikon cameras.

For wildlife get a 600mm f4 lens and a Wimberley Head, if you have £6k to spare. They take very, very good pictures.
 
Thanks looks like Macro is going to be more in my price range.

any links to the micro nikkor -p lens other than flea-bay? Im a nikon d40,
what off board flash is recommeded?
 
casfan said:
Thanks looks like Macro is going to be more in my price range.

any links to the micro nikkor -p lens other than flea-bay? Im a nikon d40,
what off board flash is recommeded?
Click to expand...


Ebay is where I got mine. But do note that it is a pre-AI lens, designed for the Nikon F, so you need to look for one with an AI conversion otherwise it will not fit your camera.

You also need to be aware that there are different versions and the one you want is the 55 mm f/3.5 Micro-Nikkor Auto (Compensating Aperture). Scroll down on this page to find it: http://www.naturfotograf.com/lens_spec.html

Somewhere on the net there is a list of Nikkor lens serial numbers, which is a great help in ensuring you get the right version of a given lens.
 
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