Next Lens advise

[twistedmoss]

Hi,

I have a Nikon D80 with an 18-105mm Kit lens, Nikkor 50mm 1.8D and a 70-300mm G lens that I had donated to me. I would love to get into macro photography.

Budget restraints are quite tight here, but my question is do I change the nikon 70-300mm G for either a Sigma or Tamron 70-300mm with Macro, or do I save up the extra £150 or so for the Sigma 105mm.

Any advise here would be appreciated as I have only been into photography for about 6 mths so still learning.

 

[Bardo]

Trust me, there's macro and there's macro! Some lens manufacturers seem to think that having a close focus distance of 1metre makes a lens 'macro' so be careful to check this all-important aspect of the lens specification before you hand over your dosh.

If you want to shoot macro stuff like insects, flowers etc then I'd go for something like the Tamrom 90mm and the Sigma 105mm - these will give you far greater close focusing than something like the 70-300mm you mentioned. In a recent round up of macro lenses, the Tamron came out very highly in the IQ department whilst the Sigma was shown to be not as sharp.

 

[Davec223]

The other option is to get a set of extension tubes and use with your 50mm, this will give you 1:1 magnification.