Recomend me a lens please!

V

VickyS

Messages
21
Name
Vicky
Edit My Images
Yes
Hi :)

I don't use the forum much but think I really should start to as you seem like such a knowledgeable bunch :thumbs:

Bascialy I need a sugestion for a new lens. I have a Nikon D3100 which I love and have the basic 18-55mm it came with and then a Tamron 70-300mm which I really like but just isn't good enough for what I want to do now really (sports mainly-equestrian/motor and others). I find that I can't zoom in enough of the subject and with sports obviously I can't get right up as close with most of it. And also I have trouble with the shutter speed being quick enough sometimes.
Also, when I photographed some showjumping indoors a month or so ago, I coudn't get them as light as I needed and adjusted and played with everything I could think of on my camera.
I'm still quite new to photography so would appreciate it if I could get some opions of what would be a good next step up. Also, I'm not made of money so nothing HUGELY expensive please :lol: (but I realise it's not going to be cheap don't worry!).
I'm prepared to pay a bit if I know what i'm getting is going to do the job.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions :)
(if you have a link too that'd be even better!)

Vicky
 
I shoot canon so can't give you specifics but what you are asking for is the following:

A long lens - maybe 500mm or 800mm to get you "closer" to the action
A fast lens - fast here refers to the maximum aperture of the lens. F2.8 for example will need less light (for a given iso/shutterspeed) then a f5.6 lens for the same conditions.
A cheap lens

So in summary you want a cheap, long, fast lens. The catch is that you can usually only pick 2 of the above.

For example the canon 600mm F4 lens is about £11000 !

The good news is that you can spend far less on a different body and get a camera with a better sensor, you can then use a much higher iso setting. You will get more noise, but this is far easier to deal with than a blurred photo.

For example I was using ISO 3200 on my Canon 5D2 last weekend in order to avoid using flash. This is not something I could have done and got the same results with a canon 40d for example.
 
If you can't zoom close enough with a 300mm lens (which is effectively 450mm or so on that crop body) you will have to get closer. At 300mm you'll be on F5.6 or something like that, which is not going to be fast enough even at high ISO. And then indoor equestrian (no flash) is one of the more challenging subjects. What circuits are you shooting at? A faster lens (f2.8), with a focus system fast enough for action is going to be expensive. A prime 300mm with a teleconverter is going to be very expensive too - and would still only give you 450-500mm effective length (with no zoom).

What to do? Sell the Tamron and get a 2.8 lens. The Sigma 2.8 (HSM) is nearly as much as a good used Nikon 2.8. Someone might say if you have a D7000 you might fare better with high ISO (hence lower shutter speed). A D700 would leave you short on reach.
 
Hi Vicky, This is a tricky one. You want a long lens 400 or 500mm. You want it to have a wide maximum aperture (so you can get a fast enough shutter speed inside) you want it to autofocus well and quickly. I'm afraid this is going to be expensive! The preferred lens for most sports photographers is the 300mm f2.8 most would also use a 1.4 tele convertor to give some extra length at the expense of 1 stop of light. This setup will cost thousands though, even if you buy one of the cheaper brands. If you don't have that kind of money then my advice would be to stick with what you have and practise lots to make it work for you. A high ISO setting will allow faster shutter speeds, shoot in RAW and use software to reduce noise in your images. Seek out areas of good light and find a location to shoot from that gets you closer to the action. Play with your autofocus settings to find out what works the best for you. Setting the focus point to the centre seems to speed up AF on some cameras. I am quite sure that with practise and good technique you will get better images from your existing camera and lenses. Good luck.. I hope this has helped.

Roy
www.royriley.co.Uk
 
Thanks, both very helpfull! :)

So, even if I were to get a better lens are you saying that becuase of the camera body it's not likely to make that much of a difference? (i'm a bit confused :lol:)
Here's a couple I toom from the indoor showjumping-not as sharp as it needs to be and too dark.
DSC_0293-1.jpg

DSC_0250.jpg
 
MrRiley said:
Hi Vicky, This is a tricky one. You want a long lens 400 or 500mm. You want it to have a wide maximum aperture (so you can get a fast enough shutter speed inside) you want it to autofocus well and quickly. I'm afraid this is going to be expensive! The preferred lens for most sports photographers is the 300mm f2.8 most would also use a 1.4 tele convertor to give some extra length at the expense of 1 stop of light. This setup will cost thousands though, even if you buy one of the cheaper brands. If you don't have that kind of money then my advice would be to stick with what you have and practise lots to make it work for you. A high ISO setting will allow faster shutter speeds, shoot in RAW and use software to reduce noise in your images. Seek out areas of good light and find a location to shoot from that gets you closer to the action. Play with your autofocus settings to find out what works the best for you. Setting the focus point to the centre seems to speed up AF on some cameras. I am quite sure that with practise and good technique you will get better images from your existing camera and lenses. Good luck.. I hope this has helped.

Roy
www.royriley.co.Uk
Click to expand...

Thank you, you're speaking more my language! I thought it would work out very costly and no, I do not have that kind of money to spend! I tend to work at the highest ISO I can at the moment bu then sacrifice light and quality becuase of it :( And I seem to spend my life wandering around looking for the best light too!
I will definatley be getting more practice in and see how that goes for now :)

I do like the look of the Tamron AF 200-500mm and it's got some good reviews but as I have no experience of it myself i'm not sure? It's doesn't seem 100% worth it to oay that much money for an extra 200mm? Or is that very nieve of me to think :lol:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tamron-200-...1ATE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1322749834&sr=8-1
 
Last edited:
As others have said getting a longer faster lens is an easy four figure sum really so I assume that is out of the question. Also those lenses are massive so you will probably need to spend extra on a good quality tripod. So cheapest way use your legs to get as close as you possible can and your camera has 14mp so you can always crop the final image to 'zoom' into the subject.

It seems like the original image is very small indeed can you post the settings (f number, shutter speed and so on) plus the original image? Might help us give more constructive advice.

The subject seems to be underexposed to me. There might be many reasons why that is and without the whole image+exposure settings we couldn't safely tell. However if you had shot RAW (not jpeg) you have a bit of room to fix exposure in an application like Lightroom.
 
vrapan said:
As others have said getting a longer faster lens is an easy four figure sum really so I assume that is out of the question. Also those lenses are massive so you will probably need to spend extra on a good quality tripod. So cheapest way use your legs to get as close as you possible can and your camera has 14mp so you can always crop the final image to 'zoom' into the subject.

It seems like the original image is very small indeed can you post the settings (f number, shutter speed and so on) plus the original image? Might help us give more constructive advice.

The subject seems to be underexposed to me. There might be many reasons why that is and without the whole image+exposure settings we couldn't safely tell. However if you had shot RAW (not jpeg) you have a bit of room to fix exposure in an application like Lightroom.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that :) I'm just off out now but will try and post the info later on thanks!
Do you know if the lens I posted above is any good or not?
 
With that sort of poor interior lighting, I would want a lens with a max. aperture of f2.8, here are some options, prices based upon Camera Price Buster

Sigma 300mm f2.8 £2197
Tamron 300mm f2.8 £2477
Nikon 300mm f2.8 £3947
Nikon 400mm f2.8 £6443

If these are outside of budget then a compromise option could be a Sigma 120-400mm f/4.5-5.6 at £689. Drawback is f5.6 a maximum zoom which sort of defeats the purpose I guess, but that is 400mm, which would give you an effective increase in focal length from the 450mm you currently have, to 600mm.
 
I have no personal experience with that lens but it has two serious downsides:

It is even slower than your current lens so you will need even higher ISOs to keep the shutter speed fast enough to freeze the action.

Also its size / focal length means that at 500 without a tripod you will need speeds of 1/1250 at best to stop motion blurring.

So even if the quality of the lens itself is good it is not a step in the right direction as it would be a good lens for well lit subjects and not for indoors shooting.
 
Ok, scrap that then :lol: back to the drawing board!

It's such a mindfield out there it really is!

I should mention though, it's very rare that I do indoor stuff and that area is particulary poor in it's lighting so maybe not base everything on that one place. But even so, it would be nice to have a lens that would have done better.
 
Last edited:
vrapan said:
I have no personal experience with that lens but it has two serious downsides:

It is even slower than your current lens so you will need even higher ISOs to keep the shutter speed fast enough to freeze the action.

Also its size / focal length means that at 500 without a tripod you will need speeds of 1/1250 at best to stop motion blurring.

So even if the quality of the lens itself is good it is not a step in the right direction as it would be a good lens for well lit subjects and not for indoors shooting.
Click to expand...

Just to clarify, whilst I agree with what you have said, I suggested the Sigma 120-400mm as a compromise for two reasons: firstly to increase focal length that was a requirement and secondly to reduce cost.

Also, I believe that it is not slower than the Tamron 70-300 the Op already has, but actually has the same max. apertures.

As I said at the start of my post, I would want a max. aperture of f2.8 in those conditions,
 
pauljs said:
Just to clarify, whilst I agree with what you have said, I suggested the Sigma 120-400mm as a compromise for two reasons: firstly to increase focal length that was a requirement and secondly to reduce cost.

Also, I believe that it is not slower than the Tamron 70-300 the Op already has, but actually has the same max. apertures.

As I said at the start of my post, I would want a max. aperture of f2.8 in those conditions,
Click to expand...

Hi Paul,

My comment was referring to the OPs 200-500 Tamron question not to the 120-400 Sigma one.

Having said that at 2Kg weight I wouldn't come anywhere near that kind of lens. :)
 
Ok, my misunderstanding, apologies, and yes you're quite right with regards to that lens :)
 
vrapan said:
Having said that at 2Kg weight I wouldn't come anywhere near that kind of lens. :)
Click to expand...

Monopod? Surely that would solve the problem.
I agree that the aperture range is the same as 70-300, but with the extra focal length, its a good starting spot till the OP can afford a camera with better noise handling.

Personally, from the samples provided, lighting doesnt seem to be a massive problem, as what is there can be adjusted with a bit of PP
 
Would agree about working with what you have to begin with. Those images don't look far off the mark to me. If you do feel like spending a bit of cash, one option would be the Nikon 300mm AF/S F4. It's one stop faster than your current Tamron, the same length (anything longer and fast will be crazy money) but will be super sharp. New, they're about £950 but I'm guessing used ones are a fair bit less.

There is also a Sigma 120-300 2.8 which is 2 stops faster than your Tamron but these are closer to £1500 and seem to be pretty rare on s/h market.
 
MJ Stebbings said:
Monopod? Surely that would solve the problem.
I agree that the aperture range is the same as 70-300, but with the extra focal length, its a good starting spot till the OP can afford a camera with better noise handling.
Click to expand...

The next step up in terms of noise handling would be something like a D7000 but realistically its only going to be a stop or so better. A full frame camera might be another stop again but we're back to big money. The D3100 is pretty good to start with in terms of noise, there aren't going to be massive gains to be made.
 
As others have said, I would work with what you have got, all your above images can be tweeked in your P&P, I just had a play with the first one and I got it to look ok, will post it up if i get a chance, a little busy :thumbs:
 
I think it might be worth taking a step back and looking at why the images posted are not up to scratch.
They are taken at about 82mm, ISO3200, f4, 1/320s on auto according to my exif reader.
The image is not the original resolution but, from the focal length, I assume it has been scaled rather than cropped so that should not confuse things too much.

I'd say forget new cameras, short of a D3s you will not see a dramatic improvement.
1st sort the exposure - the camera will do it, even if you have to resort to manual in tricky lighting and accept a slower shutter spee.

2nd worry about the sharpness - the high ISO will not be helping at all but it is worth testing the lens on a tripod (or other firm support) with the same settings to make sure you don't have handling problems.

When you are sure you have got the 1st two right I would start worrying about a new lens.... ;)

Toby

EDIT: I must type faster ;)
I just looked at the histogram and it isn't actually that badly exposed so as Paul said I am sure it can be improved a fair bit. If you want the out of camera results to be better you might want to experiment with the colour and d-lighting settings to try to lift the shadows or just shoot in raw and sort it out later as best you can.
 
Last edited:
Wow, thank you for all the replies! :)

They were taken in a very high ISO yes, probs 3200 as that's the highest my camera will do. I hate going that high but I played with the settings as much as I could and that was the only way I could get the photo's light enough.
On the day they were taken I was using the camera fully manual but must have been doing something wrong because I couldn't get them all of a good enough quality. (the ones I posted are some of the lighter, sharpers ones I took-probs because there was a light above/near these jumps). So I resorted back to cheating and putting in back into Auto :(

So the camera I have is quite a good one? As in, it wouldn't make a huge difference if I upgraded? (I can't afford to do this and am only just starting out so am happy with it for now).
I have been on a short course that helped a lot and am going on another one run by the same guy so hopefully I will improve even more but at the end of the day in several sports I like to photograph it's impossible to get close than I do (Rally cross for example, I was RIGHT up at the fence!) so extra focal length would help me there no questions I think?

Also, thank you for the edited copy! :) Much lighter but you can really see now I think that it was taken in a high ISO, it's quite grainy. I'm also doing a short photoshop course in the new year to brush up on that :lol:
 
Last edited:
I am a bit puzzled when you say you could not get them light enough - that shot was at 1/320 sec, why not go to a slower shutter speed?
or were you trying not to let the shutter speed go to low? I haven't tried taking pics of horses jumping so I am just trying to understand where you are coming from.

So the camera I have is quite a good one? As in, it wouldn't make a huge difference if I upgraded?
Click to expand...
In my opinion, yes. To put it into perspective, I would be quite happy with that noise performance from my D300 and I did a comparision between my D300 and a D7000 and decided the D7000 wasn't a huge difference. So I would say you would need to go to full frame to make it worthwhile.

I agree that a longer lens is needed sometimes but that can get seriously expensive. The longest lens I have got is the 70-300VR and it sometimes isn't long enough for what I do. Also, like you, I struggle in low light. However a longer slow lens (such as the £500 to £1000 sigmas) would be even slower and give even more problems in low light while also being not as sharp. A lose-lose situation as far as I am concerned. So that leaves me wanted a fast, long lens. So that would be the Nikon 200-400 f/4 at about £4000. A 300mm f/4 would be nice but doesn't have VR, isn't any longer focal length and is only a stop faster. Ok, a very nice lens but is it £1000 better than my 70-300? Or a 70-200 VR? £1800 for a shorter focal length?

I've used both the 70-200 and 200-400 lenses and they are superb but just impossible to justify the cost for me.

The best "upgrade" I have come up with is the 80-200 non VR 2.8. It can be had for about £400 secondhand I think and is supposed to be an excellent lens if you don't need the VR and can cope with 200mm. I'd still have to keep my 70-300 for when I need VR or 300mm though.....

Also, thank you for the edited copy! Much lighter but you can really see now I think that it was taken in a high ISO, it's quite grainy. I'm also doing a short photoshop course in the new year to brush up on that
Click to expand...

yes, grain is starting to show but I wouldn't call it intrusive and I didn't try and noise reduction at all. I guess it would look a lot worse at full resolution but try looking at some old film images if you think that is grainy :lol:

Toby
 
You are going to want / need to upgrade your kit sometime in the future but dont rush it just for the sake of it. Your current kit is fine for starters but you will need to grit your teeth and accept imperfections for now, especially over winter.
Instead concentrate on your compositions, look for viewing areas with good backgrounds where you can get near to the action. (this may well involve a lot of leg work!). Then if you're still having fun come spring look to buy some shiny new kit, I would recommend a body with inbuilt af motor (d300 / d7000 or even a d90) then some form of 70-200mm f2.8 or a 300mm f4. You really won't need much further reach at the majority of smarter events unless you go cricket crazy.
 
brman said:
I am a bit puzzled when you say you could not get them light enough - that shot was at 1/320 sec, why not go to a slower shutter speed?
or were you trying not to let the shutter speed go to low? I haven't tried taking pics of horses jumping so I am just trying to understand where you are coming from.


In my opinion, yes. To put it into perspective, I would be quite happy with that noise performance from my D300 and I did a comparision between my D300 and a D7000 and decided the D7000 wasn't a huge difference. So I would say you would need to go to full frame to make it worthwhile.

I agree that a longer lens is needed sometimes but that can get seriously expensive. The longest lens I have got is the 70-300VR and it sometimes isn't long enough for what I do. Also, like you, I struggle in low light. However a longer slow lens (such as the £500 to £1000 sigmas) would be even slower and give even more problems in low light while also being not as sharp. A lose-lose situation as far as I am concerned. So that leaves me wanted a fast, long lens. So that would be the Nikon 200-400 f/4 at about £4000. A 300mm f/4 would be nice but doesn't have VR, isn't any longer focal length and is only a stop faster. Ok, a very nice lens but is it £1000 better than my 70-300? Or a 70-200 VR? £1800 for a shorter focal length?

I've used both the 70-200 and 200-400 lenses and they are superb but just impossible to justify the cost for me.

The best "upgrade" I have come up with is the 80-200 non VR 2.8. It can be had for about £400 secondhand I think and is supposed to be an excellent lens if you don't need the VR and can cope with 200mm. I'd still have to keep my 70-300 for when I need VR or 300mm though.....



yes, grain is starting to show but I wouldn't call it intrusive and I didn't try and noise reduction at all. I guess it would look a lot worse at full resolution but try looking at some old film images if you think that is grainy :lol:

Toby
Click to expand...

I didn't want to use a slower shutter speed because they were getting a bit more blurry then I think (it was a while ago so I forget exactly what I tried!). That Indoor really wasn't helpful at all TBH, The light in some areas was very poor and as i'm not a reglular there and they didn't know me I wasn't allowed in the area so was stuck in the narrow viewing are which left me very limited :(


Thank you though, everything you said has been very helpful:thumbs:
 
I didn't want to use a slower shutter speed because they were getting a bit more blurry then I think
Click to expand...

Ah, right, now I understand. It is possible that with practice you might get away with a lower shutter speed but I am guessing horses are harder that what I am used to (planes mostly) as they accelerate in 3 directions at once :eek:

btw. Pooley has pointed out you don't have an in body af motor so avoid the older 80-200 f/2.8 I mentioned for the moment.

Toby
 
If you have the funds my seventeen year old teenage son uses the Nikkor 28-135, expensive but superb lens on his D3100
 
It really is tricky this one. I think that the Nikon 70-300mm VR is a definite step up and they can be picked up for well under £300 s/h now, the VR helps tremendously and on a tripod or monopod should enable you to get a nice high shutter speed for sharper pictures. I used to have this lens but now have the Nikon 300mm f4 which is better but the zoom was very useful.

Andy
 
JSER said:
If you have the funds my seventeen year old teenage son uses the Nikkor 28-135, expensive but superb lens on his D3100
Click to expand...

Jeremy, I don't think Nikon do a 28-135mm lens do they?

Andy
 
oh, one last comment (honest!)... if you have problems with too much noise you might want to try noiseware.

I've just started playing with it and found it quite nice if you need to tweek the noise down but still maintain (or increase) sharpness. The basic standalone version is free.

Toby
 
I once shot a outdoor show jumping event, so while my tips about exposure dont help, this tip might.

Have a look at the course, are there any areas which are well lit where the jumps are? If so, why not only shoot those jumps (as long as there is time to take one shot and then recompose, dont pick two that follow in sequence :lol:). Doing this will help you time the shots better, and also will give you a better exposure than a jump thats tucked away in the corner. Shooting the same jump over and over and over will give you the practice at timing etc while it wont leave you too disapointed with the exposure results.
 
Thank you so much for the advice everyone! :)
There's so much on here it's going to take me a while to work through and have a practice at but will definately be looking into some of the suggestions.
I don't have endless funds so for now, practice and trying some new techiques will have to do :lol: (must go and check my Euromillions ticket from last night though....)
 
MJ Stebbings said:
I once shot a outdoor show jumping event, so while my tips about exposure dont help, this tip might.

Have a look at the course, are there any areas which are well lit where the jumps are? If so, why not only shoot those jumps (as long as there is time to take one shot and then recompose, dont pick two that follow in sequence :lol:). Doing this will help you time the shots better, and also will give you a better exposure than a jump thats tucked away in the corner. Shooting the same jump over and over and over will give you the practice at timing etc while it wont leave you too dissapointed with the exposure results.
Click to expand...

Most of the time I do do this as i'm outdoors so can move wherever I want and pick jumps that are best but in that particular place I was stuck in a very small are so not only had limited jumps to photograph (some were facing away from me etc) the ones that I could were sometimes poorly lit as the ceiling lights were know where near! Frustrating!....
 
Andysnap said:
It really is tricky this one. I think that the Nikon 70-300mm VR is a definite step up and they can be picked up for well under £300 s/h now, the VR helps tremendously and on a tripod or monopod should enable you to get a nice high shutter speed for sharper pictures. I used to have this lens but now have the Nikon 300mm f4 which is better but the zoom was very useful.

Andy
Click to expand...

I'm not sure for equestrian stuff a tripod would be that useful as I move around a lot. I do definately need to invest in one though for other things because I know it would help me a huge amount!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top