Beginner Wow am a noooob at this and need help.

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Tommy
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I have an 18 to 55mm lens and silly me thought that's all I need well like I say silly me I need to know what size lens i need to take pic of deers and birds some landscapes but I also like taking pics of family members with blurry back grounds can any one help thanks
 
You might have guessed but there isn't one lens that'll do all that.

Wildlife - a zoom with a minimum long end of 300mm, but as long as you can afford.

Your current lens will do landscapes, but lots of people would also like a UWA zoom, maybe 10-22?

For portraits with blurry backgrounds a cheap start would be an 85mm 1.8. Of the 3 this is probably the cheapest, easiest to get to grips with and best 'bang for buck' to transform your results.
 
I have an 18 to 55mm lens and silly me thought that's all I need well like I say silly me I need to know what size lens i need to take pic of deers and birds some landscapes but I also like taking pics of family members with blurry back grounds can any one help thanks

I think you'll have to do a lot of reading or watching guides on YouTube.

The 18-55mm is a pretty basic lens and fine for a lot of uses but for deer and birds I think you'll need a much longer lens. Have a look at the wildlife section here or on other forums. Family members with blurry backgrounds could be possible if you use your lens at 55mm and its widest aperture which may be f5.6, getting close to your subject and moving the subject forward from the background will help as will using longer lenses with wider apertures.

Good luck doing your research but there's nothing to stop you experimenting with your current kit, especially for general landscape and pictures of the family. Birds and deer may be the problem.
 
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Thank u for your help when u say 300mm what would go before it lol
Not important really, 300mm is the 'long end', so whether it's 28-300, 70-300 or 100-300, what you're looking for is the best 'bang for your buck' with 300mm at the long end.
 
I was just looking at this one

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR Lens

Didn't know if the 55 part was ok

 
You know years ago, people 'made do' with cameras that had just a fixed angle of view, equivalent to something like 20 to 35mm on APS-C widgetal.... The 'trick' was in recognizing what you could and couldn't do with it, and working with what you got, rather, than is modern precept, expecting to be able to just buy a gadget to do it for you....

I need to know what size lens i need to take pic of deers
Deer, no need to pluralise that BTW, are not exactly small creatures, you can fill the frame with one quite happily with a 'normal' angle lens, like the one you have....
Of course, you have to be reasonably close to do that, and wild deer are often flighty beasts... so anything longer than 50mm may make filling the frame with venison a little less challenging, BUT, the 'skill' is still in the stalking. If you dont have the patience to stalk or set up in a hide, and wait for deer to come to you; or the perseverance & dedication to get up early in the morning when the deer do and start to forage, then you are starting from behind, and as said, no lens will do the job for you.
and birds
Birds are usually rather smaller quarry; to get frame filling with a finch, even at suburban garden ranges, you will struggle with much under 200mm. BUT they are also quite flighty, and with the very arrow angle of view of a long lens, actually scanning the scene to get the subject in the frame, and holding them there is often rather challenging. Still, stalking skills apply, and the gadgets wont do the work for you.

A-N-D more, long lenses often bring more problems than they solve; starting with that scene scanning niggle, then progressing through the matter of magnifying camera shake, which begs more diligence and discipline from you in your stalking and holding, before moving on to them making focus that much more critical, whilst often having more compromised apertures. So again, you REALLY need to have the know-how, NOT a long lens. If you don't have the know how you wont get results with anything If you have the know-how, you can get results almost with anything, and will either know when you might get better results with a longer lens, or simply it's going to make more work for you,

some landscapes
More Land does not more Landscape make. Wide angle lenses are as tricky, if not more tricky to get to grips with as tele's. Tele's are a bit of a one trick dog; with such a narrow field of view, they cut clutter and add impact, simply by only leaving enough space in the frame for the subject, to focus the viewers attention on. Wide angle's pack in a lot of real estate & in doing, tend to shrink the prominence of any feature subject, and include an awful lot of incidental 'clutter' detracting from that subject. Actually exploiting a wide angle to capture a dramatic scene and retain 'impact' is something that is very hard to do, and in the 'eye' not the lens. Worth noting that most of the 'great' Landscapes were taken, actally NOT with a wide agle lens, but one close to the 'normal' FoV, which is around 35mm on APS-C... slap bang in the middle of your 18-55, which is a damnably useful lens for the job. That mild tele end, is also quite well worth playing with for landscapes, cutting the clutter and focusing attention on a smaller 'section' of scene.

pics of family members with blurry back grounds
Blurry Backgrounds? Yeah! Shallow Depth of Focus then.. complicated topic this, I have been pondering a tutoral on; BUT as other comments, what you got and 'know-how' will do this job admirably. Common conception you 'have' to have a fast aperture lens, is sorry, 'tosh', and again, unless you have the know-how, likely to make more problems than it solves.

Issue is one of 'Selective Focus' rather than mere 'Shallow Focus', which is what fast apertures deliver, and which actually may NOT be what you want... sure it can chuck near back-ground 'oof' pretty easily, but such skiny Depth of Field can just as quickly see ears and noses going bury with the back-ground! Conversely, you can get some pretty effective blurry back-grounds, and keep noses and ears in sharp focus, with pretty 'slow' and relatively 'wide' lenses; in my tutorial musing, I was actually playing with a 29mm 'prime' at f4 and f8, and getting dissociated back-ground effect 'portrait' shots with it, and a little know-how... MOSTLY turning the Auto-Focus 'OFF', and putting the Depth of Field where I wanted it around my subject, not where the camera 'defaults' to put it, 1/3 infront and 2/3 behind whatever the red dot ranges in on... if you go manual, you can focus 'infront' of your subject, pulling the back of the DoF zone forwards, so your subject nose and ears an'all stays in it, but, back-ground goes 'oof' that much earlier; again, takes that bit of know-how, and some discipline and patience; you wont get that 'effect' very reliably with turbo tearaways tearing about the park; either with a fast prime or long zoom, and shallow DoF placed arbitrarily by the red-dot! Not so likely going manual and 'Zone Focusing' either.. but that little t of know how and discipline you stand a better chance!

Conclusion then, is REALLY, what you have got already, is as much camera as we ever could dream of in years gone past. It has every film in the shop in its huge range of ISO settings; whilst it's 'moderate' zoom range, covers the most used range from what was pretty 'wide' to 'quite' telephoto, and far 'more' versatile than cameras of old, when we had to work with a fixed 50mm pime or maybe a 35-70 'zoom'. AND it has all the advances and advantages of SO many easements and automation, from automatic exposure, through auto focus, BUT, for all that automation it STILL wont do the job for you, YOU still have to take the photo, ad work woth what you got to get it.

IF you expect a wider lens to get you 'better' landscapes; if you expect a long tele to get you 'better' wildlife; if you expect a faster lens to get you 'better' people shots.... you are likely to be quite significantly disapointed as well as out of pocket; the gear will NOT do the work for you, and likelihood is that it will demand MORE work from you to get what you want with it, ad if you aren't puttig that work in to get the results you want with the kit 18-55, you wont put it in with a UWA long tele or fast prime, ad will likely get worse results than you do now.

Better Photographers take better Pictures, NOT better cameras...... get a better photographer behind the lens. Do some home-work. Get some know-how; Practice & Patience, Diligence & Discipline, and yo'll get far more, far easier and cheaper than cracking out the credit card ad filling the bag with gadgets that still WONT do it for you. Lear the lesson of the masters of old.. WORK WITH WHAT YOU GOT! You already have far more than most of them ever did!
 
I was just looking at this one

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR Lens

Didn't know if the 55 part was ok

I have one of them. Useful 'cheap' all-round long tele..... BUT, if you expect it to get you those shallow focus effects, stalk your birds or find your deer in the trees, it wont. And if you do have the know how to make decent use of this lens, it's not the 'best' for the job.
 
I was just looking at this one

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR Lens

Didn't know if the 55 part was ok

The Nikon 70-300 VR is a much better lens, and so is the Tamron 70-300 VC at lower cost. Above 300mm, prices tend to jump up, they get bigger and heavier and harder to use.
 
I have one of them [55-300mm]. Useful 'cheap' all-round long tele..... BUT, if you expect it to get you those shallow focus effects, stalk your birds or find your deer in the trees, it wont. And if you do have the know how to make decent use of this lens, it's not the 'best' for the job.

A head and shoulders portrait taken at 300mm and f5.6 will have shallow enough depth of field to blur the background pretty comprehensively.
 
A head and shoulders portrait taken at 300mm and f5.6 will have shallow enough depth of field to blur the background pretty comprehensively.
DoF would be about 3" by my reckoning.. For the same 'framing' you'd get about as much DoF as using it at 135 & f8, or at 55 and f11....
It's not the lens length alone, making the DoF short, it's how close you have to be to the subject.
Meanwhile, all well and good getting the DoF down to a razor edge; you still need to keep the subject 'sharp', which a razor DoF will likely hinder; and the,back-ground itself, still needs to be 'condusive' to being oofed. If it has no texture, oofing it will just render it a texture-less tone; if it contains 'distractions' or 'features' oofing t may blur them, but not remove them and they can remain just as distracting.
While how much the back-ground oofs remains a function of the camera to subject vs camera to back-ground distance ratio. Longer the focal length, so the longer the camera to subject distance will need to be; and the closer to 1:1 the ratio of subject range vs back-ground range, and the less strongly the background will 'blur'.
Still a big difference between exploiting incidental 'shallow focus' to deliberate 'Selective Focus'. If you use deliberate selective focus, you may focus on free space in front of the subject; as you shorten the focus range, it inherently shallows DoF, without needing wide apertures, and you can retain enough DoF to keep nose and ears of the subject sharp, and 'wast' any unwanted DoF infront of the subject rather than behind, so you get more oofing of the background, earlier.
If you know how it works and how to make it work for you, you can get that effect. If you don't; then a fast aperture prime or a longer telephoto might give it you by accident or incident, through shortening the DoF, but keeping that arbitrarily 1/3 in front 2/3 behind the red dot, and the red dot diligently placed on the eyes, you are as likely to loose ears and noses, and not get so much back-ground dissociation, if that background is conducive to being dissociated.
You can certainly get fuzzy backgrounds with almost any lens, if you have a bit of know-how.. whether you get a pleasant effect is an entirely different matter, which remains in the technique not the technology.
 
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Depth of field and background blur are not the same thing. Basically, in terms of visual effect, longer focal length increases blur more than lower f/numbers.

Handy blur simulator here http://dofsimulator.net/en/
 
This is little test I did, with the aperture at F2.8 and F22
Just to add to this (as these images are possibly misleading).

Aperture alone is only a 'guide' you also need to take into account subject distance and focal length.

For instance at that close distance in the F22 shot, the background is OoF but at moderate focal lengths and focussed at 5 metres I'd expect front to back DoF.
 
Just to add to this (as these images are possibly misleading).

Aperture alone is only a 'guide' you also need to take into account subject distance and focal length.

For instance at that close distance in the F22 shot, the background is OoF but at moderate focal lengths and focussed at 5 metres I'd expect front to back DoF.


And that's why I said it was a test, different focal length's will as you say give different results, I was only showing what can be done.
 
And that's why I said it was a test, different focal length's will as you say give different results, I was only showing what can be done.
I wasn't looking for an argument, I was trying to help a complete noob, who just might have seen your images and thought that background blur at F22 was common :)
 
I was just looking at this one

Nikon AF-S DX NIKKOR 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR Lens

Didn't know if the 55 part was ok

I bought this and quickly traded for the 70-300 vr, the 55-300 does the job but not as well as the 70-300.

I'd recommend the sigma10-20mm I love mine and also for the family shots a 35mm.
 
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