Comments on: Digital Photography http://crschmidt.net/blog/archives/108/digital-photography/ Ramblings of a GIS Hacker Sun, 12 Feb 2012 14:36:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7.1 hourly 1 By: Christopher Schmidt http://crschmidt.net/blog/archives/108/digital-photography/comment-page-1/#comment-4584 Christopher Schmidt Sun, 20 Nov 2005 02:03:40 +0000 http://crschmidt.net/blog/archives/108/digital-photography/#comment-4584 Alexandre: The kit lens is a temporary measure until I can roll some cash together. My basic plan is to get the kit lens for now, which will give me a decent lens with which I can do wideangle in the house or whatever, and also do some longer distance stuff. Really, the camera is more than double the budget I wanted to spend, so anything else is out of the question at the moment, but the reason I'm willing to od it is that the SLR lets me switch lenses later, when I do have a little extra money. My goal lately has been to stick to a $200/month personal budget for "toys" -- GPS systems, extra system memory, and the like -- which means that next month I can buy myself a more specific lens for other things I might need it for. I never really had any problems with the 50mm FD lens on my old SLR for 90% of the pictures I took, and that's apparently a ~$70 lens. I did use a borrowed 70-300 lens at one point, and a wide-angle 28mm at one point, but in general I just used the basics. I'll definitely be upgrading, but right now *anything* is an upgrade, and until I know what I need - I've never used a DSLR before, and haven't done photography in 2 years - buying anything else would be a terrible waste. Alexandre: The kit lens is a temporary measure until I can roll some cash together. My basic plan is to get the kit lens for now, which will give me a decent lens with which I can do wideangle in the house or whatever, and also do some longer distance stuff. Really, the camera is more than double the budget I wanted to spend, so anything else is out of the question at the moment, but the reason I’m willing to od it is that the SLR lets me switch lenses later, when I do have a little extra money. My goal lately has been to stick to a $200/month personal budget for “toys” — GPS systems, extra system memory, and the like — which means that next month I can buy myself a more specific lens for other things I might need it for.

I never really had any problems with the 50mm FD lens on my old SLR for 90% of the pictures I took, and that’s apparently a ~$70 lens. I did use a borrowed 70-300 lens at one point, and a wide-angle 28mm at one point, but in general I just used the basics.

I’ll definitely be upgrading, but right now *anything* is an upgrade, and until I know what I need - I’ve never used a DSLR before, and haven’t done photography in 2 years - buying anything else would be a terrible waste.

]]> By: Alexandre Prokoudine http://crschmidt.net/blog/archives/108/digital-photography/comment-page-1/#comment-4583 Alexandre Prokoudine Sun, 20 Nov 2005 01:31:40 +0000 http://crschmidt.net/blog/archives/108/digital-photography/#comment-4583 Christofer, 18-55 kit lens isn't a really good choice. If you are not too tight on money, I would recommend some better one. E.g. I use 28-135mm/f3.5-5.6 mostly for outdoor/landscape shooting and 50mm/f1.4 for portraits exclusively (50mm/f1.8 is good too and it's cheaper). Sure it costs some money, but it's just technically impossible to manufacture a decent lens under $100 ;-) Christofer, 18-55 kit lens isn’t a really good choice. If you are not too tight on money, I would recommend some better one.

E.g. I use 28-135mm/f3.5-5.6 mostly for outdoor/landscape shooting and 50mm/f1.4 for portraits exclusively (50mm/f1.8 is good too and it’s cheaper). Sure it costs some money, but it’s just technically impossible to manufacture a decent lens under $100 ;-)

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