What should I take on a trip to Hawaii?

im a 20 year old college student and im going on a surf trip to

Hawaii the day after x mas. I have an N65 and two crappy Sigma zoom

lenses i got on ebay, one's a 28-80 and the other is a 100-300mm.

Asides from going surfing I do plan on taking alot of pictures. I'll

be shooting everything from guys getting worked at Pipeline to

scenery to maybe even Pearl Harbor (if i can stay out of the water

that long) well you guys are the pro's and im new to all this and was

wondering what film i should take and maybe even a good cheap (under

$200) Nikkor lens i could get. Im currently looking into the new D

series Nikkor 50mm 1.8 due to its low price, low weight, and good

picture quality. i heard its an awesome all-around lens.

 

any other recommendations? film recommendations? I was thinking

somewhere along the lines of Kodak Supra 400 for surfing pics and

Supra 100 for everything else. I heard film makes a big difference.

 

i also have one of those fisheye converters. i got it on ebay for

$50 and have shot two rolls with it on my moms Pentax and although

its not too sharp its fun to mess around with.

 

any input would be greatly appreciated.

The 50mm f/1.8 AF-D is wonderful, go for it. But if you'll be on the beach taking pictures of the surfers at Pipeline or Sunset, you're going to want a longer focal length. Nikon's best value for your purposes is the 70-300 AF-D ED lens, for $250-300.

 

Supra 100 and 400 will be fine. If you don't have (or won't be carrying) a tripod, bring some Fuji NPZ also. That's an 800 speed film, should keep your shutter speeds up into handheld territory even when the sun is behind the clouds.

 

Two things to try to keep off the lens: sand from the beach, and grease from the awesome burgers and fries at Haleiwa.

 

And do go see Pearl Harbor, and do allow enough time for the boat to the Arizona Memorial and the trolley bus to the Missouri.

 

Have a great time.

Oh yea another thing I forgot...Filters. I dont have any filters. im planning on buying a basic UV filter and was looking into some of the color filters. are there any out there you guys would recommend?

You don't have to take this with you, but be sure to buy some mosquito repellent when you get there.

You should take me. I've never been!

I would say that the only AF-Nikkor lens that you could get for under $200 that would be appreciably better than your Sigma 28-80 (which, BTW, is NOT crap, it's pretty good, not great, but not too bad) would be the 50mm f1.8 AF Nikkor. Nikkor lenses that are going to noticeably outperform your Sigma Zooms are going to run you several hundred dollars each. The low-end Nikkor-G zoom lenses are in the same quality class as your Sigmas.

 

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I have the 70-300 D lense and think that it would be a good choice for the surf shots. As far as filters go, I would say that a circular polarizer is a must to shoot around water and to get the color of the sky to pop out. I have the 50 1.8, manual focus, also and have more keepers with this lense than any other that I have used. I used a lot of Kodak Royal Gold 100 on my trip to Hawaii and have blown up some of the pics to 12x18 with very good results.

Hope this helps.

 

Mike