To the guys who ask what lens to get next

[craigd]

<p>Asking whether "bokeh" is in the OED is just silly in this context. "Bokeh" is a recent borrowing from Japanese and it's commonly used only among photographers, so it might or might not ever make it into mainstream dictionaries. "Lens", on the other hand, has been in the English language for centuries and has always been spelled "lens". "Lense" as a synonym for "lens" isn't a borrowing from another language, it's just a mistake that ought to be corrected.</p>

[bkpix]

<p>Well, that depends on whether you think language can grow and change.<br>

Dictionaries can be seen as prescriptive or descriptive.</p>

<p> </p>

[craigd]

<p>Obviously languages grow and change, but that doesn't mean that a mistake is not a mistake. If 100 years from now the English-speaking people of the world accept "lense", perhaps even prefer it over "lens", then so be it. But right now it's still just a mistake that ought to be corrected.</p>

[jaydesi]

<p>As a fairly new photographer myself, I can understand the question that's driving you all crazy and the confusion behind it.</p>

<p>Newcomers to photography haven't yet developed a style, and since they may only have their kit wide-to-normal zoom lens, don't necessarily know what they can accomplish with other lenses. Since there are only a handful of broad categories (wide, normal, telephoto, etc), they hear things like "lens kit" and want to create their own. They believe (rightly or wrongly) that a proper kit has a representative of all of these, with specialty lenses mixed in, but they don't know if they should get an ultrawide lens next, or a tele lens, or a macro lens. If there's a "lens kit," then what might follow is that there is an order to how you complete it...you move from most used to infrequently used specialty lenses as you grow your kit...but they don't know what that order is, or that the order is dependent on their interest, since they don't have the experience.</p>

<p>The advice to buy the lens that allows a shot they can't take with their current lens(es) isn't always useful, because they read about macro photography and want to try it, and about using telephoto lenses to photograph birds, and want to try that too, or they see an interesting shot with a fisheye and would like to take that kind of shot. As amateurs pursuing photography for enjoyment, they aren't limited to focusing on one type of photography, and want to try them all, but for their second lens, they don't likely want something that's going to sit in their bag most of the time, they want something that will have a more broad use.</p>

<p>It's common advice to suggest a normal-to-tele zoom as a complement to the kit lens, and also to buy a nifty fifty. I rarely see someone suggest a macro lens (or a fisheye) when this question is asked unless the person specifically says they'd like to try that kind of shooting. To me, this suggests that the question has an answer, because the same or similar advice is often given. But searching for "what lens should I buy next" may not seem logical to them, since there are so many different cameras, that they may not know or understand which thread is applicable to their situation.</p>

<p>I'd be willing to bet that most of the time, this question is asked by a hobbyist, because one would hope a pro or photo student would have the knowledge to know what they're likely to need. Amateurs are learning on the fly, and aren't constrained by the rules of the classroom or the demands of a profession. Usually, their only constraint is financial.</p>

[ridinhome]

<p>My take on this is - I'm generally willing to forgive the "What lens should I buy" question though it contains no context about intended use, limitations of current gear etc. However, these questions have usually been answered a dozen times previously, likely within the last week. So I do find these questions irritating when the OPs question could easily have been answered by a simple search. It's forum courtesy to Google / search for the answer to your question before you pose it.<br>

(I admit I've been guilty of this particular form of rudeness, but I've learned to try and avoid it).</p>

[lex_jenkins]

<p>Yay, lense troll thread. Welcome back. Just as chewy as the first time I saw ye back in 'ought-six.</p>

[JDMvW]

<p>But Lex, the trouble is that it is all junk calories and nothing but sucrose. The cotton candy of P.net.</p>

[DickArnold]

Ok. I guess I want to make a point. I gave classes to forty photography neophytes this past winter. I had them bring their cameras and instruction books. They paid me to do this. I conducted very informal walk around instructions and had them set up behind tables set in a square. . The cameras ranged from P&S to some decent DSLRs; Canons, Nikons, Sony etc. The cameras were gifts, new purchases, hand me downs etc. Most of them did not know enough to understand their instruction books. Please get that because part of the curricula was giving them the vocabulary to just be able to make sense out of what to them appeared to be jibberish. The ground rules were that there is no such thing as a stupid question, or a stupidly phrased question. They were allowed to stop me at any time if any one of them could not understand something. I did my level best to keep the class with me as we moved along. I brought a lot of my own gear and pictures and did a lot of show and tell. Each class ran two hours based upon carefully developed progressive lesson plans that began at a very basic beginning level. I added classes at the request of a majority to finish out the lesson plans. How do you turn the camera on. Where is the lens? What is an SD or CF card. As we progressed I got any number of very basic questions like I can't find that on my camera. What is this for? Every time I answered a question I explained the answer to everyone. I had to learn to operate cameras I am not familiar with along with the owner. My point is many camera owners don't know the first thing about what is their next lens (although, they may ask the question) just as newcomers here don't know how to search this site let alone have enough vocabulary to understand their sometimes poorly written instruction books. Not many of those forty or so people (when they started) probably could make the basic qualifications to get into this PN club. They could not understand many of the terms we use (aperture, lens opening, ISO). After all you all can search the site and you all know how to operate your gear. I thought that was why Josh set up the beginners section so they could get acquainted with PN and their gear and ask really dumb sounding questions. You know I did weddings for several years and I had to start with my first wedding and there was a hell of a lot I didn't know. I appreciate the extreme patience with which Nadine handles the beginners. I am still learning from her. I wish she had been around when I started as I made some significant billing mistakes in the beginning. In my opinion, from my limited teaching experience, I think there are thousands upon thousands of camera owners out there that know very little about their equipment. I could have kept those beginner classes going ad in finitum except they wore me out but they were relaxed and a lot of fun. As someone suggested you could start a forum for truly knowledgable people.

I no doubt would not qualify. We all started somewhere with very meager knowledge.

[nomad_.]

<p>What happened to all the beginners guides and introductory books? I'm sure I must have used such things when I took up photography 30-odd years ago. Do people no longer sit down and research a new hobby when they realise they're interested in it? When I see people asking when they should start using manual exposure, I find myself wondering how I ever managed to get a frame of film exposed at all, never mind developed and printed (and all without 'teh interwebz').</p>

[mark_stevens9]

<p>With any expensive purchase I have always asked myself, "What am I trying to do?" I love my toys, but the tightwad in me also has to justify each purchase in regard to what it can do for me.<br>

I don't think a novice should go out and buy a bag full of lenses until there is a specific need they need to fill. With experience they will make better choices, because they will know which questions to ask.</p>

[Ian Taylor]

<p>photo.net is 95% people obsessed with gear not light or the other things that make a good photo.</p>

[DickArnold]

There is the make believe world where everyone buys stuff they fully understand and the real world, where, like I said, thousands that, according to you all, don't use good sense go out and buy stuff before they understand it. This is of course exacerbated by the ever increasing complexity of digital photography There is also a great body of consumers who are new to photography because digital has greatly expanded the number of people buying cameras. Because digital is heavily marketed there are those who have to learn about photography from scratch using fairly sophisticated equipment as they are new to photography. Years ago I bought a lot of MF equipment and gradually grew into sophisticated use of that equipment by asking some very simple minded questions. There are those who will set their Canon on the green square and shoot along blissfully without ever going beyond that. However, many of those newcomers, as they get into it, will want to learn more and, like some of my students, will have to grow into the equipment that have purchased. I don't think being self-righteous about one's own behaviour is the way to treat people who are asking on this site how to grow into their equipment and ability to make decent images. In my opinion I think appropriate behaviour to "stupid questions" is to gently guide such questioners into rational ideas of what they need to learn and what they need to buy. I sure had a good time trying to teach forty students just that. BTW they were all intelligent and quite reasonable people who were looking for enough knowledge to improve their image and equipment decision making. What I found is that they just needed to learn enough fundamentals to improve the quality of their questions. This they did as we developed a common vocabulary based upon some understanding of the arcane language we use on this forum and the manufacturers use in their instruction manuals.

[MichaelChang]

<p>I'm sure if we took inventory of everyone here's equipment, we'd have a list in which at least 3/4 of the gear would fall in the category of 'seldom if ever used'. How we amassed the gear would take another thread a mile long.</p>

<p>Funny thing is every purchase seemed so essential and justifiable at the time, and for me it only became apparent when I see these eBay estate sales getting pennies on the dollar from a life long accumulation of stuff. </p>

<p>And maybe that's Bruce's point in his original post - do we <em>really</em> need it?</p>

[steve_levine]

<p>The sad truth is that many visionary photographers (Arbus, Cartier-Bresson, etc) used 50 MM lenses for the bulk of their known work.</p>

[bobbymac]

<p>Try using a little humility when responding to lens questions. Everybody started somewhere and learned through experience. Your experience can help people from making the same mistakes you did and I would be willing to wager that a lot of responders here have made bad mistakes on lens purchases. In the past year and nine months I've made some mistakes on lens purchases because asking on a forum (any forum) will usually not get you much of an answer, unless you just get lucky and find a response from someone who remembers being in the same dilemma when they started.<br>

I looked at my local Craigslist yesterday and saw an ad for a Canon 5dMk2, a 50mm lens, cards, bag etc. the guy stated he used the camera for a wedding (1000 shots) and never used the camera again preferring his P&S better. He was taking an $800 loss to sell the kit. If he had came to PN for advice before he purchased that kit do you think he would have got the right advice or would the responses been all over the place.</p>

<p> </p>

[mark_pierlot]

<p>Bob, most of the respondents would have advised him to rent rather than purchase the gear for a one-off shoot, unless of course he didn't know at the time that he'd be using it for only the one wedding.</p>

<p>But anyone asking for gear purchasing advice on photo.net (or anywhere else, for that matter) should weigh the (often conflicting) advice along with all the other relevant considerations, and then make his decision.</p>

<p>It's unwise to let other people decide for you.</p>

[976photo]

<p>OK, I'm still pretty new to all of this technical side of photography, but it seems to me that if you need to ask the question "what lens should I buy next?" then you probably don't really need it.</p>

<p>There's some nasty stigma out there that all kit lenses are utter crap and the first thing you need to do is go out and buy a better lens. Problem is most newbies don't know what makes a lens better in the first place. And the fact is there's really nothing inherently wrong with the lens that they do have.</p>

<p>9 times out of 10, I'm willing to bet it's not the lens causing them to take crappy pictures, it's their technique. If they take the time to work with what they have and actually <strong>learn</strong> something first, then by the time they're ready to buy a new lens, they won't have to ask the question.</p>

<p>Why? Because they should reach the point where they know what their current lens's limitations are, and realize that for a particular situation they're going to need a lens that has a wider aperture, or a longer focal length, or whatever it is that they know they want to do but the lens can not deliver. And if you reach that point, then you know what you need, you know what to look for, and there's no need to ask "what lens should I buy next?"</p>

[bmm]

<p>I never understood why people get so wound up about what others 'should' do in an aspect of life that is so harmless, and that doesn't impact them at all.</p>

<p>I also don't know why there is this snooty view that the acquisition of good gear - even if it is not entirely 'logical' or adhering to rules of bare neccessity - is somehow an inferior pleasure to the arty-farty side of this hobby. This is, after all, a gear-based and technical passtime.</p>

<p>And I guess a third 'don't know why', which in part synthesises the above 2, is that I don't know why people seem to advise on such questions as if each person asking is a professional/business photographer and where the lens in question is an asset that has to be justified by a return, or by a business case, or a technical gap... when in fact I'm pretty sure that the overwhelming majority of people on this site are amateurs and hobbyists that can do what they like when they like without such accountabilities.</p>

<p>Each to their own. People buy cars or guitars out of need and utility, people also buy cars or guitars out of desire to collect, to 'have the best' or 'have a large range' or whatever less immediately logical reason. Each are valid (though different) angles from which to enjoy those items. It's no different with photography.</p>

<p>And so if some dude on the other side of the world is happy through thinking about a new lens - whether to use constantly or to put under his pillow - then I'm happy. Sure I'm going to give him my ideas if I happen to have experience in the kinds of kit that he is considering. But I'm not going to label him something just because his potential purchase breaks some unwritten rules about what we do and don't 'need'. [And I deliberately put 'need' in inverted commas because 95% of the planet would not see even the most basic SLR equipment as anything else than an absolute first-world luxury and extravagance].</p>

[phule]

<p>[[i never understood why people get so wound up about what others 'should' do in an aspect of life that is so harmless, and that doesn't impact them at all.]]</p>

<p>The irony here is, of course, that the very thing you're railing against is the very thing you're doing: getting "wound up" about what others "should do." You're concerned about how and why people get wound up. If you truly believed what you are preaching then you wouldn't see the need to post this response espousing what you believe.</p>

<p>This will continue <em>ad nauseum</em>. :)</p>

<p> </p>

[mark_sirota1]

<p>B M Mills:</p>

<blockquote>

<p>I don't know why people seem to advise on such questions as if each person asking is a professional/business photographer and where the lens in question is an asset that has to be justified by a return, or by a business case, or a technical gap... when in fact I'm pretty sure that the overwhelming majority of people on this site are amateurs and hobbyists that can do what they like when they like without such accountabilities.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>And that's exactly the point. People ask <em>what</em> lens to buy next without saying (and often without knowing) <em>why</em> they want to buy another lens. Once the <em>why</em> question is answered, the answer to <em>what</em> often becomes much clearer.</p>

[justine_k]

 

<p>*Ahem*...as someone who recently asked the same question, I certainly hope I was clear as to why I was contemplating new lenses, and I hope no one rolled their eyes and had the thought to be nasty! </p>

<p>I think the reason that there are so many individual threads on this subject is because, bottom line, I don't think any one person will easily find another thread in which someone else has their exact set of circumstances for photo taking.</p>

<p>Also, for a "hobbyist" I think this might be an even more daunting task, even if you are not completely clueless on the subject. As a hobbyist myself, my photography varies SOO much, that it's very hard to put a weight on what lens is going to be most beneficial next. My husband and I are avid hikers/climbers, and there is nothing that makes me smile more than amazing summit photos with a wide angle (sorry, 18mm on a kit lens just isn't wide enough!). On the other hand, I travel all over the world and would like to take a picture of a narrow alley way one minute and zoom into a stranger's face the next. On yet another hand, taking portrait shots of my dog AND action shots across a field is something I do all the time. It's hard to decide what niche is the most important and what lens is going to give me the best bang for my buck (obviously I can't get ALL the lenses I want in one fowl swoop). </p>

<p>So, the opinions on "what lens to get next" is often confusing and overwhelming. It's not like there are a dozen lenses to choose from as a whole. There is such an immense variety out there, and a huge difference in opinions that it often doesn't help and I think people have the idea that if they start a new thread for themselves, they will get answers that better suit them.</p>

<p>Sure, there are plenty of threads out there that are just poorly asked questions: "I have a Nikon DSLR what lens do I get"...but (at least from what I've seen most? are a little bit more detailed than that.</p>

<p>I do know that I'll probably never ask a variety of that question on here again!</p>

 

[faysal]

<p>If you feel this applies to you, then it probably does:<br>

If someone wants to get something new, has some buying parameters, and is having trouble deciding between similar items, you could either help, or not. You should not assume that they don't understand or respect light enough for simply asking the question of what to get next. Given their parameters, you could suggest a technique that may allow them to use what they currently have. Sure, not everyone posts what their end goal is and what their current gear is, but its quite simple to just ask instead of being snide about it.<br>

Irregardless, what does "lense" have to do with anything? ( http://tiny.cc/ipfcq :) )</p>