Macro lens (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter Tendo
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Nikon's 105mm Macro is a nice lens. Will allow for better cropping, and probably better glass than a kit lens.
I would argue heavily against spending that kind of money on a lens right away. (this is my personal opinion)
Depending on WHAT you are trying to do, the 15-55vr that probably came with your camera is a great lens and focuses to about 11 inches (if I remember correctly.)
A really good, super affordable, second option would be the 55-200vr which focuses at about 3 feet (also, IIRC).
My (helpful) question to you is this: What is it EXACTLY that you are "missing" out on by NOT having a dedicated macro lens? Are you losing sales because of it? Are you ACTUALLY not able to get the shots you want with what you have, etc?
If you want to talk more, feel free to send me a PM. Happy to chat.
Finally, if you buy the 105mm and decide you don't want it a couple months down the road, LMK, I would be happy to pay "used" price for it
-Joe
Depending on WHAT you are trying to do, the 15-55vr that probably came with your camera is a great lens and focuses to about 11 inches (if I remember correctly.)
A really good, super affordable, second option would be the 55-200vr which focuses at about 3 feet (also, IIRC).
My (helpful) question to you is this: What is it EXACTLY that you are "missing" out on by NOT having a dedicated macro lens? Are you losing sales because of it? Are you ACTUALLY not able to get the shots you want with what you have, etc?
If you want to talk more, feel free to send me a PM. Happy to chat.
Finally, if you buy the 105mm and decide you don't want it a couple months down the road, LMK, I would be happy to pay "used" price for it
-Joe
Check this thread out. Nate's getting some amazing shots with just extension tubes. Cheap alternative to a dedicated macro lens.
http://www.tcmas.org/forums/showthread.php?t=38459
http://www.tcmas.org/forums/showthread.php?t=38459
Stoneyj33
Senior Member
I just spent a day shooting a nikon 105 macro, Tokina 100 macro, and the tamron 60mm f2.0 macro.
The tamron is the sharpest lenses without a doubt. Also is a great portrait lenses, with similar bokeh to my 50mm f1.4.
Id rank them in this order based off of quality and value. Remember the tamron and Tokina run 1/2 of the cost of the nikon. Tokina is a company started from ex nikorr lense employees.
Tamron 60mm f2
Tokina 100
Nikon 105.
The tamron is the sharpest lenses without a doubt. Also is a great portrait lenses, with similar bokeh to my 50mm f1.4.
Id rank them in this order based off of quality and value. Remember the tamron and Tokina run 1/2 of the cost of the nikon. Tokina is a company started from ex nikorr lense employees.
Tamron 60mm f2
Tokina 100
Nikon 105.
Not looking to get one right now. I just read in a lot of places that a macro len would be a good thing to get. I've seen just macro lens and a macro len that you place on the end of your existing lens. So courios on what the difference between the 2 is?
Can you share some examples? The Nikon 105 VR is often considered one of Nikons sharpest lenses, with lovely bokeh. I'd be interested in seeing some side by side comparisons.
The 105 VR is as expensive as is it is in part because of the vibration reduction feature, and because of a rugged professional-quality construction. The VR feature is much more relevant if using the lens as a moderate focal length telephoto (e.g. for portraits and that sort of thing) than for really close up stuff. You can get cheaper Nikon macro lenses. And I'm sure the Tokina and Tamron are both great sharp lenses (no doubt for even less money).
Close up lenses that you screw onto the front of your standard lens can give good results (I have a Canon 500D close-up lens that I have used on a telephoto lens for macro shots), but this sort of option tends to be less convenient. A macro lens will focus from infinity all the way down to extreme closups, whereas when using a screw on closeup lens (my Canon 500D anyway) you are restricted to certain distances. I think there are some similar constraints with extension tubes, but I have not actually used extension tubes. Nate could tell you more about this.
If I recall correctly, the 18-55 kit lens (if that is what you have) actually focuses pretty close - gives 1/3 life size images I think. That is pretty good, as long as you don't need extreme closeups (the closest Nikon macro lenses will take you is 1:1 - life size images on the sensor). If you want to take detailed photos of small insects, or amphipods, or greatly magnified images of single polyps of SPS corals, then a 1:1 macro lens would be useful. If you just want to take relatively close photos of your corals then the kit lens would probably work fine for you. Your kit lens is unlikely to be as sharp as a macro lens (macro lenses, in general, tend to be very sharp lenses), but it will give genuinely nice photos that will probably be plenty sharp enough as long as you don't need to do extreme crops.
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Stoneyj33
Senior Member
No examples to share. Just took some pictures of coins for detail and comparison, I didn't keep the pics.
The nikon had a very shallow depth of field in comparison with the other two. Which is strange. National camera carries the tamron and the nikon to test them out.
The nikon had a very shallow depth of field in comparison with the other two. Which is strange. National camera carries the tamron and the nikon to test them out.
If you were getting lower depth of field with the Nikon this (for multiple reasons) would give the impression that the lens was not as sharp, even if the lenses were all fundamentally identical in sharpness.
Depth of field is a function of focal length, aperture, and distance to subject - all these things taken together determine depth of field, and if these three things are the same you should get the same depth of field for all of the lenses. Were these the same for all of your shots with the different lenses (and were all the lenses the same focal length?..... all else being equal longer focal lengths have shallower depth of field)? If not, this was an apples to oranges comparison.
The Nikon closes down to a ridiculously small aperture (f/45 I think?), which gives quite impressive depth of field for extreme closeups (the other lenses might too, I don't know). You need a lot of light at this aperture (an off-camera flash gives very nice results), but that is not a function of the lens, per se, but a universal issue any time you shoot any lens at such a small aperture (most lenses don't actually have the capability of closing down that far).
By the way, generally, one wants to avoid extremely small apertures if you can because you have light diffraction effects that degrade the quality of the image (I guess maybe the small aperture opening starts behaving a bit like a pinhole camera maybe?), but people on the Flickr forums who are more knowledgeable than me point out that this concern is not relevant to macro photography (don't ask me to explain the physics of this - I don't know the reason). All I know is that when doing extreme closeups I use the smallest apertures I can get away with given the light and I get very nice sharp, crisp, good quality images.
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Stoneyj33
Senior Member
It is impossible to have the same focal length on the three lenses listed.
I took the shots at same apertures and also at the fastest setting possible. Tamron 60 f2 appeared to have more depth than 105 f2.8
I took shots at the same focal distance, and used different focal distances to frame the shots to make each of the different photos appear to have the same focal length
I took the shots at same apertures and also at the fastest setting possible. Tamron 60 f2 appeared to have more depth than 105 f2.8
I took shots at the same focal distance, and used different focal distances to frame the shots to make each of the different photos appear to have the same focal length