What lenses do I need to start taking photos?

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francdore

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What lenses do I need to start taking photos plus help with camera settings?

Hello.

My finance and I are starting to do photography together as a hobby and want to know which lenses we need to take landscape photos, wedding photos and photos of live bands.

Currently we only have the 18 ~ 55mm lens that came with the Nikon D3000 camera.
I also wanted to know if anyone could help me with some of the settings on my camera. I took some photos of a band recently and on most of them the photos came out great when I used the "no flash" setting. I use the no flash setting because the stage lights looks awesome when there is no flash. But sometimes the camera auto adjusts the shutter speed so slow on “no flash” mode, the photos come out blurry because the shutter get’s left open for a few seconds.

Can anyone tell me how to take photos with no flash with a Nikon D3000 and at the same time adjust the shutter speed faster so that the photos come out clear with no blur? We want sharp focused photos.

I tried the “M” manual setting where you can adjust the shutter speed and aperture but the photos come out black.

I hope this makes sense...

Thank you in advance!
 
Last edited:
Sonic2k

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The 18-55mm is good for everyday *mik-en-druk* type photography.
To progress, you would do well to get a 70-300mm zoom lens..
Can anyone tell me how to take photos with no flash with a Nikon D3000 and at the same time adjust the shutter speed faster so that the photos come out clear with no blur? We want sharp focused photos.
Click to expand...

Read your post you are making a few mistakes...
without flash = long shutter speed & means tripod and everything being kept still is essential... If you want sharp focus raising the ISO number won't help either...
 
Dolby

Dolby

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Does a higher ISO effect focus/sharpness as well?

Perhaps on 'M' when you are selecting the shutter speed too fast, which is why it's all black?
 
Sonic2k

Sonic2k

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not so much as it makes the photo more noisy... the same effect as with high ISO film...
I shoot only ISO 100/200, nothing else, except ISO800 for moon/star shots.

The trick with this kind of photography is the clever use of the available light and sometimes, fill-in-flash... but the trick is to squeeze as much light onto the film (or image sensor) as possible with a fast shutter speed.
 
Dolby

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Ah - yes ... noice I knew.

With an SLR one can do 1600ISO without worry though?
 
bwana

bwana

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@francdore - personally I'd get a 50mm f/1.4 or 1.8 (not sure what nikon offers) and then get stuck into learning about the aperture priority and shutter speed priority modes.
Dolby said:
Ah - yes ... noice I knew.

With an SLR one can do 1600ISO without worry though?
Click to expand...
Depends on what you're worrying about. I was shooting at NMMU stadium the other night and even with the lights on that place is a dark abyss so I had to go as high as 3200 (f/2.8 and 1/400th) because what I was worrying about was getting the shot, not the noise. Higher ISO also decreases the dynamic range and knocks down the contrast.
 
Sonic2k

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bwana said:
Depends on what you're worrying about. I was shooting at NMMU stadium the other night and even with the lights on that place is a dark abyss so I had to go as high as 3200 (f/2.8 and 1/400th) because what I was worrying about was getting the shot, not the noise. Higher ISO also decreases the dynamic range and knocks down the contrast.
Click to expand...

There we go. thank you so much for putting that in words for me... was on the tip of my brain. bwana FTW...
 
Sonic2k

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Afterthought:
I would advise only professionals to go fully MANUAL... frandcore... for what you are trying to do, play around with the shutter-priority mode and see if that helps... Using either Av or Tv modes can easily be the new ground you are seeking to reach in photography
 
Dolby

Dolby

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Thanks bwana!

I'm guessing both contrast and range can be processed afterwords with levels?
 
Sonic2k

Sonic2k

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There is a mag-book that was being sold in some bookstores last year called "Getting Started in Digital Photography" That book is worth its weight in gold.. if you follow the advice given there you will become good... The alternative is to enrol at the CODP for the fundamentals course. Or better still, do what I did- experiment, play around, and become a professional photographer's appy!
 
Dolby

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Koosi said:
There is a mag-book that was being sold in some bookstores last year called "Getting Started in Digital Photography" That book is worth its weight in gold.. if you follow the advice given there you will become good... The alternative is to enrol at the CODP for the fundamentals course. Or better still, do what I did- experiment, play around, and become a professional photographer's appy!
Click to expand...

Or just come to MyBB and ask the guys here ;)

They've answered th most basic of all questions for me and been pretty helpful
 
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francdore

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Dolby said:
Or just come to MyBB and ask the guys here ;)

They've answered th most basic of all questions for me and been pretty helpful
Click to expand...

WOW! I just had a look at your photos. What lens did you use to take those closeup photos of the insects? I also love all the other photos!
 
RanzB

RanzB

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francdore said:
Hello.

My finance and I are starting to do photography together as a hobby and want to know which lenses we need to take landscape photos, wedding photos and photos of live bands.

Currently we only have the 18 ~ 55mm lens that came with the Nikon D3000 camera.
I also wanted to know if anyone could help me with some of the settings on my camera. I took some photos of a band recently and on most of them the photos came out great when I used the "no flash" setting. I use the no flash setting because the stage lights looks awesome when there is no flash. But sometimes the camera auto adjusts the shutter speed so slow on “no flash” mode, the photos come out blurry because the shutter get’s left open for a few seconds.

Can anyone tell me how to take photos with no flash with a Nikon D3000 and at the same time adjust the shutter speed faster so that the photos come out clear with no blur? We want sharp focused photos.

I tried the “M” manual setting where you can adjust the shutter speed and aperture but the photos come out black.

I hope this makes sense...

Thank you in advance!
Click to expand...

Go to youtube and searching for DSLR's for beginners, a great one is DSLRtips (I think), it'll explain everything you need to know about aperture, shutter speed, DOF and so on. I'd suggest not shooting on Manual until you know how to adjust your settings.
 
Dolby

Dolby

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awww - makes me all warm and fuzzy when people look at my Flickr account ;)

I actually don't have an SLR - I use a Canon SX1 bridge camera.

bwana can correct me here - but a compact/bridge is much easier to take macro photos than an SLR due to smaller sensor size and lack of mirror? I understand you need to use mirror lock up when using an SLR
 
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ebendl

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francdore said:
Thanks. So basically when taking photos in darkish places of bands, I need to use the shutter priority and put the iso on more or less 400?
Click to expand...

Not necessarily - if it is much darker, you might need to bump up to ISO1600 or even 3200. If you have a kit lens, which can only do aperture f3.3 or above, you might need higher ISO and then probably slower shutter speed. As somebody else said, digital sensor noise is less of an issue than a blurred shot, so rather get the shot with more noise than get a blurry shot.

Photography is about getting the right amount of light on the sensor. The bigger your aperture (lower the number), the more light gets in. The slower your shutter, the more light gets in. The higher your sensor's sensitivity (ISO), the more the sensor can gather from the amount of light that got in.

But each of these have a trade-off - it is your job to balance the advantage to the disadvantage and jingle these three settings to get the shot you want.

You will seldom find a pro-photographer taking photos in Auto (most professional cameras don't even have an auto setting), most will take in P, aperture priority, shutter priority or full manual. If you REALLY need to take a shot in 5 seconds, then you might switch to auto (to rather get the shot than miss it). But that's about it!
 
Sonic2k

Sonic2k

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I came from point-and-shoot territory and still use them for ultra-close-up macro photography the DSLR cannot seem to manage...

As for mirror-up... only ever used it once, to shoot star trails... in this mode a remote shutter release is essential equipment...
 
ponder

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BobJones

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Pop in to Estoril books and look for a cheap book called "Handbook of Digital Photography".

The first couple of chapters will show how to balance the meter in manual mode using different shutter, aperture and ISO settings.

That should get you experimenting.
 
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