- Hey everybody.
This is Roberto Blake at robertoblake.com
helping you create something awesome today.
Today I'm going to help you buy your first
camera lens beyond your kit lens
for your new DSLR camera, and the reason I'm
gonna help you with that is because it's a really hard
decision.
If you want to make great photos or shoot great videos,
you need some quality glass to help you with that,
and it's a tough decision to make with all the information
out there.
Let's see if I can make this simpler for you.
One of the things I will say is that sometimes you
do need to try these lenses before you buy them.
That's why I always recommend instead of just picking
Canon or Nikon or Sony because a pro tells you,
I think that you should pick a camera system
that a lot of your friends and family members
are shooting on, that way you can borrow lenses and borrow
other gear and accessories from them,
and so you can try it out,
learn how to use it, and learn what fits you
as a creator.
I think that's so important, and I think that
that's a good way to decide what camera system
you wanna buy.
If that's not an option for you though,
you can rent lenses before you buy them,
and it's not that expensive honestly.
Our friends over Lumoid actually let you rent lenses.
They're not sponsoring this video, but I actually
use them to rent this 85 millimeter F1.8
because it's a lens that I'm thinking of buying.
It would cost me 400 bucks, and it's an awesome portrait
lens, but I don't know if I'm sold on it or not,
and that's why I decided to rent it.
I get to play with it for a couple of days
and make an informed buying decision.
If you wanna do that, you can use the info card here
or the link in the description below
so that you can try stuff out before you buy it.
If you don't have the luxury of going to a friend
or a family member.
All the big pros out there will tell you that it's
all about glass.
We have a friend who's famous for saying
glass, glass, glass, glass, glass,
and I think you guys know who I'm talking about,
but he's not wrong, it's just that
when you're just starting out, budgets can be a real thing.
You don't know if you're gonna stick with this,
and what's good for somebody else may not be
good for you.
You may not need to buy an expensive 70 to 200
millimeter lens.
I have a good friend, Eric Rossy who actually did that early
on, because that's what pros said to do,
but was a lens that he wasn't using immediately
and he had to pay that off anyway.
Granted it's made him much more money than he spent
on it over the years, but initially it may not
have been the best investment.
What he might have been better off doing with that same
2,000 dollar plus investment is getting some great
glass that was within a much tighter budget
where he could have either spent half as much
or gotten a variety of glass.
Let's talk a little bit about that.
One of the pieces that I have here on this crop body Nikon
is an 85 millimeter F 1.8.
Now that may not mean a lot to you, so let's
go ahead and talk about it.
85 millimeters is a tremendous piece of glass.
It's a great focal length
the F 1.8 isn't that heavy
so it's something that's not gonna be a burden
to you the way that a bigger piece of glass
like a 24 to 70 or a 72 to 100 might be.
If you're a small body person and you're just getting used
to shooting, and you're mostly shooting portraits of people.
You're shooting head shots, this is a great piece of
starter glass for you, and you won't get distortion
in your portrait images.
It's great for compressing and making sure
that people stand out of the background very well
and it handles low light situations.
It's also good for you film makers for exactly those
same reasons, and you'll be able to get a great film look.
I really like this lens,
but a lot of people will have an issue with it,
because you can't get close up to a subject.
It can be good, because you know, maybe your
subject will be intimidated by that
and it's too much intimacy, but if you want an alternative
to that you can go with what's call the nifty 50,
a 50 millimeter lens, usually a F 1.8.
You can also get an F 1.4 or 1.2,
and if you are still wondering what those numbers mean
I do have a video explaining how aperture works
so make sure you check that out,
but basically the smaller that number is
the more light will come into the lens.
You'll be able to shoot in low light situations.
You'll also get more depth of field,
that's that shallow, blurry background
that you see where a subject is popping out the background,
and it's not very busy.
That's something to think about.
The 50 millimeter will let you get up a lot closer,
and you can still shoot from far away if you want to.
You have a lot more options.
It's probably the most versatile of all the prime lenses,
those are lenses that don't zoom.
Really think about that.
I think you should have at least one good prime
lens in your bag.
I think you should have either an 85 millimeter like this,
or a 50 millimeter or both.
The 50 millimeter F 1.8 from Nikon costs about 220 dollars.
It's a really great option for you.
The 85 millimeter F 1.8 costs 400 dollars.
My friend Eric would have been able to get these two lenses
and still had money left over instead of that 70 to 200
that he got,
but if zooms are something you need
let's go ahead and talk about that.
You do have some very great options here.
If you're somebody whose gonna shoot things that
are gonna be more landscape, music videos,
street photography you might wanna get something
like a 14 to 24 or a 10 to 24 lens.
You can get these either from a third party
like Tokina or Sigma or Tamron,
or you could buy them for the camera system
that you have.
I'll have links for this stuff in the description below,
by the way, but that's a great wide
angle lens, and it can be tremendous for you
for what you're trying to do especially as a video maker.
If you're doing Indie films or something like that,
music videos, a 14 to 24 is usually ideal for you.
That is one of the lenses in your kit.
If you're doing more general stuff then maybe
you just get a 17 to 55 F 2.8.
These aren't that expensive either.
They usually range between 400
and 700 dollars.
That's not really a bad option for you.
You'll be able to get shallow depth of field,
so you get a blurry background,
but then you also have some flexibility.
If you're in that 500 dollar sweet spot,
that's actually a really good lens for you.
If you throw that in with something like
either the 50 millimeter or this 85 millimeter
as a prime, you're pretty solid,
and again you'd still be within 1,000 dollars
at the end of that.
If you bought all of those together
you're still not even close to 1,500 dollars yet,
so I think that that could be a really good combination
for you to have.
The 14 to 24, I'm gonna be honest with you,
it is a little bit more expensive.
It's gonna be pricy, but if you're doing paying work
it's absolutely worth it.
If you're an absolute beginner,
and you just really wanna learn this stuff
your kit lens is fine, but maybe it doesn't zoom
enough for you.
You can get a 50 to 200 or a 70 to 300 for just a few
hundred dollars.
Maybe it's gonna cost you somewhere between two
and 400 dollars to get either of these.
In some cases if you buy them used
you can get both for that price if that's something
you're interested in.
I don't necessarily think you need both but it is
on the table if that's what you wanna do,
and I think that having that extra zoom capability will help
you understand how zoom lenses work in
the future so you can try and make up your mind
as to whether that's something you need
to make a bigger investment kit.
If you're really not going to do this professionally,
there's no reason for you to spend a lot of money.
You can get those zoom lenses
and just deal with the fact that you have to adjust
the aperture for the lighting conditions,
ectetera, and the fact that they won't be able
to shoot low light situations that great,
but if you're not doing that it doesn't really matter.
If you're someone who's not shooting indoors a lot,
you're not shooting sports, you're shooting more stuff
that's like family or vacations, or you're doing this
as a hobby, these are still great lenses for you,
and they're super affordable.
Also if you're a beginner and you're learning
and you're not making a ton of money back
on this stuff yet, but you're doing a few weddings for
like one off family members, cousins, relatives,
something like that, then you can make your money
back on this investment really easily
and you start to build up toward
better glass later.
Let's go ahead and talk about some of this pro glass.
I've used the 24 to 70 a couple of times.
My friend Daniel has it.
I'm thinking of investing in one myself.
I've only used the 70 to 200 one time.
These are great pieces of glass, but they are heavy
so you really have to think about it,
and I do recommend you try them before you buy them,
and just see if you're even comfortable shooting
with them.
See if they can produce the kind of shots you're looking for
and give you the abilities that you need.
Again, if you're not shooting sports, you're not shooting
arial photography, maybe you don't need
a 70 to 200 lens.
If you're shooting head shots the 24 to 70 is fine,
and like I said I think that the 85 millimeter is actually
great for portraits, and it might be
the best portrait lens out there.
The 24 to 70s are usually a F 2.8
which means you'll be able to get shallow depth
of field.
They have great optics in them,
and the image quality is superb.
I'm not gonna lie, but you can still get great
image quality out of the less expensive primes
especially when you're just learning.
This is after all a video for you buying
your first lenses, so I really want you to keep
that in mind.
If you're doing video, the 24 to 70 can be very advantageous
for you especially if you're a filmmaker.
It gives you a lot of flexibility because of that zoom range
and the fact that you can control the lighting
conditions because you have a fixed aperature
and make sure that your shots look consistent.
That's gonna be very important to you.
If you're going to do videography, you're gonna film events
then I would really consider investing in this lens.
If you're going to shoot stuff that's
a conference and you're gonna shoot stuff
that's pretty far away.
You're gonna shoot concerts,
consider getting the 28 to 70 and the 70 to 200 for
those situations even if you're a new photographer
and you know that that's what you wanna shoot,
that's probably the best overall glass for you.
Remember, buying your first lens is a huge
commitment beyond the kit lens,
and you have to get what's right for you.
Like I said, if you can borrow something, that's great,
but if you can't borrow it try and rent
it so you can get a feel for it and see what it can do
for you.
Again I recommend renting from Lumoid.
They're who I use,
and I've had nothing but great experiences with them.
They're not a sponsor, but they are a friend
of the channel.
They've sent gear over before,
and this is something that I rented myself
completely out of pocket,
and it's helping me make a decision as to whether
I'm gonna make the 400 dollar commitment to this
85 millimeter, or whether I'm gonna go ahead and
get something like the 17 to 55 that I mentioned earlier.
If you wanna try before you buy, you can go ahead
and use the link up here
or in the description below to go ahead
and check that out.
If you wanna buy any of the lenses that I mentioned
out right, you can use the Amazon affiliate links
in the description, and that will help you out,
and it'll help out the channel.
Speaking of help, I hope you guys found this video
informative.
If you still have questions about buying lenses,
and you still can't make up your mind
go ahead and leave me a comment.
I'll try and answer as many of your questions as I can,
but also remember there are other lens reviews here
on the channel, and when you use the affiliate links
or when you rent from Lumoid that actually
helps me borrow more gear or buy more gear
that I can review and help you make a great
buying decision.
Anyway like this video if you like it.
Don't forget to subscribe.
Check out the other awesome content on the channel.
As always you guys, thanks so much for watching
and don't forget, create something awesome today.
Maybe with a new lens or two or three.