Educate me on DSLR lenses

[slakjaw]

I've decided to move up from point and shoot cameras to the world of SLRs. After way too much research, I went to the store intending to buy the Pentax Kx, long story short I walked out with the Nikon D5000 it just seemed like a better choice for a starter camera lots of Scene modes as well as fully manual… it came with two lenses an 18-55 and a 55-200. I am interested in playing around with some close up stuff and I want to get a macro lens. There is a Sigma 70-300 F/4-5.6 APO DG Macro local to me for ~150.00

So what would be a good Macro lens for this camera? I do not mind manual focus. In fact I kind of prefer it and have been shutting the auto focus off.

[Zeke]

There's not a macro feature in the 18-55?
I'll have to look at my Canon, but it's not a Nikon, of course. I do like your flip LCD.

[RWebb]

the lens forms the image and there are no better lenses than Nikon

if the close up feature on that lens is not enuff for you, then either buy the 60 mm Micro from Nikon, or get a used Nikon Micro

avoid using non-Nikon lenses on your camera; there have been a few over the years that have been as good as Nikon (Series 1) but you can sometimes even make money buying and selling Nikon lenses - that should tell you something

if macro photography is imp. to you then the spendy micro flash unit (replaces most of their old ring lights) is well worthwhile

to get even more involved Nikon makes some lenses with built in ringlights - right inside the lens - useful for dentistry and forensics, etc.

[slakjaw]

Originally Posted by milt

There's not a macro feature in the 18-55?
I'll have to look at my Canon, but it's not a Nikon, of course. I do like your flip LCD.

There is but results have not been very impressive.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by slakjaw

I've decided to move up from point and shoot cameras to the world of SLRs. After way too much research, I went to the store intending to buy the Pentax Kx, long story short I walked out with the Nikon D5000 it just seemed like a better choice for a starter camera lots of Scene modes as well as fully manual… it came with two lenses an 18-55 and a 55-200. I am interested in playing around with some close up stuff and I want to get a macro lens. There is a Sigma 70-300 F/4-5.6 APO DG Macro local to me for ~150.00

So what would be a good Macro lens for this camera? I do not mind manual focus. In fact I kind of prefer it and have been shutting the auto focus off.

I've got the Sigma 70-300 APO DG. I did a lot of research before I bought it. It seems to be a very good lens for the price. I've done some macro stuff with it. It's a half size macro. A full macro lense (that'll probably run more than $150 will probably be a full life size macro. Lots of folks will actually use extension tubes (I think Kenko is a popular brand) to do macro photography. A set of extension tubes and the Nikon equivalent of the nifty 50 (inexpensive 50mm lens) would probably also be a good choice for macro work.

The nice thing about the 70-300 is that you also have a fairly long telephoto (200mm always seems a little too short), and because its apochromatic, you can take cool pictures of the moon and stars (if it's not apo, then you will probably end up with blue rings around stars).

I guess it really depends upon how serious you want to get about macro stuff. If you really want to get hardcore into it and you're willing to spend the $$, then I'd get a more dedicated life size macro lens.

I think the 70-300 is a good low priced lens. You get the macro and the telephoto both taken care of for a really good price. THen later if you decide you want to delve more heavily into telephoto stuff or macro stuff, then you can buy one of the $500-1000 lenses.

[Eric Coffey]

Nice!

One thing you might ponder is buying FX vs DX lenses. FX lenses work great on DX cameras, but not so much the other way round. So, if you think you will stick with the Nikon platform for a long time, and might upgrade to a full-frame sensor camera in the future, the FX lenses might be the way to go (just remember the focal length conversion when lens shopping).
I'd probably be more apt to buy used fast glass than new cheap/aftermarket/slow/kit lenses as well. The 5000 doesn't handle high ISO (noise) near as good as it's big brothers, so you would already be slightly limited with a widest-aperature of only f/4. Also, if you have to buy aftermarket, I'd stick with Sigma or Tamron.

[masraum]

A few shots from the Sigma (and I'm far from expert with a camera).

[masraum]

a couple more that aren't in macro mode.