Deciding between two lenses

Question

With my budget and as it is my first lens and DSLR camera ever, I am looking at these two:

Nikon 35mm f/1.8G ED AF-S FX NIKKOR Lens

and

Nikon 24-85mm f/3.5-4.5G ED VR AF-S

for my D-610 camera.

I like landscape and street photography and also for portraits I like shallow depth of field . Now between those two, which one do you recommend? And around that price range is there any thing else you can suggest?

Product recommendations are off-topic. If you re-word your question to ask what the specific differences are between those lenses that might help, but be aware that this sort of question will probably already have been answered to it would be worth doing a search. — connersz, Nov 27 '14 at 12:19
This is a big improvement over the first version of the question, but it's still really hard to answer, since the difference really comes to your usage and preferences, and we don't know those. And it sounds like you don't either — which isn't a bad thing, really. It just means you'll need to figure it out. — mattdm, Nov 27 '14 at 16:01
possible duplicate of Would a fixed or zoom telephoto lens be better for learning? — mattdm, Nov 27 '14 at 16:02
You might consider renting lenses until you know better what you're looking for. Lens Rentals (probably the biggest and most well-regarded) even has a program where you can keep it if you like it — mattdm, Nov 27 '14 at 16:07
And as a final comment, don't sweat this so much. Buy whichever appeals to you most right now, and plan to buy 2-3 more lenses of over the next couple of years. — mattdm, Nov 27 '14 at 16:08
I lied about that being the last comment. :) It occurs to me that you would enjoy Mike Johnston's "Letter to George", because it fits with your idea of buying high-end and not worrying for years. Mike' advice fits with that, but but he does recommend two lenses to start. — mattdm, Nov 27 '14 at 16:21

clabacchio · Accepted Answer · 2014-11-27T08:29:50.563

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This is the typical tradeoff between a zoom lens and a prime.

The zoom gives you more flexibility, and is appropriate for both landscapes and portraits, with the whole range in between.

The prime gives you a lot of quality for a small price, more light and shallower depth of field for the same focal length (and for some longer ones), it's lighter and forces you to compose with a single possible field of view. You can argue whether this is an advantage, in that it can be stimulating for developing technique and style.

The 35 mm on FX qualifies (I think) as wide-normal, thus it's really appropriate for street photography. It's not the typical portrait lens, although you can of course take portraits too.

edited Nov 27 '14 at 08:29

answered Nov 27 '14 at 07:59

clabacchio

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what is a "prime" lens? I see this word everywhere. – user1899082 Nov 27 '14 at 14:34
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"Prime" == "Not zoom". See. – Nov 27 '14 at 14:41
with Any of those lenses, Can I take a shot like this image? http://wvs.topleftpixel.com/13/06/30/ ? What kind of lens is needed for this? – user1899082 Nov 27 '14 at 14:42
That looks like some sort of wide-angle lens because of the distortion at the corners. I suspect much wider than (effective) 24mm. But you can get similar effects with an FX body at 24mm if you get close(r) to the subject. – Nov 27 '14 at 14:56
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@user1899082 that image was taken with a 12mm (ultra-ultra-wide) lens and then cropped to prevent converging verticals, you wont quite be able to get that dramatic a perspective using a 24mm, nor will you be able to have the building's edges parallel to the edge of the image. See: http://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/1100/will-a-tilt-shift-lens-solve-my-leaning-building-shots – Matt Grum Nov 27 '14 at 15:20
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@user1899082 you can achieve that with nearlt any lens, but unless you have an ultra-wide one, you'll need to take multiple shots and stitch them using a panorama tool like Hugin – clabacchio Nov 27 '14 at 15:27

Asmith · Answer 2 · 2014-11-27T14:38:07.783

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You have a full frame camera, you wont have crop effect that means you get actual frame according to the focal length(35mm or 24mm).

As your interest in landscape, its better to go for 24mm of focal length, but again as you also said you need shallow depth of field and you like portraits, 35 mm is what i recommend for that purpose that has 1.8 aperture. 35 mm falls under 24-85mm but you then compromise its lowlight capability and Dof.

so i would recommend you to get 35mm for its versatile capability for detail shots on street and portraits and 24-85 for landscape and for situations you cant move close for shots.

For your interest you need both the lenses. If budget is a constraint i would say to go for 35mm lens first as it gives so much for that price and later 24-85mm which is almost $300 expensive to 35mm.(also see Sigma 12-24mm F/4.5-5.6 EX DG HSM II which is much wider but expensive too).

edited Nov 27 '14 at 14:38

answered Nov 27 '14 at 08:12

Asmith

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The sigma you mention is designed for crop sensor cameras (DC is sigma's equivalent of EF-S or DX). Also, please separate out your answer into paragraphs to make it more readable. – damned truths Nov 27 '14 at 08:33
I think the first part of this post is confusing. There's nothing magical about 24×36 in terms of "actual" field of view, even though many lenses and are designed for that format. I know we call it "full-frame", but still, it's confusing. All lenses produce a field of view according to the focal length and sensor size combined, whether on full-featured, APS-C, 1",or smaller or larger. The crop isn't an effect — it's a conversion factor between formats. – mattdm Nov 27 '14 at 16:14

Deciding between two lenses

2 Answers2