I have a Nikon 3100 with a DX 18-55mm lens. I was wondering if a more expensive lens would give me better pictures. The reason I ask is cause I talked to a photographer today and he said they are bare minimum when it comes to quality. Is there any truth to this? I have been looking and have noticed a huge difference in prices for almost the same MM lens, but what is the difference?

Same thing that makes a Leupold VX3 different from a Wal-Mart Tasco: better glass, better build quality, closer quality control and tolerances.

A better quality lens for your Nikon doesn't have to be expensive, though. You might try out the Nikon DX 35 f1/.8. It has an excellent reputation as a very sharp lens.

You might also take a look at Ken Rockwell's site: www.kenrockwell.com He has extensive reviews of almost every Nikon lens and while his opinions are sometimes over the top, the information in his reviews is very useful.

KR likes these.

http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/1855.htm
http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/18-55mm-vr.htm
http://www.kenrockwell.com/nikon/d3100.htm

But those are not expensive lenses.

Rockwell is also a big fan of the 35 f/1.8.

I don't have and no desire to have a prime lens. Afraid I'd spend so much time taking a perfect photo and being disappointed that the fun of taking photo's would be lost. It sounds to me like you don't know if your getting good shot's right now, try posting a couple! I don't think good shot's need to be a work of art but rather convey a memory to you that you don't find offensive. I have about every sq inch of space on my walls covered with framed photo's I've taken if they don't turn on other people, sorry about that but there are there because I like them so well!

I strongly suspect that as you get more experience with your camera and lens your gonna see a vast improvement in what your taking. A really good photographer could probably take your camera and lens and make photo's you wouldn't believe possible with them.

18-55 everyone calls a kit lens. Well every Nikon lens I have would be called either really old or a kit lens. Don't be discouraged by the term kit lens. You'll usually get a plastic mount and body but they work unless your a ham handed goof! I guess what I'm trying to say is don't get caught up in chasing what you think is better equipment, learn to use what you have and a some point you'll decide for yourself if you really need a change.

Ok, here are some. They are not professional , but I still get better pics with my Nikon d3100 because it focuses and turns on much faster than my Cannon SX110. I do love my beat up old SX110.

What kind of photos do you like taking or want to take? What do you find lacking in the quality of your current images?

That's a good question. I mostly take outdoor pics from trips around the midwest and just the kids and family pics ETC. Honestly, I dont see anything wrong with the quality. Maybe they area little amature in quality. This is kind of why I started the thread. Some people say a good lenz is better. I see pictures that just seem superior to mine and thought maybe it is in the lenz, and if I get a better lenz I might see better picture quality it might be worth spending money on.

You have to look at photography as a package deal. Each and every part of the package is important. Technique first and foremost is the biggest part of the package. From there, you have to ask what camera body is going to suit my needs. Some of course do faster burst for sports and wildlife, some slow for landscape. As for the glass, it is no different than eye glasses, some have coatings for glare, as pointed out specs are much closer on expensive glass, and optical formula is important. That is where the design of the lens can give you sharp images throughout the zoom range.

Where you will see the biggest difference in a more expensive lens is contrast and detail sharpness. In a nutshell, light focuses at different points, red, yellow and blue all are sharp at tiny different spots. More expensive lenses have super high quality multicoating that will aid to focus all the colors at the same point...your sensor. Another difference is the number of imperfections in the glass elements. The slower the glass is cool, the less imperfections. It is more costly to allow the glass to cool and the quality standards are much higher and will therefore demand a higher price at market.

If you are happy with what you are using and the results are meeting your standards, then don't get more expensive glass. If there are things your lenses don't do for you or when you look at the details, you feel you need better glass then get it. That is what drew me to Tamron lenses in the 70s. I couldn't afford the "expensive" glass and I needed to do some macro work. I gave the 90mm a go and have been using them ever since. I have 2 types of lenses in my bag, Tamron zooms and a couple of Zeiss prime lenses. I use the Zeiss primes less than 1% of the time. I hope this helped a little and didn't add to any confusion.

Thanks Camera Land! Just another question. The top picture was taken on 4 megapixels. Do you think I should be higher , like 8 mlx? Would it make a noticeable difference in the quality? I need glasses to some degree and have not noticed a difference in quality. These questions are important to me and may sound a bit goofy, but I am asking people that take a lot more pictures than I do and my question is a mystery and the answer to some are obvious. I usually take 4 mp cause it takes so long to load my pics to Photobucket .

4 megapixels is fine for sharing on the internet in reality, 8 would be better of course. I think the problem is how photosharing sites like Photobucket, Flickr, Facebook, etc compress an image when it is uploaded to them to share. Some do funky stuff with sharpening that looks horrible when it is viewed on the internet as a result. I tend to capture the picture at the highest resolution possible, then in the computer change the resolution to 72dpi and then 1000pixels on the wide side of the photo. It has to be done in a photo editing software. In camera often to maximize the viewing on the internet, see if one of them is set to 72dpi which will work well.

Ok. Thanks a million, ! but I have no idea what you just said. ( snicker) I will go to 8 mp and be done with it. It seems pictures are not their best on the computer. I took a picture of my son with is bear and it was a cheap Kodak 6mp back in the day. I was mad I didn't have a better camera for his first bear. When we made an 8"x10" enlargement, the printed pic was much better than the same picture on the computer.

If one really wants to do a comparison, I'd suggest one do a weekend rental of the high end glass. Find some targets that really demand high resolution and shoot same with both lenses. Cookie did this once when she suspected her filters were the source of some barely noticeable image degradation. Her target was a distant realtor sign with quite an array of large and smaller fonts. Without the filters one could read every line in the images. With the filters, smaller fonts were completely illegible. With that, $250 in filters fell in the round file. All her lenses go commando now.

I don't have any expensive lenses but then I don't do photography for a living either. I have looked at a lot of photo's taken with other than expensive lenses that are absolutely super! I'm not sure even a pro could really justify the cost of some of the high dollar lenses for no other reason than their client's will never know the difference! I shoot trial dogs casting off. I use a 55-300 Nikon lens, not the best but does a job that everybody seem's to like. For placement shots I use an 18-105 Nikon, more than good enough for what I do. I would like to have a good high dollar lens for no other reason than to say I have it! Here is a couple photo's of my Squirt I took with an old, film days, Sigma 70-300 lens. I don't think anyone would call this a high quality lens but then I think the photo's are more than alright. How much better would they have to be with an expensive lens to make the expensive lens worth buying?





Our Tamron rep here has taken and posted a lot of absolutely super photo's taken with after marker lenses that are not high dollar lenses. I think what you have to ask yourself is, how good is good?

Thanks Don for the kind words. Expensive doesn't always mean it is the best as Don points out. Also as 1minute posted, try and rent a different lens, or go to Tamron's website and see if the Tamron Tailgate Tour is going to be in your area. You can try some lenses out for free!

This is a common misconception that, if your photos seem lacking, go to more pixels.

Do you mean to tell me that the 3100 can be switched from 4 to 8 MP's? I had to check an old photo catalog and it claim's the 3100 has 14.2 MP's, how do you switch away from that?

I am guessing it is the way it is saved. A smaller resolution for internet. I don't think it shoots at 4 and 8, just saves it. However, the D7200 and a few others are capable of switching from the standard DX size to an additional 1.3x crop which reduces the size of the sensor capturing the image. It will give you a little boost in frames per second. A small box appears in the viewfinder letting you know the area of capture.

I can't remember how I did it but I saw it in menu under file or picture size. Cant remember. It takes less megabites to load the pic though so I assume it uses less megapixels.

More likely the camera just applies more aggressive compression of the file, the actual output of the sensor would remain the same.

I'm guessing what your talking about is in the menu where you can choose file size. It's under image size in my D5000. I have a choise of small, med and large. If that relate's to changing the the pixel's, I never realized it. Tell you what, I shoot everything in large file, I can downsize in a photo program. I don't know that you could take photo in small size and take it up though. The only reason I could see to use med or small is to get more photo space in your card, more shot's without filling the card. At the large file size my camera's save enough photo's that I can simply change out for a different card. Now I'm guessing here but I doubt the small file will print as big a photo as the large file will. If you wanted to print one of the photo's at high file size, no problem. But the print the same photo at say 16x20, couldn't do it and get a good photo. But no matter which size you use I would think that each file size would make good print's but nit all at the same size. I got a photo in a week or so ago to frame for a friend. The photo was re-sized to made it easier to load on the internet, it would have could out a small size. Best size I could get with it was 5x7. Take the same photo and do it in large size and generally it'll blow up to 13x19+. So if I,m getting what your saying about 4mp, small size, or 8mp,Med or large size, the only difference you should see is in the size of a print you can make.

Ya that is it. I can also go to 14 mp. It takes so long to load it to Photobucket though and I can't tell a difference on the computer. I don't know for sure , but I doubt I can tell a difference with an 8x10" pic. Here is why. I had a little Kodak 630? and it was only 6mp. My so got a bear and I wanted to take some pics and I go mad at myself for not getting a camera with more mp for the occasion. When I got my 8x10 back I couldn't believe what a nice picture it was. No grain at all and very clear. I figure I was not giving 6mp enough credit. Now that I have a good lens I figure 6mp should always be enough. I am going with 8mp lately. Are we forgetting the beautiful pics we took with our little 6mp cameras. Sister has a Nikon D40. Takes very good pics but only 6mp.