Help with new gear

[JohnnyK]

I am looking to upgrade my camera gear and wanted to reach out to the group for some suggestions. I am looking at spending somewhere around $2k on a new camera body and glass. I have been looking at both Canon and well as Nikon and needs some help coming to a decision. Most important to me is a nice camera and lens for taking portraits, wide landscapes, as well as dark rides so I need some glass at 1.4 or a 1.8.

With that being said does anywhere here have any suggestions?

thanks

 

[wdwmagic]

All the innovation right now is coming from Sony, with the Alpha 7 series. Well worth looking into, particularly if you are not looking to reuse existing gear.

1.4 and 1.8 ar really difficult to get focus on, and have such shallow depth of field. A better solution for dark rides is a high ISO capable camera, where you can use something like f2.8 or f4, and bump the ISO high enough to give you a usable shutter speed without destroying the image with noise. Some of the new sensors are very capable of this.

 

[JohnnyK]

Thanks for the feedback. Any recommendations for camera bodies?

 

[wdwmagic]

Thanks for the feedback. Any recommendations for camera bodies?

At the price point you mentioned, A7ii. If you want spend a bit more, A7Rii

 

[thomas998]

The first question that pops up in my mind is what camera do you already have? If you already have some lenses then do you really want to swap systems?

I use Nikon and Sony, and honestly I would suggest you don't get the Sony. Go with a Nikon, in which case you need to decide if you want full frame or crop sensor. If you go full frame you can get a D610 for around 1500.

The problem with Sony is the lens selection isn't that great and the lenses that do exist on the fast side are pretty pricey. I use my sony mostly with adapters and existing lenses I have where it works find if you don't mind manual focus but if you want auto focus you are more limited in your lenses. Other problem with Sony is their flash system is way behind the Nikon system, and if you want to do portraits too then having a dependable flash system will likely be on your list. When I hook a nikon to a flash the shot I get will be spot on about 99% of the time.... when I connect a flash to a Sony I'm doing maybe 50% on the older cameras and closer to 80% on the later camera.... At this point I don't even take a Sony if I know I'm going to be using a flash because I can't trust it.

And as someone said the very fast lenses will make focusing difficult. It isn't impossible but the fast lenses will work best on rides like Pirates which are slow and where you are quite a distance from the subject, but on rides like Peter Pan don't bother trying to use fast lenses they don't work well because of the speed and proximity to the subject.

 

[wdwmagic]

The problem with Sony is the lens selection isn't that great and the lenses that do exist on the fast side are pretty pricey

Sony has recently released a good batch of lenses, certainly enough to cover the bases in both f2.8 and f4. What are you thinking they are short on?

 

[thomas998]

Sony has recently released a good batch of lenses, certainly enough to cover the bases in both f2.8 and f4. What are you thinking they are short on?

I think you missed my point.. I said, "... lenses that do exist on the fast side are pretty pricey." A 35mm 2.8 for $800 is what I call pricey, especially when you could do a faster 35mm Nikon for about half that... Sony for whatever reason has decided to go premium on a lot of the lenses that it is bringing to market and if the OP is on a limited budget going down the Sony road is probably not a very good idea. Yes you can get quite a few of the APS-C e-mounts for a reasonable price but then the quality of your photos will go down.

 

[wdwmagic]

I think you missed my point.. I said, "... lenses that do exist on the fast side are pretty pricey." A 35mm 2.8 for $800 is what I call pricey, especially when you could do a faster 35mm Nikon for about half that... Sony for whatever reason has decided to go premium on a lot of the lenses that it is bringing to market and if the OP is on a limited budget going down the Sony road is probably not a very good idea. Yes you can get quite a few of the APS-C e-mounts for a reasonable price but then the quality of your photos will go down.

The new full frame Sony 50mm F1.8 is only $248. It has taken a while, but I think the Sony lens lineup is starting to mature nicely.

 

[thomas998]

The new full frame Sony 50mm F1.8 is only $248. It has taken a while, but I think the Sony lens lineup is starting to mature nicely.

I haven't used that one myself, but it is a step in the right direction. Though from reviews it seems to be a bit noisy when it focuses.

 

[fractal]

Probably the best "bang for your buck" lens in the Full Frame E-mount is the 28mm f/2. Going for about $450.

 

[JohnnyK]

I decided to go with the Sony a6300, seems that this camera is pretty close quality wise to the A7ii from what I have been reading. Now I just need to find a good lens.

 

[fractal]

So that leaves you with about $1,000 to spend on lenses. Assuming you got the 16-50 kit lens with the camera, I would suggest the following;

Sony FE 28mm f/2 (should be plenty fast enough for dark rides) $450
Sony SEL 50mm 1.8 OSS (for portraits) $250
Sony SEL 55-210 OSS $350 - in good light it makes for a nice telephoto zoom (think Safari).

All prices are for new lenses but you can get them cheaper used - especially the 55-210 which was sold in a bundle with the kit zoom. The kit lens wide open is average, but stopped down
for landscape is actually pretty good and is wider than most kit lenses.

If you didn't get the kit lens with the camera, I would then consider getting the Sony G 18-105 f/4 zoom ($599) instead of the 55-210.

 

[thomas998]

So that leaves you with about $1,000 to spend on lenses. Assuming you got the 16-50 kit lens with the camera, I would suggest the following;

Sony FE 28mm f/2 (should be plenty fast enough for dark rides) $450
Sony SEL 50mm 1.8 OSS (for portraits) $250
Sony SEL 55-210 OSS $350 - in good light it makes for a nice telephoto zoom (think Safari).

All prices are for new lenses but you can get them cheaper used - especially the 55-210 which was sold in a bundle with the kit zoom. The kit lens wide open is average, but stopped down
for landscape is actually pretty good and is wider than most kit lenses.

If you didn't get the kit lens with the camera, I would then consider getting the Sony G 18-105 f/4 zoom ($599) instead of the 55-210.

If you already own existing DSLR system, look at the 50mm lens you already have to it and for portraits just get a cheap adapter for it to your a6300. Fast auto focus doesn't really matter if you doing portraits. As for dark rides I would probably suggest you get the 16mm 2.8 instead of the 28mm f2 because you have a crop lens and the 28 is going to be closer to a 50mm while the 16mm will give you the equivalent of a 24mm and on a lot of the dark ride you will be so close that you want a wider lens to capture more of what you are seeing.... if you do go for the 16mm you can pick one up for about 250 new or often find the Hasselblad version on ebay for even less since Hasselblad discontinued their emount camera and dumped a lot of lenses with their name on it earlier in the year (all their emount lenses were really just re-branded sony lens)

 

[fractal]

If you already own existing DSLR system, look at the 50mm lens you already have to it and for portraits just get a cheap adapter for it to your a6300. Fast auto focus doesn't really matter if you doing portraits. As for dark rides I would probably suggest you get the 16mm 2.8 instead of the 28mm f2 because you have a crop lens and the 28 is going to be closer to a 50mm while the 16mm will give you the equivalent of a 24mm and on a lot of the dark ride you will be so close that you want a wider lens to capture more of what you are seeing.... if you do go for the 16mm you can pick one up for about 250 new or often find the Hasselblad version on ebay for even less since Hasselblad discontinued their emount camera and dumped a lot of lenses with their name on it earlier in the year (all their emount lenses were really just re-branded sony lens)

I found my 24mm 1.8 to be just about right on dark rides. Personal preference really. The 16mm 2.8 may be the weakest emount lens. You can use the kit @16mm with only 1/2 stop difference in aperture.

 

[thomas998]

I found my 24mm 1.8 to be just about right on dark rides. Personal preference really. The 16mm 2.8 may be the weakest emount lens. You can use the kit @16mm with only 1/2 stop difference in aperture.

16mm might be a little more soft than the kit lens wide open, but then with the 16mm you can also put on an adapter to turn it into a 12mm which you can't do with the kit lens.

 

[fractal]

16mm might be a little more soft than the kit lens wide open, but then with the 16mm you can also put on an adapter to turn it into a 12mm which you can't do with the kit lens.

Again, personal preference. I had the 16mm + F/E adapter. Wasn't crazy about them. Sold them and bought the Rokinon 8mm Fisheye which has been one of my favorite lenses. Would much rather have the kit + 8mm vs. the 16mm + adapter.