Gift for the Wife

Looking for a gift for my wife, and thinking of finding her a good lens to add to her collection. Was hoping ya'll might have a suggestion or two as she is the semi-pro photographer and I am not.. Right now she has a Nikon D70s with the two package deal lenses, an AF Nikkor 28-80mm 1:3-5.6G (her primary) and an AF Nikkor 70-300mm 1:4-5.6G. What would be a good extra lens to have on hand for like indoor shots, or walk around shots as we'll be going to Disney World later this year. Trying to keep the price ~$200 just to throw a number out there and something with Amazon prime would be a big plus. I've got a couple I ran into, but no clue which one or what a better option would be.

Nikon 35mm f/1.8G AF-S DX

Nikon 50mm f/1.8D AF

Comments, suggestions, questions are welcome and appreciated. Thanks

Oh, she also has a Promaster 7500edf digital flash, a decent flash frame, and a good tripod just to throw that out there.

35mm. I find it to be sharper and most importantly, more versatile than the 50mm on a crop camera.

I second the 35mm as well, I found myself using this the most when I went on vacation in the Philippines since it's so lightweight and small. Made the camera easier to lug around and hide if need be, ahaha.

Both of those primes are great, but it's hard to get an idea of what she wants or needs without really knowing her shooting style and also for knowing what type of photography she likes. If her photography hobby is mostly taking photos of family and social events indoors then yes I would highly recommend those lenses. But those lenses aren't limited to those types of photography either, for some it's also preference.

I really like the 35mm prime, but most of the time I hear people swear by their 50mm. That's not only on these boards, but also from the many articles and RSS feeds I read. I like the wider perspective. I would tend to gravitate either towards a 35mm or an 85mm, I care less about the 50mm in the middle.

Okay so, I'll try to give you something more useful. The 50mm lens you listed is a non-DX lens. Which means it isn't accounting for the crop factor of the D70. With the 1.5x crop it will appear to be a 75mm lens. As a result it will work well for portrait photography, but will be less useful as a walk-around lens.
The 35mm DX lens you listed will be an excellent general purpose lens, especially if your wife likes to cram more into the frame, or likes to be closer to her subjects while taking photos.

Knowing the two lenses she already has in the bag, I would probably go with the 50mm because it would be excellent for portrait stuff, and her other two lenses are kind of general lenses. Having a lens more geared to a specific purpose seems like it would be nice to have.

I agree the 35mm F/1.8 would be an excellent choice. But I also noticed the two lenses you mentioned that she already has do not include the wide angle spectrum. Shooting landscapes and architecture, as well as larger groups of people and many other subject matters would benifet quite a bit from having a good wide-angle in the kit.

Here's a link to Nikon-mount wide zooms on B&H. She'd probably love to have any one of these.

madFive said:

I agree the 35mm F/1.8 would be an excellent choice. But I also noticed the two lenses you mentioned that she already has do not include the wide angle spectrum. Shooting landscapes and architecture, as well as larger groups of people and many other subject matters would benifet quite a bit from having a good wide-angle in the kit.

Here's a link to Nikon-mount wide zooms on B&H. She'd probably love to have any one of these.

Click to expand...

I agree a wide angle would be nice... but I think even the third party ones are priced out of the range of the ops stated budget.

^And none of those wide angle lenses fit the ~$200 bill OP quoted

UnknownSouljer said:

Okay so, I'll try to give you something more useful. The 50mm lens you listed is a non-DX lens. Which means it isn't accounting for the crop factor of the D70. With the 1.5x crop it will appear to be a 75mm lens. As a result it will work well for portrait photography, but will be less useful as a walk-around lens.
The 35mm DX lens you listed will be an excellent general purpose lens, especially if your wife likes to cram more into the frame, or likes to be closer to her subjects while taking photos.

Click to expand...

And the 35mm DX will appear to be a 52mm lens

//edit, and holy shit, the 14-24 is now at $2k?! lol... I remember buying it from BH not too long ago for $1400.

So far it seems like I really can't go wrong, which is great for me. But just to throw a little more info into this, she has a BFA in Photography and has done a few gigs along with some weddings and such. Many were for friends, but a few were paid jobs. But her main thing is she loves shooting our two kids and dogs.

Also, we do have a CoopPix s8200 point and shoot that goes out when the d70s doesn't need to be. I have no idea if this helps our not, but just in case.


*edit* Ya the wide angles posted would eat into our vacation trip play money too much, but a good idea later on for sure.

northrop said:

And the 35mm DX will appear to be a 52mm lens

Click to expand...

True.

Don't buy the 35mm through the Amazon link you posted. Those are all overpriced.

B&H has it instock for $196.95 with free shipping.

Have you asked her what she would like? Photography is an artsy thing. Sometimes what makes sense to us, doesn't fit the view that the person behind the camera is picturing in their mind.

Maybe something cheap and wider than the 28-80 would be good - a craigslist 18-55mm VR for somewhere around $125.

A 35mm 1.8 could be nice, if you two are into available light low depth of field photos, or it could be completely wrong because you want more than your kids eyelashes in focus. Of course that is overly simplifying it because you can still shoot stopped down, but if you are going to do that you might as well use your current 28-80.

She already has a nice flash that you can bounce off the walls and or ceiling. Could be nice to get the flash off the camera and onto a separate stand, then you'd set the flash to slave and it'll go off when the main flash is fired on the camera. Setting the flash near the wall and pointing at the wall, will give some nice side light to any photos in that room of your kids. What I'm recommending is a flash stand. If your walls are not white or tan, that won't work all that well, but you could get a flash stand with an umbrella

Does she have a remote trigger? Could be nice for family group photos. I have a Phottix Plato that I like.

Does she have something nice to carry the camera in? She might love it if you took her to a camera store to pick-out a fancy new camera bag. The National Camera Store near me has a bunch, maybe you have a store like that near you.

MN, I went with the B&H and called it good, she has mentioned wanting the umbrella "things" before, but I think I did good for now. Thx all for the advise. I'll keep the other suggestions for later, that's for sure.

I'm glad you got the 35 AF-s, it totally rocks. Something to keep in mind perhaps, is the Tamron 17-50 F2.8 non-VC. Extremely high value for the money, and you don't know what you've been missing until you get a lens that is a constant F2.8. Just my 2 cents.

and you also don't know what you've been missing until you figure out what all those fancy smancy numbers mean either lol