Beginner Advice please: Nikon AF-S DX 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR II

[Sam B]

Hi all,

Right then, I'll more than likely be ordering my Nikon D5300 tomorrow but I'm wondering which package I should decide upon. Thanks to the good people of Google and a helpful member of this forum, I managed to find the D5300 for a couple of hundred pounds cheaper than those on the high street (Still a UK-based retailer). My options are as below:

D5300 body + Nikon AF-S DX 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR II = £389 +£10 delivery

D5300 body only = £349 + £10 delivery

I'm a complete newbie to everything to do with cameras so I'm quite keen to start learning as soon as it arrives; but I also have the suspicion that the lens offered is often upgraded by people quite soon after purchase... is this the case? - The lens appears to sell on eBay for around £65 new (unboxed but inc. delivery) and between £20-£50 used. Is it a good lens or does this tend to be the one people quickly trade-up on?

£400 is the maximum I'm prepared to spend on camera related stuff this month so do I blow the lot on the kit lens package or save £40 and simply skip straight to whatever the common upgrade tends to be next month?

Cheers, Sam

 

[mbscad]

I would say it depends upon your level of experience using Nikon cameras and lenses.
What I mean is that the 18-55 VR is a very good kit lens and will teach a lot about camera use. You can then analyse your photography and determine your preferred focal length.
Some will opt for wide angle (landscapes and so on) and some will opt for more reach.
For an extra £40, I would buy the kit lens. If you need more information about the lens, its sharpness and foibles look at www.photozone.de where the lens tests are evaluated.
For reference, I bought a crop body and then bought a 18-105 VR cheaply which I find excellent for my walkabout purposes.

 

[Ed Sutton]

also have the suspicion that the lens offered is often upgraded by people quite soon after purchase... is this the case?

It is, because a lot of people fall for the hype on forums like this that you need something 'better'. The kit lens is more than good enough to start out with. In fact it's pretty damned good full stop.

Only think of changing it (or adding to it) when you start to find it is limiting you - when you'll know what those limitations are so you can buy something that removes them.

 

[PaulButler]

It is, because a lot of people fall for the hype on forums like this that you need something 'better'. The kit lens is more than good enough to start out with. In fact it's pretty damned good full stop.

Only think of changing it (or adding to it) when you start to find it is limiting you - when you'll know what those limitations are so you can buy something that removes them.

This ^^^

 

[Sam B]

It is, because a lot of people fall for the hype on forums like this that you need something 'better'. The kit lens is more than good enough to start out with. In fact it's pretty damned good full stop.

Only think of changing it (or adding to it) when you start to find it is limiting you - when you'll know what those limitations are so you can buy something that removes them.

Hi,

Well I'm pleased to read that the kit lens isn't as bad as I thought it must be; I assumed by the number of them on eBay that people must have been 'upgrading' them pretty quickly. For the extra £40 I should really go for it then.

However, whilst I want to take pictures of the family and our dogs, my main interest will most likely be mountainous landscapes... would that kit lens be sufficient for that or should I consider something else from the off?

Cheers, Sam

 

[Ed Sutton]

However, whilst I want to take pictures of the family and our dogs, my main interest will most likely be mountainous landscapes... would that kit lens be sufficient for that or should I consider something else from the off?

People do 'upgrade' kit lenses quickly, but they needn't. They do it because they are told they need 'better' lenses - and think that better lenses will make better photos... I know that the accepted wisdom is that ultrawide lenses are what you have to have for landscapes, but it isn't true. Anything wider than he kit lens goes to can get troublesome to make nice pictures with because they get so much in the frame everything looks tiny.

Use the kit lens and see where it takes you. THEN decide if you need something else. You might find that you take more landscape pictures at 55mm than 18mm. You won't know until you try. If you jump straight in with a wider lens for landscapes odds on you'll take photos that look like everyone else's wide angle landscapes. Boring!

Just my opinion - as someone who often feels out of step on here.

 

[bdslr]

As a Nikon owner I too would agree that for £40 I would get the lens. I used the kit lens for a long time before it broke.

I suspect when I started I could not have told the difference between the kit lens and the primes I now mostly use - but I can now. So - as others said - go with the kit lens and learn about the camera and lens.

If you decided to put it in the classifieds here I suspect you'd get about £40 for it (this is opinion NOT fact )

 

[BBR]

I agree with most of the above. In short you will only know if you want to upgrade and more importantly, what to upgrade to, when you have been using your camera with kit lens for awhile.
A photo I took with my very first Nikon with 18-55 non VR lens is still one of my favourite all time photos.

 

[Sam B]

Hi,

Thank you all for your replies. I ordered the D5300 with the kit lens about an hour ago; it should be with me by the end of the week all being well [emoji1]

Cheers, Sam

 

[Stu Meech]

You won't get a better lens for £40, that's for sure! It's not a bad little lens, not as good on 24mpx but good enough. Work out what you like to shoot, which focal lengths and apertures you use then go from there.

 

[droj]

... my main interest will most likely be mountainous landscapes... would that kit lens be sufficient for that or should I consider something else from the off?

Of course it will be sufficient. You may though find yourself wanting to shoot contre-jour quite often and a zoom will be more likely to suffer from flare in those conditions. If you were to favour a prime instead (to use in the hills), the best focal length will depend on the nature of your attention to the land - some of us are wide-anglists and others are certainly not. Using a zoom will help to tell you what focal length you naturally favour.

 

[Sam B]

You won't get a better lens for £40, that's for sure! It's not a bad little lens, not as good on 24mpx but good enough. Work out what you like to shoot, which focal lengths and apertures you use then go from there.

Hi,

Aside from taking a few haphazard pictures of the kids, my photography interests will mostly be centred around mountainous landscapes in Snowdonia, the Black Mountains and maybe up in the Lakes. My thoughts were if it was going to be a case that said lens would need to be 'upgraded' to achieve decent landscapes anyway, then I would have rather just put the £40 towards whatever it was I needed rather than be left with a 'surplus' lens - You're talking to someone who knows very little about cameras or lenses so I don't know if an upgraded would have made the kit lens obsolete or not anyway? There are also hundreds of used ones on eBay which made me suspect that people soon opted for a similar replacement instead.

Cheers, Sam

 

[Sam B]

Of course it will be sufficient. You may though find yourself wanting to shoot contre-jour quite often and a zoom will be more likely to suffer from flare in those conditions. If you were to favour a prime instead (to use in the hills), the best focal length will depend on the nature of your attention to the land - some of us are wide-anglists and others are certainly not. Using a zoom will help to tell you what focal length you naturally favour.

Hi,

The photos in this post https://www.talkphotography.co.uk/t...ion-the-art-of-suffering.578538/#post-6719114 are the kind of angles I would like to capture

Cheers, Sam

 

[Stu Meech]

Hi,

Aside from taking a few haphazard pictures of the kids, my photography interests will mostly be centred around mountainous landscapes in Snowdonia, the Black Mountains and maybe up in the Lakes. My thoughts were if it was going to be a case that said lens would need to be 'upgraded' to achieve decent landscapes anyway, then I would have rather just put the £40 towards whatever it was I needed rather than be left with a 'surplus' lens - You're talking to someone who knows very little about cameras or lenses so I don't know if an upgraded would have made the kit lens obsolete or not anyway? There are also hundreds of used ones on eBay which made me suspect that people soon opted for a similar replacement instead.

Cheers, Sam

The 18-55 will be fine for landscapes, while you find your feet, at landscape apertures of f/8 or f/11 then it'll do the job well. When you want to get a new lens, you'll be able to sell it for £30-40 with no real trouble.

When I started out with a D40 and 18-55, I used it for about a year to get a feel of how I wanted to go from there - I have linked to my Flickr 18-55 set here so you can see the versatility of the lens.

HTH.

 

[d00d]

Enjoy your D5300 Sam, I certainly am. And may I suggest your next lens be a 35mm 1.8g @ £140ish ... not the best for landscapes perhaps but like 18-55mm it's regarded as another DX essential.

 

[JamieW]

As a newbie, I'm certainly enjoying the 18-55mm on my Nikon D3200. The only other lens I have bought is the 50mm f1.8g, as I read countless reviews saying it was a great bargain lens. Which I have found that they were all right! Plus it's great for portraits, which is what I'd like to do mostly.

It maybe a while before I buy a new lens now, as I'd like to get to know the lenses I have...plus there's a limit to how much I can spend before the wife raises an eyebrow!!!

Maybe a decent macro lens next as I love bugs, spiders and other creepy crawlers! Or the pricey 70-200mm....wife permitting!!

 

[d00d]

Off topic but ... Jamie tried shooting reasonably close-up items with your 50mm in Aperture Priority Mode at f1.8 ... great shallow DOF/Bokeh. I have the 35mm version which is probably more versatile, better suited to DX Nikons.