What camera to buy???.

[unibob]

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[Reef Hero]

Different DSLR bodies will be better for different applications.  Entry level DSLRs won't have that type of application, but will do everything okay.  Definitely better then a P & S. While lenses have auto and manual focus, and you'll hear people talk about how \"fast\" or \"slow\" a lens is, it is the body's focus system, sensor, frame rate etc. that determines what it excels at.  There is a myriad of information in this regard.  That said, certain lenses will be better than others for different applications.  I don't put my 90 mm Tamron on my camera and go for a walk through the woods with my family or go shoot birds.  I use my 30 mm Sigma or my 400 mm Canon respectively.

Regarding bodies, they do have their specialties when you move from entry level to prosumer.  For example, my Camera, the Canon 7D, has a 19-point auto focus system and an 8 frame per second shoot rate.  This is good for shooting birds in flight, action sports, and anything that moves fast.  Other bodies, like the 5D Mark II, are better suited to shooting portraits, landscapes, etc. and have better image quality.  They can't shoot as fast or lock onto objects and focus as quickly (all other points held constant).  My dilemma is when I upgrade, do I go to the 7D Mark II or the 5D Mark III - a pipedream at the moment, but depending on your budget, much like with tanks, you can spend tens of thousands of dollars on camera gear (or you can do alot with less expensive gear as above if you are patient and willing to learn).

Anyhow, a good way to go is get a decent body, and a good to great lens.  A good lens will up your keeper rate, no doubt about it.  A good forum to check out is http://photography-on-the.net/forum/ for all things camera related.

There it is......


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[Duke]

Just to throw out an update to this, I have the 90mm macro right now.. The reason we were having different opinions on this lens and it's overall usefulness for reef photography is because Jordan is shooting a mark 2 which is a full frame sensor dslr.. If your like me and most dslr owners here your using a camera with a crop sensor... Effectively making the 90mm shoot at 145mm, your going to have issues capturing anything other than coral closeups with it if u aren't using a professional full frame sensor camera.

 

[Petercar (RIP Dec 2017)]

I have the 90 mm tamron...now what i dont get. Is when i want to get really close it zooms the picture big and close...yu know what ?...there is no focus......is that right?...with the rebel t3

 

[Duke]

Petercar, The tamron 90mm is good for close up to around 11 inches.. any closer and the lens and the subject you are not going to be able to focus sharply.. also its important to mention that shooting through your glass tank at any angle other that straight on, your going to get distortion that makes photos look out of focus. secondly with your lens that close you need to be using a tripod.. thirdly.. you can buy extension tubes which from what I was told will bring your focus distance in a lot closer.. but also will make focus range alot smaller and probably add distortion around the edge of the photo. 100% u would need to be shooting on a tripod and at least using a shutter delay or remote shutter button.

Sorry my other post was from my cell at work.. Jroovers isn't shooting a 5d mark II, hes shooting a 7D.. which came both with 1.6x crop sensors and also with a full frame sensor i believe from looking on google .. im assuming jroovers is shooting a full frame sensor 7D by what he was saying in his previous posts which is giving him exactly what the tamron is.. 90mm. its hard to understand without a immensely huge explanation but with my camera and your camera petercar.. and pretty much everyone's camera, we are going to effectively be shooting at 140-150mm using that 90mm lens. because its magnified 1.6x. does that make sense?? Maybe Jordan can throw his thoughts out there again.


So im not knocking this lens.. its extremely great, and I really love shooting it.. the sharpness is unreal, and from what i was told it rivals the 100mm cannon.. and that right there says enough about it. but with my camera.. and most dslrs.. your going to find the 90mm doesn't fit into the daily tank photography camera bag all that well. For me shooting 8-10 ft away from my tank.. I get 3 ft of my tank in the photo.. so unless you want to shoot pictures of your tank from across the room its probably not the greatest 2nd lens to go with for your reef photos.. a canon 50mm 1.8 lens with an extension tube for macros would be my first purchase.. they are cheap, sharpness and quality are great, and for me I feel most importantly its really fast for the money, which means you can take photos at high shutter speeds while still getting proper exposure.(great for capturing fast fish or swaying polyps without shutting your hole system down to remove the motion)..


Watch this video and you can see the difference in the same lens on 2 different cameras, also note the 7d in this video is not a full frame sensor camera(so to compare, Jordans camera is like the 5dmark2 in the video and Petercars t3 is like the 7D in the video) after you see the difference around 100mm, you might think twice about buying the 90mm lens for general reef photography.. its really great for coral closeup and macros.. but unless your shooting a professional level camera its just too much zoom to be practical.



video

 

[jroovers]

Just to throw out an update to this, I have the 90mm macro right now.. The reason we were having different opinions on this lens and it's overall usefulness for reef photography is because Jordan is shooting a mark 2 which is a full frame sensor dslr.. If your like me and most dslr owners here your using a camera with a crop sensor... Effectively making the 90mm shoot at 145mm, your going to have issues capturing anything other than coral closeups with it if u aren't using a professional full frame sensor camera.

Duke, the crop factor versus full frame isn't as straightforward as it seems.  Technically, you are still shooting at the same focal length, but what you see in the viewfinder on the crop sensor isn't what you get in the final picture (it is cropped by a factor of 1.6).  The full frame is what you see is what you get.  Here is a brief explanation: http://digital-photography-school.com/crop-factor-explained.

Some lenses are better matched to FF versus Crop sensors... the Tamron 90 works well on the 7D, which is a crop sensor.  You are right though, you are going to have to stand pretty far back to get a FTS with this lens, not one of the most practical uses.

I have the 90 mm tamron...now what i dont get. Is when i want to get really close it zooms the picture big and close...yu know what ?...there is no focus......is that right?...with the rebel t3

Can you elaborate on this Petercar, I'm not sure I understand your post - do you have the AutoFocus turned on on the lens?  There is a ring you slide up and back (you'll see AF and MF) to switch between the two... by sliding up to AF you'll engage the motorized drive of the lens.  Depending on what focusing setting you are using on your camera, you're focusing abilities may change... I'd start with single point or single point expansion.  You definitely should have no problems focusing automatically with this set-up...

Petercar, The tamron 90mm is good for close up to around 11 inches.. any closer and the lens and the subject you are not going to be able to focus sharply.. also its important to mention that shooting through your glass tank at any angle other that straight on, your going to get distortion that makes photos look out of focus. secondly with your lens that close you need to be using a tripod.. thirdly.. you can buy extension tubes which from what I was told will bring your focus distance in a lot closer.. but also will make focus range alot smaller and probably add distortion around the edge of the photo. 100% u would need to be shooting on a tripod and at least using a shutter delay or remote shutter button.

Sorry my other post was from my cell at work.. Jroovers isn't shooting a 5d mark II, hes shooting a 7D.. which came both with 1.6x crop sensors and also with a full frame sensor i believe from looking on google .. im assuming jroovers is shooting a full frame sensor 7D by what he was saying in his previous posts which is giving him exactly what the tamron is.. 90mm. its hard to understand without a immensely huge explanation but with my camera and your camera petercar.. and pretty much everyone's camera, we are going to effectively be shooting at 140-150mm using that 90mm lens. because its magnified 1.6x. does that make sense?? Maybe Jordan can throw his thoughts out there again.


So im not knocking this lens.. its extremely great, and I really love shooting it.. the sharpness is unreal, and from what i was told it rivals the 100mm cannon.. and that right there says enough about it. but with my camera.. and most dslrs.. your going to find the 90mm doesn't fit into the daily tank photography camera bag all that well. For me shooting 8-10 ft away from my tank.. I get 3 ft of my tank in the photo.. so unless you want to shoot pictures of your tank from across the room its probably not the greatest 2nd lens to go with for your reef photos.. a canon 50mm 1.8 lens with an extension tube for macros would be my first purchase.. they are cheap, sharpness and quality are great, and for me I feel most importantly its really fast for the money, which means you can take photos at high shutter speeds while still getting proper exposure.(great for capturing fast fish or swaying polyps without shutting your hole system down to remove the motion)..


Watch this video and you can see the difference in the same lens on 2 different cameras, also note the 7d in this video is not a full frame sensor camera(so to compare, Jordans camera is like the 5dmark2 in the video and Petercars t3 is like the 7D in the video) after you see the difference around 100mm, you might think twice about buying the 90mm lens for general reef photography.. its really great for coral closeup and macros.. but unless your shooting a professional level camera its just too much zoom to be practical.



video

I'll give you my take on this...  :

Important distinction - The minimum focus distance on the Tamron is 11" - but that is measured from the camera sensor, not the end of the lens.  It is different than "working distance".  I take lots of shots with the lens pretty much touching the glass with coral just on the other side. You can get it up very close to your subject therefore. 

No need for extension tubes with this lens - you are going to make your working aperature smaller and DOF narrower, which will just make life more difficult.

The 7D is only a crop body camera.  I don't think it is offered in two different sensor formats, that is news to me.  I believe the new 7X will be FF, but I don't think that has been released by Canon yet.  The 7D Mark II will continue to be cropped as well.

The Tamron 90 is good for shooting fast moving fish too - it is a prime lens after all - the "glass" is fast, the "AF" is definitely not.  What I mean by this is that you probably want to stop down the Av (to maybe 9 or 11) if you can manage and give yourself more DOF to play with... and when the fish enters the correct DOF, shoot away.  When the focus is where it needs to be, the lens is very fast!  Most "prime" lens (e.g. lens of fixed focal length such as the 90 versus an 18-135 "zoom" lens) are considered much faster than zooms as there is less working parts.  Most of my favorite fish pics are taken with the Tamron 90.  One great tip for this is going into the operating/drive functions of your camera, and turning off the AF component of your shutter release button (when you press the shutter half way - the AF tries to focus the lens - you want this turned off for faster action like fish).  On the Tamron, everytime you push the shutter release button halfway down, the AF is going to "hunt" and you'll be chasing fish all day.  I transfer the AF to a button on the back of the body with custom functions, focus with the back button to where I want my focus to be (e.g. where the fish is going to be when I want my picture), then push the shutter button down to take the shot without any focus hunting.  This is a camera operation issue, not a lens issue.  Shoot 20 to 30 shots and presto, one will turn out!

In my opinion, the Tamron 90 excels at Macros, fish portraits, individual coral and coral group shots - the one thing it does not excel at as you noted is FTS's, unless you have lots of space away from the tank to shoot.  Easy solution to this is to pick up a $100 50 mm lens, as you noted above, problem solved.  Great walk around lens too for general photography.

HTH! 

 

[Duke]

ok  sorry for the discrepancy's with your camera.. shows how much I know really.. I was just regurgitating info someone I work with was telling me.. I thought you were shooting a 5d for some reason.. its just been bothering me ever since you posted that photo from 4ft away.. I cant for the life of me get nearly that much into a shot from 4ft away. and I agree about this lens being fast, I love it.. I wish I could afford a 50mm 1.2 lens. im shooting my best fish shots with the 90mm at around 1/200 which is impossible to do for me with the kit lens without bumping the iso too high and lowering photo quality.

Thanks for chiming in.. moral of the story is take ur camera with u when you lens shop so you know what your getting.

 

[Duke]

Petercar, there is no zoom on that lens, the limit switch helps a lot with auto focusing faster, then its not trying to focus to infinity when your subject is only 12" away.

Jroovers, Shooting so close to the glass do you find if your not shooting straight on you get distortion?

nice tip about changing the AF mode to get it off the shutter button, im going to try that out for sure.

 

[jroovers]

ok  sorry for the discrepancy's with your camera.. shows how much I know really.. I was just regurgitating info someone I work with was telling me.. I thought you were shooting a 5d for some reason.. its just been bothering me ever since you posted that photo from 4ft away.. I cant for the life of me get nearly that much into a shot from 4ft away. and I agree about this lens being fast, I love it.. I wish I could afford a 50mm 1.2 lens. im shooting my best fish shots with the 90mm at around 1/200 which is impossible to do for me with the kit lens without bumping the iso too high and lowering photo quality.

Thanks for chiming in.. moral of the story is take ur camera with u when you lens shop so you know what your getting.

Sounds like you aren't happy with the 90... sorry to hear that.  If you find the focal length too long, you could always sell it and get something in the 50 to 70 range without too much of a loss.  Most of my pics I take handheld of fish and coral groups are in that 4 ft range - I had a couch that I sit on when doing so (the back faces the tank and I use for shotting support).  That said, I can't get near my full tank in the shot unless I'm at the back of the room, but I don't use this lens for that.  The fixed focal length takes some getting used to, my wife picks up the camera with one of these lenses on and always asks "but how do I zoom?" lol. 

In terms of the 50, when you get below an AV of 2, your working AV really isn't going to be that wide open.  The 1.8 is the best bang for your buck and will still take fantastic photos, and doesn't really get any more affordable. You may want to try something even lower focally - I really like my Sigma 30 mm (I don't have a 50, but as you know, the 30 mm is considered a 48 mm equivalent on a crop body). Don't forget the zooms too, there are some nice lenses on the lower end of the zoom spectrum. 

Petercar, there is no zoom on that lens, the limit switch helps a lot with auto focusing faster, then its not trying to focus to infinity when your subject is only 12\" away.

Jroovers, Shooting so close to the glass do you find if your not shooting straight on you get distortion?

nice tip about changing the AF mode to get it off the shutter button, im going to try that out for sure.

Good tip re: limiting switch, could be the issue right there. 

You do have to shoot straight on to prevent distortion, but a little leighway of a few degrees from perpendicular doesn't seem to affect IQ. 

 

[jroovers]

ReefHero, did you end up getting a camera, or still looking?  Pretty good time to buy, lots of deals at the stores for new, which also floods the used market with cameras from people upgrading to new equipment.