Originally posted by mrozema Hello all,
I'm new here and new somewhat new to DSLR's in general.
I'd like folks to weigh in on what they think some essential lenses to own are for general purpose photography. I'm not sure what I want to specialize in yet.
This is assuming you can only own two or three.
Any thoughts?
Thanks!
Matt.
Essential lenses? Everything pentax ever made!
Seriously, however, if you are looking for a general "kit" to put together, I ran a poll a couple of weeks ago as to what forum members thought a lens kit should cover. you may wish to look at it.
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-slr-lens-discussion/120286-lens-kit-design-poll.html
In addition, my own concept is pretty simple, as a start, you can consider getting 3-4 zooms to cover the range of 10-12 mm at the wide end, through 200mm at the long end, with some idea as to how to get to 300/400mm if you want to go for sports or wildlife.
My own recomendation is that this should be from perhaps somewhere around 20mm through 135/200mm at F2.8 but that only got about 1/2 the voters in the poll, and higher ISO capability is making that less important or some.
You can then branch into faster primes, and specialty lenses like macros and fisheyes, but those basic 3-4 zooms are a good starting point.
One of the zooms should In My Opinion, also be capable of limited close focus (1:3 macro) for use when a macro lens is not around.
Depending on the quality of what you get, you will keep the basic kit for a long time.
FOr me the F2.8 issue is a function of how to reach 300-400mm. I have a 70-200F2.8 zoom (sigma) with Sigma 1.4x and 2X TCs. If you get a 100-300 or 130-400 zoom, you will not have the range below 200 at F2.8 but you may not care, or you have something else for the shorter lengths.
There are lots of ways to do this. look around, look at photos posted, ask questions and visit stores to try if at all possible