Buying a new lens

Hi all. Give me some advise.

I want to buy a new close-up lens. Do I go for the 18 to 200mm OS lens or the 28 to 300mm lens. I can get a really good deal on the 28 to 300, but it doens't have Image stabiliser. Is this very important? And if I decide to buy the 28 to 300mm Sigma for my Pentax, am I going really to miss the 10mm for 18mm lens?

I mostly take wedding photographer and close ups of people.

Thanx.

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Permalink Reply by Ed Harp on March 8, 2010 at 8:07am

What equipment are you currently using? You can get close-ups without having to buy another lens, but it depends on what you already own. I would not buy the lenses you mentioned just to get close-up capabilities. Also these particular Sigma lenses don't test very well on various testing sites. At best they are average budget lenses.

Depending on what you already own, you may want to get a high quality close-up diopter to screw onto the end of your lens. You may spend around $100-150, but it will work well. Also you could think about a macro lens. Sigma, Tamron and Tokina has very good macro lenses.
Check out the Sigma AF 70mm f/2.8 EX DG macro... It checks out super sharp and clean.

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Permalink Reply by Lawrence on March 8, 2010 at 8:17am

If you do weddings, I would go for a prime lens. 50mm would be your best bet. Check out the Sigma 50mm or maybe a Pentax 50mm?

With a prime you will have much better quality of pictures just from the glass alone.

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Permalink Reply by CameraClicker on March 8, 2010 at 6:28pm

The longer the lens, the more useful stabilization becomes. You don't say what lenses you already have. I have Canon gear and use the 18 to 200 from Sigma on the body with the small sensor (APS-C), and a Canon 28 to 300 on the body with a full frame sensor. This gives the roughly the same field of view, but at different magnification, on both bodies. Both lenses have stabilization. I also have a Sigma 10 to 20 for APS-C and use a Canon 16 to 36 for full frame, again I get the same field of view but at different magnification.

The benefit of 18 to 200 on an APS-C body is that you seldom have to change lenses, which means you are ready to shoot more often and you don't get as much dirt on the sensor since the lens lives on the body.

The thing with the super-zooms is the maximum aperture is not that large, being 3.5 or something similar at the wide end and 5.6 or so at the zoomed end. This upsets some who like to have a shallow depth of field. If you want a very shallow depth of field, you might be happier with a lens with less (or no) zoom range and a wider (and possibly constant) maximum aperture like 2.8 for a zoom or 1.4/1.8 for a prime lens.

The other thing to consider is the weight of the lens. My 18 to 200 is a much smaller, lighter lens than my 28 to 300. Carrying around the 28 to 300 all day builds muscles!