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Macro Lens Suggestions?

Nov 29, 2013

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    1. I'm in the market now for a macro lens for my Nikon D3100. I primarily want to use it for taking pics inside dollhouses of my tinies and miniatures, though I imagine I'll probably want to take it outside for nature photos too. With my current kit lens I've been primarily shooting using the 18mm at f3.5, though I do recognize that I should probably branch out and try 55mm and other focal lengths. I often have to shoot in low light situations (the inside of a dollhouse is usually not the brightest ^^;; ) so I don't think I want an aperature above 3.5ish...I'd actually really love to have a 2 or lower. :3 So, after all this blabber, does anyone have any macro lens suggestions? I've been looking at some of the lenses on Amazon and I've just become a little overwhelmed since there are many with many different variables. ^^;
       
      #1 Tsukiyono, Nov 29, 2013
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    2. Inside your dollhouse and outside nature typically have different focal length requirements. The first thing you will want to figure out is if you actually need a true macro lens (one that can magnify 1:1 and is optimized for close-up work) of if what you really need is a wider angle lens with a short minimum focus distance. You're not likely to find a macro lens shorter than 40mm, which is a very big field of view change from 18mm. If you have a kit zoom lens (something like the cheap 18-55mm that cameras often come bundled with) it can be useful for figuring out if a specific focal length will work out for you, before putting down serious money on a prime lens.

      Nikon's 40/2.8 and 60/2.8 AF-S macro lenses are very highly rated and either would be very well suited to BJD photography in general.

      For outdoor nature macro--flowers, insects, etc--a longer focal length is usually preferred, something in the 100-200mm range. Nikon and Sigma both have excellent lenses in this range, but they would have limited usefulness for shooting doll, really only useful for tight portraits and detail shots (unless your dolls are all of the very tiny varieties).
       
      #2 adam, Nov 30, 2013
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    3. Thanks so much for your input, it's really helped me narrow down my choices. :) I guess I should say that I've become used to shooting at 18mm mainly because it has the largest aperture. I think I probably would like shooting at 35mm more, but with the largest aperture being only f5 it's really limiting for indoor use and generally vexing. I did see the Nikon 40/2.8 on Amazon, and I read where you can get up to around 6 inches from the subject. I think I may be leaning towards that lens because it's well below my budget and I think it will be good for shooting the 1:12 scale miniatures and my brownie doll. If it will also be well suited to shooting my big dolls too that will be perfect, not to mention an f2.8 sounds better than f3.5 any day.
       
      #3 Tsukiyono, Nov 30, 2013
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