There are amazing lenses available. It is tempting to buy a special lens, because it can open doors to a whole different kind of images. But there are lenses which you probably won’t need anytime soon. Here are six of them.
Just look in any random online shop, a real camera store, or on manufacturers' websites, and you can find almost every lens imaginable. For any type of photography, you probably will find a lens that works best. It is easy to order a new lens because someone is saying how well it performs for some kind of photography. If you shoot landscapes, you must buy a certain wide-angle lens. For portrait photography, a portrait lens with a large aperture is a must. You probably can find a lot of other examples.
I have listed six lenses that are wonderful pieces of engineering and can provide amazing results if you are in the market for them. It is tempting to buy one of these or even more than one. But these are lenses you probably won’t need anytime soon, if ever.
1. A Tilt-Shift Lens
Perhaps this kind of lens is the most amazing piece of engineering. It originates from the old large format technical cameras, which use bellows to manipulate the plane of focus. The tilt-shift lenses make this possible for normal cameras with relatively small sensors.
A tilt-shift lens, perfect for architecture and real estate.
The tilt-shift lenses for normal cameras have some limitations concerning the amount of tilt and shift you can have, but the lenses do make it possible to correct converging lines of large buildings or manipulate the plane of focus in a way to gain a large depth of field with a large aperture.
There are amazing tilt-shift lenses available, like the Canon TS-E collection, ranging from 17mm up to 135mm. Also, Nikon has some nice ones available, like the 19mm tilt-shift.
But, you don’t really need these lenses unless you do some real architectural photography or product photography. You might think real estate photographers also would use these a lot, but most of them don’t; I know from experience. With Photoshop, a lot of perspective correction is possible.
2. Super Macro Lens
We all love a nice macro photo — flowers, insects, mushrooms, you name it. But on a lot of occasions, these so-called macro photos don't even have a 1:1 magnification. With a macro lens, a 1:1 maginification is the maximum size you can get, and I bet most are not that much.
Super macro lenses can get really close, with magnifications up to five times and perhaps even more.
You can get even get a larger magnification. The Canon MP-E 65mm lens is a good example, reaching a 5:1 ratio, meaning it will enlarge the subject five times. A couple of other super-macro lenses are also on the market, like the strange Laowa Probe lens, making it possible to see the unseen.
But it is a completely different kind of photography that requires some real differentiation. I have shot some macro (not super macro), and one thing I have learned is how intensive this kind of photography can be. I believe some macro and near-macro is great, and it can be done with a regular macro lens. But on most occasions, you don’t need a super macro lens for that.
3. Fish-Eye Lens
A fish-eye lens has a field of view that is roughly 180°. There are different types of fish-eye lenses. Nikon even has a fish-eye that has a field of view that is larger than 180°. Can you imagine? That lens looks behind itself.
Look at me, shooting with a fish-eye lens. It was fun, but I got tired of the distortion very quickly (photo by Hetwie (http://www.hetwie.nl))
These fish-eye lenses seem great to use. But with almost everything in view, everything becomes really small, unless you get very close. In that case, some serious perspectives can occur. And don't forget the wide-angle distortion.
Although a fish-eye lens can be used for some great images, it is very difficult to use it in a good way. Often, it becomes a nice picture to look at, nothing more, nothing less. I know a lot of photographers that used one for some time, then left it at home eventually, or they even sold the lens.
4. Super Tele Lens With a Large Aperture
Yes, we all have seen the big white lenses of Canon and Sony. You can get a Nikon version if you like, but these are black and don’t stand out so much.
Regardless of the color, using super tele lenses, from 400mm up to an amazing 800mm or more, is all but practical, Especially when combined with large apertures like f/2.8 or f/4, these monsters are very heavy and not easy to carry with you. They are all but flexible in real life. Only a small group of photographers really need these lenses.
A wonderful beast: the Canon EF 800mm f/5.6L lens. Very large and heavy, it is now returned to the rightful owner, I don't miss it at all. Well, almost.
If you love shooting with long lenses, you probably are better off with a nice 100-400mm or a 150-600mm zoom lens. These fit into your camera bag, are not that heavy, and are often flexible because of the zoom capability. And you will save yourself a lot of money.
5. Lens With an Extremely Large Aperture
There are lenses that are called bokeh monsters. It is a range of lenses that have apertures that are f/1.4 or wider. Some of them even go to f/0.95, which is amazing.
These lenses don’t need a lot of light and can be used in relatively dark environments. But at the same time, the depth of field will be small. Very small. Too small on a lot of occasions.
Focal length and distance to the subject will play a large part in the depth of field story, of course. But on most occasions, these very wide aperture lenses are not necessary, I think. Oh yes, you can play with a nice minimum depth of field and have smooth bokeh. But, I believe in most situations, you would rather stop down and have both eyes of the model in focus. If you need a nice, small depth of field, perhaps a longer focal length will be the answer.
Nevertheless, these lenses are very tempting, as seen from the previous article I wrote on this subject.
6. Lensbaby
I almost forgot about these babies. The Lensbaby is a strange little thing that is relatively popular among a lot of photographers. It works somewhat like the tilt of a tilt-shift lens.
But Lensbaby has more to offer. It is a lens for creative photography with flares and other things. Perhaps you should look into it if you are in the market for it. Although Lensbabies are not very expensive, they are expensive when you buy one and never use it.
Lensbaby: strange little lenses that produce strange results. You love them or you hate them.
Of the six lenses mentioned, the Lensbaby is probably the one you can try without spending a lot of money, but only if you like a strange and unexpected out of focus element in your photo. You love it or hate it.
To Sum Up
This article is not to prevent you from buying a lens, but to help you avoid buying something you don’t need. If you are one of the photographers that is a real target for one of these types of lenses, you will know. Or you will learn eventually. So, think twice before buying. Perhaps you will find out it is a lens you probably won’t need anytime soon, if ever.
I would like to know if you bought a special lens that is gathering dust. Or perhaps you can think of a lens that has a small niche and isn’t for a lot of people. Please share it in the comments below.
"Except #5 that's some straight up B%($&*#t, how dare you!"
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I am sorry Ryan, I truly am. I never going to make that mistake again. Next articel: Why you don't need a lens that can stop down from f/0.95.
hahaha ;)
Why not "Why Some Photographers Don't Need a Lens That Can Stop Down Fro f/0.95"?
Why repeatedly use the word "you" in article titles, when doing so is often misleading and incorrect?
Well... I was just joking.
Anyway, when I use 'you' in the title, it is being read a lot. :D
I fail to see the practical point of this article. It sums up niche lenses for niche jobs. If you're no professional architectural photographer, you obviously have less need for a tilt shift lens. But don't even think photoshop is "good enough" for replacing T&S lens for a pro. If you can take the image on location without the need for photoshop perspective correction, you spend less time in front of your computer. This counts for every other lens type in this article. Maybe except Lensbaby.
"Buy this lens if you really need or want it". No shit, sherlock.
Is this something that makes it worthwhile to spend time on actually typing (milking) it out?
This actually speaks to my comment above. There is a general misconception regarding how TS/PC lenses function and which functions an architectural photographer uses and why. FWIW, the photoshop equivalent to shifting for an architectural photographer is not the perspective correction tool, it's the crop tool. But most people think that there is some sort of tilting involved...
600 f4 is my most used lens. Anything shorter is covered by my 300 2.8. Anything of narrower aperture is not really too useful. Those jolly Sigma superzooms really won't do what I need as I am often shooting in very low light. Good bird and wildlife photography usually occurs under awful conditions.
Concerning broad aperture lenses: when I was shooting weddings, there were no better lenses. Broad aperture is essential in dimly lit churches filled with clutter. The difference between 2.0 and 1.4 is quite significant. Astrophotography also needs broad apertures.
I do not have a fisheye, but it would be fun. My wife would love lensbaby.
I do not have tilt shift, but, it would be insanely useful for landscape.
I do not get the point of this article...
Krissa,
I am in full agreement with you about the benefits of using large aperture lenses for wildlife.
As for "those jolly Sigma superzooms", I assume you're referring to the newer, insanely popular 150-600mm f6.3 lenses that have sold like crazy over the last half decade or so. To my eye, the images they produce never seem to yield the kind of subject isolation and dreamy background rendering that I strive to produce in the wildlife images I make.
Hence, I kind of have the opposite view on this than the author - I believe that the smaller, lighter, more affordable telephotos with smaller apertures are the lenses that I don't need, because they are the lenses that are not capable of giving me the results that I want.
In general, if one wants to create images that stand out and are notably different than most of the images in a given genre, then a niche lens can be very helpful in creating photos that have a different look and feel than those created by the masses of photographers that are shooting the same subject matter with "normal" lenses.
I don't really have a need for any of these lenses either
Specialist lenses are for specialist purposes, so yeah, if you’re an amateur shooting mostly friends and family and the odd holiday pic, no you won’t need these 90% of the time. If you’re a pro though shooting sports or wildlife, interior architecture, etc, you probably will. The lensbaby is probably the only exception.
You are correct.
Why would an amateur get into obscure world of specialized lenses to begin with if there is no specific need?
I see a lot of amateurs go wild on specialized lenses because these things 'promise' professional results.
If they didn't we wouldn't have this article.
If they didn't we wouldn't have this article.
You probably won't need to adapt M42 or other legacy mount to EF, F, RF or Z anytime soon but old lenses are a lot of fun and can provide fantastic results with patience and practice.
But only if you like that kind of photography. I was in doubt if I would add vintage lenses also. If you are not into that sort of thing, leave it alone.
On the other hand; if you never try, you will never know.:)
I mean I guess you're as entitled to your opinion as anyone else, but I think it's a little silly to write an entire article about specific gear you don't think most people need. Fstoppers seems to really hate on tilt-shift lenses too for some reason. I think most people would find a lot of value in learning to use tilts and shifts. I'm a nature photographer above all else, and although I don't use tilts and shifts for the purposes you identified here, I find them invaluable in my nature photography.
I miss the point why it is silly to write an article like this. Please enlighten me.
It is not about hating tilt-shift lenses (since that seems to be your problem) at all. Why would it value a lot of people learning about using those lenses? Can you explain?
I personally love using tilt-shift lenses, I think they're great. But I also know most photographers won't take to time to use these lenses if they had one. Too many times I see these lenses sold again, because it is too much work and the 16-35 lens is soo much easier.
Please Fstoppers. Do an article on the catadioptric camera lens.
hahaha - I can only tell you from my experience back in the analogue days of photography. Nice circulair bokeh rings and a fixed aperture...
I have an old Russian MTO1000A - f/10.5 / 1100mm Reflex Mirror Lens... perhaps I can do something with it. When the weather becomes more friendly ;)
I would love that and think many in here would.
When I really began taken photography seriously and bought my first "pro" camera in the beginning of the 1990s, the reflex type of lenses was becoming a dated concept, so never got to own one.
Still haven't stopped dreaming though.
I won't promise anything yet, But I will look into that, Hans
I LOVE my 16mm fisheye. Combine it with the Fisheye Hemi for Photoshop it becomes a great wide angle lens.
Interesting because I never experience any edge stretching at all with Fisheye Hemi. If I used Photoshop by itself to correct for the fisheye lens it stretched the corners horribly and made the image unusable. However, with Fisheye Hemi add-in it made corners and people normal looking.
Correcting a fisheye image will stretch it a lot in certain places, which is not very good for the quality and sharpness of the image. But that doesn't matter if you are not using it in a very large print, or on the internet.
I used to do that with my fisheye also, but manually. Of time I discovered I don't need to go that wide.
Fisheye-Hemi actually corrects the fisheye lens quite a bit. I don’t experience any stretching and it does an amazing job. I used to have quite a few examples on my Flickr site but unfortunately had been purged in my last mass purging job.
Still, it has to stretch the image, otherwise it is not possible to correct the image. But I believe when you say it can do an amazing job. But just like William Johnson mentions, it may depend on the image.
I agree that it doesn't seem like it can do anything without stretching the image and cutting the image in the very edge, but it does it very minimally. I'm a true believer of the program, obviously.
This is just a very minimal correction. There is still a lot of fisheye distortion visible in this image. Straight lines are nog straight, and the people are still not standing upright. But the people are less thin indeed, which is a good thing.
I would have corrected the bended lines also as much as possible, and corrected the converging lines..
Actually that wasn’t my final photo. I had done exactly what you did. The photos were just an example about how well the program did.
As you saw the fisheye wasn’t useless. Yes, not all lines were straight because it’s a fisheye lens. It doesn’t replace the reticular lenses.
Please don’t modify my photos without asking for permission.
I never said a fisheye is useless. I only mentioned most photographers won't need one. Clearly you have a good use for it.
I have removed the photo. :)
Thanks!
Fisheye Hemi?
Hemi - A little piece of software that can correct (part of) the fisheye distortion.
Thanks!
Thank you sir. I do use numbers 2, 4 and 5. But have absolutely no need for a lens baby or the tilt lens. Interesting to see who is using what here.
All articles like this do is make me want to go out and buy another new lens or two that I don't need! 😝
lol
me too
Actually, I went out, but the lens I want is out of stock. Also, my camera guy told me, in confidence, to wait for the upcoming sale. So, for November, I'll have to be satisfied with my new geared tripod head and some memory cards.