Probably the best investment he could make for his first purchase given
he already has the Nikon, and that the D5500 has one of the best imaging
systems in it's class, a good lens, to replace the kit lens as the first
order of business.
I don't think he could go wrong with the unstabilized version of the
Tamron 17-50mm f2.8. I've done a lot of research on them, and at the
current price of about $300 it's probably the best bang for the buck in
a "normal" zoom. That lens compares pretty favorably for IQ to every
other manufactures "pro" APS-C zoom in that range.
For example IIRC it's not quit as sharp in the center as the Pentax
16-50 but sharper in the corners at all focal lengths and f stops, with
less CA, which is pretty true when compared to the Sigma.
Build quality isn't quite up to the OEM lenses. But I actually tied out
the image stabilized version on a Nikon body, as my local camera store
doesn't stock Pentax and it handles very nicely and easily matches the
build quality of the Nikon body.
I don't know for sure if those lenses are still available new, the
stabilized version isn't supposed to be nearly as good optically, though
it should still blow the kit lens away. At that point I'd probably go
for the Sigma, but it's selling for maybe $100-$150 more than the
Tamron, still a lot less expensive than the Nikon version though.
On 3/23/2017 11:22 AM, John Sessoms wrote:
At my weekly photography brunch yesterday, we had a new "member" who had
a question. He's recently retired & his son had bought him a Nikon D5500
(I'm guessing with kit lens). He said he's interested in landscape
photography.
He asked what kind of computer should he buy. He's already signed up for
an adult continuing education class in Lightroom from the local
community college (if it doesn't get canceled because not enough people
sign up).
Before the discussion devolved into Windoze vs Apple, desktop or laptop,
and whether he should buy the Tamron 70-200 or the Sigma 100 - 400, my
advice was he should get "the fastest processor, the most memory & the
biggest hard-drive you can afford" (which I think holds up either way in
the Windoze vs Apple debate).
I should have suggested a good tripod, but missed my chance.
But that got me thinking overnight & I decided to submit a more general
question to the group wisdom.
Given a new photographer who already has a "pro-sumer" DSLR, what advice
would you give him/her regarding BASIC kit?
... after I suggest a good, solid tripod.
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