Hi everyone need advice on a lens for shooting at an indoor car show and would i need a flash? right now i have my Kit lens 18-55mm f5.3
What is the best lens for shooting a car show d90?
(5 posts) (5 voices)-
Posted 1 year ago #
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Which camera body? If a D90, D3100, or D300s you are walking on ice with noise. If a D3000, D40, D80, D60, D2x, D200 ,D-whatever is older than those... yes you will need a flash. If D700, D7000, D3, D3s, D3x you should be fine.
If I were going to a car show I would take a 14-24mm and a 10.5mm... Chances are that both would be too pricey for you. a 17-35mm is a good lens and has a fast aperture...
There probably is already a thread on this...
Posted 1 year ago # -
Your 18-55mm lens is fine to use. You'll have to use an exteral flash like the sb400 or better on TTL, just set your ISO at 1250.
You can check here to see how I did one last winter with that lens (might of been a Tamron but won't make any difference) and a D90:
https://picasaweb.google.com/110598189464498271207/DarrylStarbirdCarShow2011TulsaOkla#
Posted 1 year ago # -
For the best results on the car's exterior, you don't want to shoot much wider than about 30mm on DX (or 50mm on FX) if you are close enough to fill the frame with the car. I have used an ultra wide angle, but I tend to end up getting too close and it ends up looking really weird due to the distortion (some parts get stretched and the proportions of the car just end up looking all wrong). A 10.5mm fisheye does work amazing on engine bays and interiors (can get away with it on the exterior if it is a open-wheel car like a custom Model A Ford). For the exterior shots, a 18-55mm will work fine if you have good lighting. I have the Sigma 17-70mm f/2.8-4 OS HSM which I like a lot better than the kit lenses and I have also used a 35mm f/1.8 on cars (you will probably get more consistent pictures with the 35mm, but your knees will hate you for all of the extra steps forward and back to frame the picture).
Posted 1 year ago # -
I guess I will add my 2cents on this topic. I would say in some cases it depends on the show what lens you want. I shot an indoor show earlier this year, I don't know why but they wouldn't let me use my flash (I think they had a vendor there for show coverage and was the only reason that happened, from speaking with others that was not normal).
In this case, some of the cars were really close together so I needed a wide angle lens, then in other cases they were in a 20x20 display so I couldn't get that close if I tried. I used a 16-35 VR, I would say due to the flash issue the VR was a lifesaver. I was using a D700 and cranked up my ISO to around 2000. I would say there were only a couple of shots that I wanted different lens but your shooting on DX so for you this might vary some.
I find indoors unless they have a pretty good set of lights for the display the top of the car is over exposed but the sides are underexposed. A flash is almost mandatory, just be careful to diffuse the flash if on the wide angle side. I will agree using a wide angle lens can distort a car but I would rather have some distortion than only get part of it. I like to take interior shots of the car as well, a wide angle is pretty much nessasary for that. I guess call me lazy but I don't want to carry 2 cameras or change lenes all the time. The situation will dicatate sometimes more than anything else.
Posted 1 year ago #
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