Third Party Lenses
Derek Smith • 31 May 2024
Poppies
Sony NEX 3N with Sigma 60mm f/2.8 lens by Derek Smith
Bollards
Fuji XS-20 with TT Artisans AF 27mm f/2.8 lens by Derek Smith
Girl and Horse
Sony 5100 with Tamron 18-200mm lens by Derek Smith
Sam
Olympus OM EM5 II, with Sigma 56 f/1.4 prime lens by Derek Smith
Choosing a lens for a camera system is never an easy task, selecting the right focal length for your needs, whether to buy a zoom lens, or prime lens and then what aperture is required. For some camera systems the manufacturer may even provide a different aperture in the same focal length as an example a Canon RF 50mm prime lens f/1.8 can be purchased for around £200 but choosing the 50mm f/1.2 version might cost ten times this.
Many cameras when purchased new will be available with a “kit” lens, these are very often good value for money, and get you started with the new camera. The “kit” lens supplied with a camera system can often be of an inexpensive build quality, sometimes the widest aperture will be f/3.5, and have a lower optical quality than more expensive offerings. I used the Sony 16-50mm PZ compact zoom lens for many years on my APS-C cameras. At that time Sony did not offer much in the way of E-mount APS-C lenses, just a longer zoom 55-210mm, and a 35mm f/1.8 prime, and this is where a third party lens can be of a real benefit, I bought a Tamron 18-200mm f/3.5 – f/6.3 zoom lens, (when Sony introduced a 18-200mm f/3.5-f/6.3 lens it was rumoured that it was manufactured by Tamron), and a Sigma 60mm f/2.8 prime to add to my camera kit.
Tamron, and Sigma dominated the third-party lens market for many years and provided lenses that often filled gaps in a propriety manufacturers offerings. Sigma has produced a widely acclaimed trio of f/1.4 lenses the 16mm, 30mm, and 56mm available for many APS-C mounts. As an example when Canon introduced the M mount mirrorless series of cameras, such as the M50, as far as I am aware Canon developed only 2 zoom lenses, and a nice 22mm prime pancake lens, this system had a lot of potential, but Canon dropped the system in favour of the RF mount digital mirrorless cameras, all three of the Sigma f/1.4 prime lenses are available for the M mount cameras, filling the gaps that Canon left in the system.
Samyang manufactures a wide range of lenses for various mirrorless camera mounts, the 12mm f/2 APS-C wide angle lens is well renowned for build, and optical quality, and I’ve used this lens on my Sony A6300, and now on the Fuji system, I’ve created some incredible images with it such as at Mam Tor, Whitby, the night sky images, and all of the last years churches project. For full frame cameras I used the Samyang 45mm f/1.8 on my Sony A7 ii and took some amazing portraits with this lens.
Chinese lens developers have come to the fore with some very inexpensive third-party lenses to fit various mirrorless camera mounts. Viltrox, 7 Artisans, TT Artisans, Meike, and Pergear are some of these Chinese brands, initially a lot of lens offerings were, and still are manual focus, but many more autofocus lenses are now being produced. Sigma, and Tamron manufacture quality products in Japan, and Samyang are a South Korean company.
Currently, I’m using the TT Artisans AF 27mm f/2.8 pancake lens with my Fuji system, the lens is on sale for around £160, and I’ve just purchased the TT Artisans AF 56mm f/1.8 bought for £130, which I’m very pleased with. I replaced my Fuji 18-55mm f/2.8-4 lens (the optical quality of this Fuji lens was superb) but the Sigma 18-50mm lens has a constant f/2.8 aperture, is smaller, lighter, and focuses closer making it a great little travel lens.
In summation then a third-party lens may have the advantage of providing more choices of lenses for different camera mounts, at a competitive price point. The disadvantages of choosing a third-party lens could be a reduced resale value, less reliable product support, and may have inferior image quality, but if I can get 90% of the image quality at a third of the price then it’s a choice I’m prepared to make.
Louth Photographic Society
The body content of your post goes here. To edit this text, click on it and delete this default text and start typing your own or paste your own from a different source.
Roger Hance Memorial Lecture 16th October
Last night Lee Dixon from Cleethorpes Camera Club gave his first ever presentation to a camera club, which we were privileged to view. His presentation consisted of portraiture, creative, and his genre of choice; wildlife. Lee is an extremely talented photographer, with a highly creative portfolio, his portraits are quite atmospheric, unusual, and capture the essence of the model, and scene. For Lee’s creative work, he buys props from charity shops, often very cheaply, reusing those props in various scenes. For his composite work he will often take one of his photos of a room, and blend it with a subject in Photoshop using “blend” modes. For wildlife he visited Lake Kerkini in Greece to photograph the Pelicans, if the sky is a little on the bland side, Lee will often over expose the image resulting in a striking white background to the subject. On safari in Africa Lee showed us some amazing images of the wildlife, the close-up images of elephants, the wildebeest migration, and this stunning image of a cheetah. Lee was ably assisted by Mike Bennett. More of Lee’s work can be found on his website: https://leedixonphoto.co.uk/ Lee his kindly given permission for his images to be used in this post. Many thanks to Lee, and Mike for an amazing evening.
Good Morning All Last week at the club we held our monthly PDI competition, with the categories of "Objects in the Air" and "Open", there was a very high-quality entry in both competitions and judge Mike Bennett had quite a job on his hands scoring the entries. Well, done to Dave Turner for first place in the Objects in the Air and Tony Gaskins for first place in the Open. All the results are on our website. This week, Wednesday 30th September, our speaker will be Lee Dixon from Cleethorpes Camera Club showing us his natural history, Creative and many other photographs he has taken. It will be the first time Lee has shown his photographs at our club. If anyone else wants to enter PDI's in the 2027 N&EMPF Exhibition, the deadline is this Wednesday at midnight. Harry is still taking entries for the PDI competition, with the categories of "Local Straight from Camera" (unedited .jpg), and "Open", to be held on Wednesday 7th October. Regards Graham
At the meeting last night Mike Bennett judged our competition with the categories of “Objects in the Air”, and “Open”. The standard of entries was excellent, and it gave Mike a tough task of judging the images, Mike gave some very good critique of the images displayed, the feedback helps members to develop compositional skills. Dave Turner was awarded first place for his image of the “Tiger Club Display Team” in the “Objects in the Air” category. Tony Gaskins was awarded first place for his image of the “Spectacular Rustgill” in the “Open” category.
Good Morning All, Last week at the club we watched the N&EMPF PDI Exhibition for 2026, it was a very good evening viewing very high standard images from all over the East Midlands. Dave Turner and I did manage to get images accepted; there is a full report on our website. This week, Wednesday 23rd September, we will hold our monthly PDI competition, with the categories of "Objects in the Air" and "Open", please send entries to Harry by midnight tonight. Harry is also accepting images for the PDI competition, with the categories of "Local Straight out of the Camera (only resizing permitted)" and "Open". Regards Graham
Members were shown the 2026 N&EMPF PDI Exhibition video last night with all of the accepted PDI images in the first part, and after the break the awarded PDI images. There were some stunning images on view, and Louth was successful in having 3 PDI images accepted, Graham Harrison with his image of a Stonechat, and Dave Turner with his portrait of Paul Rudd, and his monochrome image of Kings Cross railway station "Going Down". Overall it was a good inspirational evening.
Good Morning All Last week at the club members had 15 minutes to show what they had done over the summer. It was a very interesting evening with eight members taking part. There were many locations on show and as usual some excellent photography. There is a full report on our blog. This week, Wednesday 16th September, we will be showing the N&EMPF exhibition, this is part one showing all the PDI's that were accepted. This is the highest standard of photography we as individuals take part in as a club. Members sent around 50 entries but only 3 were accepted. If you are inspired to enter the 2027 Exhibition after seeing the show, I send the clubs entries and I can give you more information. Closing date is the end of September. The Maximum size for N&EMPF is 1600 x 1200 3MB sRGB Harry is still taking entries for the monthly PDI competition, with the categories of "Objects in the Air" and "Open". Harry did ask about what can be accepted, and we couldn't really say as long as it's an object in the Air. The best way is to look up the definition of an object first. Harry is also accepting entries for the Local and Open competition in October. Robin is going to judge the Open competition, does anyone fancy judging the "Straight from the camera" category? Regards Graham
The Louth Photographic Society has returned after the summer break. It was an incredible return, with members providing us with some stunning images from over the summer break. A full, and varied smorgasbord of well executed photos, many of us visited Whitby, the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, and further north images from Staithes, and Sandbanks. Tony showed us his long exposure minimalist calming coastal scenes, from the Lincolnshire coast, and Whitby.. Chris brought us some beautiful photos taken of local churches, many of which many of us have never seen. Now I’ve never really seen the attraction of an expensive Leica camera, but when Mark showed his photos from his visit to the German Leica factory in Wetzlar, I now understand, camera bodies, and lenses milled from solid blocks of aluminium, hand polished, hand finished lens glass, and textured leather applied to the camera body, not a robot in sight, just craftsmen, and women making a superb photographic instrument. Sue brought us “pink” ladies driving tractors to raise money for cancer research. Last but definitely not least Richard showed his monochrome, and infrared images of trees, his compositions, and photographic eye bring these tree studies to life, we appreciate them even if some judges don’t understand. Many thanks to all of those members who contributed.
Good Morning All We spent last week on the Isle of Wight visiting many of the attractions. This week, Wednesday 9th September, we are back at the club with 15-minute PDI shows of what you did during the summer break, I have Derek Smith, Tony Gaskins, Harry Kerman, Chris Birchmore and Richard Hildred on the list, if I have missed you off, please let me know. I should be there but could be late as away playing golf. Harry is taking entries for the September PDI competition, with the categories of "Objects in the Air" and "Open". Harry will miss the October local competition but will sort the entries out for us, The competition categories will be "Local-Not Edited" and "Open". We judge this competition in house so could do with two volunteers to judge. The local competition is a .jpeg photograph taken and straight from the camera, no cropping, or post processing etc, like the old days taken no more than 25 miles from St James church. Regards Graham
