So, I've been looking into getting my girlfriend a new lens for her camera. She's an art ed. major and also getting her BFA in photo. I don't know much about photography and was looking for help in deciding whether a new lens would be a good gift, and if so, how to pick one out.

She's got a nikon d3000. She only has the lens that came with it. I don't know what kind of lens it is. I'm assuming they all come with the same starting lens; if I'm wrong, I can probably snoop around and see what she has.

As for photos, she generally likes shooting abandoned buildings. Sometimes big mansions from outside in broad daylight; sometimes inside an old dark train-car.

I don't really have a set budget for this yet; I'd rather see what's available before making a decision like that. I've also got a little over a month before I need to purchase it.

I'm not hip with photography lingo and don't really know what I'm looking for. Any input from anyone here would really be appreciated.

My dad(who went to college for photography and just got done buying his own D90 and a few lenses) says the lens that comes with that camera is already an excellent lens for taking pictures of buildings. The only lens he can recommend is the 55-200 Telephoto zoom, which is inexpensive and can get in real close to faraway subjects. He would also suggest you visit kenrockwell.com and do some research there. The stores Ken Rockwell has advertising on his site have been around forever and won't rip you off. That's where my dad has gotten his gear and he's always been satisfied with his purchases. Adorama is the one he's used most often.

No. That 55-200 is not ideal for architecture or low-light photography. It's better at wildlife and sports. What do you want to photograph in a building or a subway car at 200mm? You'd be incredibly invading with a foot long lens on the subway and at 200mm your lowest aperture is 5.6, you'd need a pretty slow shutter or a really high ISO to compensate for that.

On the other hand, You can get her a nice 50mm 1.8 for just over 100$.

Ideally, if you have money to burn or saved up, for with a Tilt-Shift lens. These lenses are great for architecture because you can change the plane of light, correcting for distortion when you point the camera up at a building. Luckily, Photoshop is able to do that with ease. Sadly those lenses run well over 1000$.

You can't go wrong with the 1.8. I myself have a 1.4, it's about 200$ more though. The 1.8 will allow the camera to capture the light in subway cars at faster speeds and lower ISO's and the dark spaces in abandoned buildings. The narrow DoF at 1.8 will also help her isolate subjects from there background. Only downside is that you can't zoom in/out. I'm not familiar with Nikon terminology, but this appears to be full frame, so she'll get the equivalent of an 80mm 1.8.

I'm interested in viewing her photos, at some point you should encourge her to post in the Photography topic!

Update: If you'd like, any lens below about f/2.8 allow for modification of the light. Generically, all the out of focus light will hit the lens as some form of circle (whether it's a somewhat spherical or hexagonal). Also known as BOKEH. When the aperture is at 2.8 and below (2.4, 2, 1.8, 1.4, etc) you can place a shape in front of the lens and it will act as the aperture. Basically, the light takes the shape of the aperture of the lens. There's a cheap BOKEH kit over at Photojojo that you can get her to accompany this lens where ever she takes it.

The 1.8 is also ideal for portraits. The narrow depth of field will isolate the subjects eyes from other elements and most drastically, the background.

I should have mentioned that the telephoto is not for architecture, but for other things you might want to photograph from far away(such as air planes at an air show). The lens that comes with your girlfriend's camera is more than enough for photographing buildings.

My dad has mentioned that the 1.8 is an awesome lens, which he would also highly recommend, however, you have to get the more expensive newer one($220) if you want one that will auto-focus with that camera. The older one will work, but she'll have to focus manually. This is second-nature to my father, who has been taking pictures since before anyone here was born, but I don't know how great your GF is at this, or if she'd appreciate you skimping on her gift to save $50.

That's what telephotos are made for. But you don't buy a telephoto for what foamy3 has mentioned.
The kit 18-55 lens is adequate for buildings. It'd be more than enough if they came with an aspherical element to correct distortion. It's there on an 18-55. Take an anglular look at the front glass element of any kit lens. It's con-vexed, and it's not corrected for. At 55mm, who cares. The angle of view is too narrow to notice. But at 18mm, you can notice it.

Good catch, I didn't see that. This 50mm 1.8 is 220, as DShiznit stated.

If you're referring to the price difference in the lens of the 1.8's, your math is off. It's closer to 100.

I'd like to throw in that if she doesn't have Photoshop CS5 or Lightroom, the student edition of either ($199 and $89, respectively) of those would be a great gift. I personally use Lightroom far more than Photoshop.

Also, a 25 mm extension tube can be a wonderful way to get into macro photography without spending a lot of money. Trust me, it's fun.

Deeply seconded. I sadly have a 10x Macro filter with really poor quality glass. You can find some neat things in buildings to take macros of.

If she needs a proper photo editor, I also second Lightroom 3. It's much better than Photoshop. Highly tailored to photographers and not graphic designers.

Thanks, guys! That 50mm 1.8 definitely looks like a possibility. I would go with CS5 or Lightroom, but she's about to get a new computer and still isn't sure if she's going PC or Mac.

Do you guys have any links for an extension tube? The few I found had pretty low ratings. From what I've gathered, the extension tube helps you focus on objects closer than a with just a normal lens?

Very nice, my Quad-Core Mac Mini comes this Thursday.

The longer the distance on the extension tube, the higher the magnification, you can also stack tubes to get a particular magification level if needed. Vivitar is a reputable brand, I sadly don't have any extension tubes, but those look rather nice. It'll keep the autofocus and the TTL - Through The Lens - auto exposure. It's out of stock but there are other sites such as Adorama.

What an extension tube does, is push the lens farther from the sensor. Very similar to what chrisop posted. However, instead of a one milimeter, the lens is being pushed 14, 20 or even greater. Secondly, they also enlarge the object. Since the lens is built to provide a circle of light the perfect size to hit the imaging sensor, if you move the lens forward, the circle increases. Much like taking a projector and moving it farther from the wall it's projecting on. Extension tubes are pretty nifty for macro, since they both enlarge and decrease the focus distance.

Personally, I favour B&H over Adoramas' site any day.

foamy, what did you end up getting?