Valentine's Day Gift Guide: For the Photographer

Valentine’s Day is almost upon us, and that means it’s time to get together with that special someone and show them how much you care. While flowers, confectionary and Valentine’s Day cards are easy enough to find, what to do you get a photographer for Valentine’s Day? According to scienceofrelationships.com, the average amount you should spend on a Valentine’s Day gift is $134. This makes sense considering the holidays were only a little over a month ago. Since it wouldn’t be fair to expect a new full frame DSLR body on Valentine’s Day, we’ve selected a handful of camera accessories to help you buy something nice for the photographer in your life, without breaking the bank.

Manfrotto Advanced Tri DSLR Camera Backpack

Lens Filters

If you’re looking for a great gift that will also help your lover with their photography, consider purchasing a few fun lens filters for their favorite DSLR. There are at least three main types of filter you may want to consider adding to their kit when building your Valentine’s Day gift bag—UV filter, neutral density (ND) filter, and circular polarizing filter. A UV filter is a clear glass filter that absorbs UV light, reducing bluish tones while protecting the lens. ND filters reduce the amount of light traveling through your lens without changing the color of your subject. Circular polarizing filters enhance color and contrast within images, allowing you to shoot better photos on bright sunny days. Filters vary widely based on quality and price, so buying a few quality filters for their lenses to replace the cheap ones that typically come in bundles will go a long way towards showing them how much you care. Just make sure to pay attention to the length of the lens you’re buying a filter for.

Bargain Value Lenses

  Contrary to popular belief, shopping for a new lens doesn’t have to break the bank. Canon and Nikon have been around for a long time, so if you’re shopping for a proud owner of a DSLR, there are decent quality standard lenses that can give them access to new focal lengths or angles that they may not currently be able to shoot. The game is all about figuring out what types of photos your favorite photographer might want to take, but doesn’t have the right focal length of angle to get just right. Take the Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 for example—a fast prime lens that provides the equivalent of an 80mm focal length on APS-C format Canons and the viewing angle of an old fashioned standard lens when equipped on full-frame Canon EOS.  That 80mm focal length isn’t useful in most situations, but turns out to be perfect for portrait photography, where 80mm is considered the ideal. Similarly, a Nikon owner might appreciate the nostalgia of the AF-S DX Nikkor 35mm lens which approximates to a 50mm lens on modern APS-C size DSLRs, this makes it roughly 2 stops faster than the available kit lens on a typical Nikon DX-format camera.

Mirrorless Accessories

  If the photographer in your life happens to be a proud owner of one of the new mirrorless cameras on the market, like the Sony a6000, then chances are good they haven’t been able to acquire all the lenses and gear they need for a complete set. Most of these cameras come with kit lenses in the 16-50 mm focal range and apertures of f/3.5-5.6, so looking for lenses outside of this basic range are a good place to start. Consider the Sigma 19mm f/2.8 which give a nice boost to aperture allowing for sharp quality and quick autofocus. Or perhaps spend a little more on a Sony 30mm f/3.5 Macro E-Mount Lens for the only macro specific E-mount lens currently available on the market—it will let them take stunning close up photos of insects and other miniatures. The idea is to give them something fun that will let them go wild with their new mirrorless camera.