Renting Lenses - A great experience
A few weeks ago, I went on a vacation to Montana’s back country, Yellowstone, and the Grand Tetons.
Yellowstone is known for it’s diverse wildlife including bear, elk, moose, bison, and deer. It’s located mostly in Wyoming while part of it is in Montana. There is also an elk refuge area near the Tetons on the outskirts of Jackson, WY, and we were with a great guide in Montana’s back country with the goal of photographing wildlife. We weren’t disappointed.
In Montana, we ended up seeing some large bucks, a few does, a bull moose, antelope, sage hens, etc. In Yellowstone, we saw many bison, a couple of huge bull elks, a bald eagle, and others. Overall, we were very happy with the variety of animals that we were fortunate enough to see, and we were able to capture images of several of them.
I don’t own a telephoto lens and I have little experience using them, but I knew that I’d need one to have a chance at getting a decent shot. We tried Yellowstone last year with a 28-80mm lens and was sorely disappointed with the results. The animals were simply too small in the photo.
After doing some research and getting recommendations on focal lengths, it seemed that I’d need a bare minimum of a 300mm lens, and most likely, I’d want one around 500mm. 500mm after the 1.5 magnifier of my DX camera (I have a Nikon D50) is the same as a 750mm lens or about 15 times the magnification of the normal human eye. I wanted to shoot birds as well, if any happened to be near and many people recommended at least a 500mm lens for bird photography.
Solaria, one of TLF’s members, recommended a company called LensRentals.com. I tried them out and I couldn’t be more pleased with their professional service, price, and product.
Local photography stores wanted to charge $75/day to rent their lenses. No thanks. I needed the lens for at least 10 days and wasn’t about to fork over $750.
LensRentals.com rented me a Sigma 50-500mm lens for my Nikon for 14 days with insurance for $99. The lens is huge and heavy, and my tripod isn’t strong enough to support the weight. I’ve always wanted to try out a monopod, so I rented a heavy duty monopod for $30. Shipping is a little expensive because the lens and monopod are heavy. They ship Fed Ex 2 day, and you pay for the return shipping at the same time. Shipping for both was around $60. Bottom line is that I got my 500mm telephoto lens for 2 weeks for $193, which wouldn’t have even been 3 days worth at the local photography store.
I could have chosen a more expensive lens and paid a little more for it, but I’m considering buying the 50-500mm Sigma, where the other lenses are way out of my price range to purchase. Stay tuned for a review of the lens after I’ve had a chance to upload a few of the pictures I took of those animals.
LensRentals.com was wonderful to work with. I received my lens on the day I specified. The lens looked brand new. The monopod had been used a few times, but it was in good working condition without any dings or problems (which is exactly what I expected). They kept me well informed of the process and let me know when the items were shipped. When I returned it, they let me know that they had received it. It’s always a little scary to pay for something on the Internet from a company that you’re not familiar with, but I was very pleased with how everything turned out and highly recommend them to anybody that needs to rent a lens or camera equipment. They can only ship to US residents, so keep that in mind.
I’ll rent from them again, even if it’s just to try out a lens before I buy it. I’d much rather spend a few dollars to know if the lens is right for me before I pay $500-$5000 for it. Sure, anybody can go to the local camera store and try the lens there, but you only get so much out of shooting a couple of pictures in the store. Having it for real life situations for a week or more at a time is the way to go.
Tags: camera, lens, lensrentals, renting lenses
