Jon Sienkiewicz Blog

We love lenses, especially lenses we can buy at a loveable price. Here are five lenses that are high quality and inexpensive.

It’s November, and that means retail stores and malls are shifting into end-of-year holiday decoration mode. Soon the red-suited elf will be shaking his bell outside the train station. Is it rushing the season? You be the judge. One thing we know for sure: it’s not too early to pick up a few new ways to give your holiday photos that extra sparkle.

What can you buy for $29? A quick Google search suggested charcoal-based tooth whitener, a pair of crappy slippers and a few other bits of future garage sale fodder. I already have slippers, so I checked out a few major camera retailers to see what sort of camera bags are available for less than 30 smackers. 

Over the past 72 hours I’ve removed 19-inch-deep snow from my driveway and spent three days and nights without heat or lights. Things were so bad my faithful dog ran an ad in the newspaper looking for a new home. I don’t know what I did to irk the snowplow driver but he neatly sealed my drive with a four-foot wall of solid ice. And did I mention that four of my trees fell from the weight of the snow, one narrowly missing the house? So in the wake of this madness I did the only thing a sane person would do: I made of list of the new camera stuff I want to get if the sun ever shines again in New Jersey.

I saw you in the high school gym last night, clicking away with your DSLR and long telephoto zoom. You weren’t obnoxious like the lady behind you who kept firing her point-and-shoot—with flash—from fifty feet away, or the couple who held their cell phones high above their heads (they were either shooting video, playing 3D Candy Crush or signaling their alien Mother Ship, I couldn’t tell which). But I felt sorry for you, because I could tell that your photos would turn out crappy. 

A friend showed me a Father’s Day gift list published by venerable Vogue and on it was a pair of socks from Thom Browne for $150. Not to be a lowbrow, but I would think that for $75 a foot they could at least learn how to spell colors. If I put $150 socks on my feet I’m afraid that my other extremities would be jealous. Imagine what I’d have to pay for a hat, gloves and a jockstrap.

Dads and tools go together like crooked public servants and greasy bags of banknotes. Photographers tend to tote tools, too. Put it all together (minus the politician) and we just might have the perfect Father’s Day gift suggestion. And it comes from SOG, a company with a rich and venerated heritage.