Not my smartest move

I love a deal, and if you look at my audio setup, it is very much made up of equipment that is on sale, which means I have saved around £3,000 on my setup. Whilst less so, the same goes with camera gear. I am always looking for a good deal. Saving thousands on cameras, lenses, camera bags, tripods, lighting and peripherals, etc. Which is very good, and the vast majority of equipment I buy I buy for a good reason.

Unfortunately, this wasn’t the case with todays purchase. I started out looking for a camera stand, for studio, but ended up getting side tracked, looking at various items I could buy that could save me £75. Now, these items were useful. A couple of light stands, as well as a couple of cable bags, a monopod, and a CF express type B memory card. Which was all very reasonable.

Unfortunately, after that I went a little stupid and bought a camera lens. So the camera lens is the Zeiss 21mm f/2.8 Milvus. Now, I love Zeiss lenses, and own the Zeiss 85mm f/1.4 Milvus and 135mm f2 APO Sonnar, which are two great lenses. I have also thought about getting the 35mm and 50mm lenses, but have resisted, because I know I don’t really need them.

The same goes for the 21mm f/2.8 Milvus. It is a great lens, based on the 21mm f/2.8 Distagon. but with a new weather sealed body and coatings. Normally costing £1675, I could buy a open box copy with full warranty for £724.99, and I did.

The problem is, I can’t really think of much of a use for it. Now I am sure I will find one but it isn’t a lens that is going to make my life better, or get me more work. I am not particularly a landscape photographer, and I find it a little too wide for character portraits.

The truth is I bought the lens for the wrong reasons. Last night I was feeling a little down, and this morning ever worse. My shoot haven’t gone as planned the day before and I just felt lifeless. I was meant to be going to the gym but blow that off. So buying stuff was really my way of trying to cheer myself up and get a dopamine rush (very common in the ADHD world), Made even better because it was a very good deal.

The next reason is snobbery. I must admit to being a lens snob, and Zeiss lenses are the ultimate in lens snobbery. They are very very good, but they are not very practical. My Zeiss 85mm f/1.4 Milvus rarely leaves my bag, because it is a manual lens and not massively practical on my D850, when it comes to focus (though better than my D800). With my 135mm f/2, I use it almost exclusively on my GFX100s.

So whilst they give great images, the practicality gets in the way, but I knew that going into buying the 21mm f/2.8. In reality I will only really start getting the most out of my Zeiss lenses if I buy a mirrorless camera which fits them. But I have more than enough camera, as it is.

So today was not my finest day. But such is life.