11 Essential Accessories That EVERY Beginner Photographer Should Have

Are you a beginner when it comes to Photography? Well you're in luck, because in this video we're counting down the top 11 gear items you need as a beginning photographer. They're all pretty affordable while not being cheap in quality. Whether you're into Landscapes, Portraits, Strobist, or Product Photography, you'll find what you need to get your photography to the next level.

Neewer 43-inch / 110cm 5-in-1 Collapsible Multi-Disc Light Reflector

Neewer® 5 in 1 Portable 24 x 36"/60 x 90cm Round Collapsible Reflector/Diffuser

DustAid Dust Wand Kit

Nikon AF-S FX NIKKOR 50mm f/1.8G Lens with Auto Focus for Nikon DSLR Cameras

Nikon AF FX NIKKOR 50mm f/1.8D Lens with Auto Focus for Nikon DSLR Cameras

Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 STM Lens

YONGNUO YN50mm F1.8 Lens Large Aperture Auto Focus Lens For Canon EF Mount EOS Camera

Tripods

YONGNUO YN560 IV Wireless Flash Speedlite Master + Slave Flash + Built-in Trigger System for Canon Nikon Pentax Olympus Fujifilm Panasonic Digital Cameras

Giottos Rocket Air Blaster Air Blower

Lightdow 12 x 12 Inch (30 x 30 cm) White Balance 18% Gray Reference Reflector Grey Card with Carry Bag

ExpoDisc EXPOD2-77 2.0 Professional White Balance Filter

X-Rite ColorChecker Passport

Zeiss Pre-Moistened Lens Cleaning Wipes

NEEWER® 160 LED CN-160 Dimmable Ultra High Power Panel Digital Camera / Camcorder Video Light, LED Light for Canon, Nikon, Pentax, Panasonic,SONY, Samsung and Olympus Digital SLR Cameras

Adobe Creative Cloud Photography plan (Photoshop CC + Lightroom)

Cases

[joeyw]

Every beginner photographer should have a camera.

[DavidVogt]

The Yongnuo flash is AWESOME. I have a ton of them and they work beautifully. Would never spend $600 for a "brand-name" flash again.

[esanford]

This is very good but very fashion - centric. I do landscapes. I recommend that photographers to explore available light before even thinking about a flash. In my film days, I had several flashes for doing sports portraiture. I switched to digital 5 years ago and have yet to buy a flash. That money can be invested into other areas if you are into nature, landscape, photojournalism and travel. When you master the art of managing available light, you are then ready to tackle flash.

[MichelleCoxPhotography]

This is a really great list for any photographer. I am a wedding phootgrapher so I can see some things that would need to be added for other wedding photographers but for "any" photographers I would say that you pretty much covered it!

[pgm]

I'd recommend a cable (or wireless) shutter release, and a CPL to fit the phi of your favorite lens. A cable release lets you do long exposures without jiggling the camera, and a CPL will cut glare on most reflective surfaces, bring out cloud details on overcast days, darken and enhance a blown-out sunny sky, and let you shoot through windows with only the controlled amount of reflection you want. Spare batteries, say, two of them, are useful more often than you'd think. A back-up SD card is a good idea too; it doesn't have to be a large-capacity one, it just needs to allow you to finish the day's shoot if you somehow run out of room (which can happen if you store JPGs, RAWs, and vids on the same card, which is not an unusual thing to do). You don't need all this at once! But you've just become very easy to buy Christmas gifts for.

[slgmc]

The camera shop at Thats in Dublin Ireland.. I recognise it..

[markharris]

May I add another two? Macro lenses are far from cheap, but extension tubes are dirt cheap. You can get them that will allow you to use your AF etc and they are a trillion times better than those tip off macro filters, even those that you have to manually focus are better that the filters. Then I don’t think you mentioned a remote, Sometimes you want either to catch motion or totally freeze it with no blur at all, bot require mirror lockup and a remote, get the cheapest rather than expensive brands. I came across the lens wipes many years ago when I bought them for my spectacles. Mmm, looking at the comment below this isn’t the first time I’ve watched the video, funny I never thought of a polarising lens today. I have subscribed this time on the strength of your first video I think.

[flywheeldk]

I'm not sure about the Gimp (We'll never become great chums), though it is powerfull - but other open source packages like Darktable, LightZone or even KDE DigiKam are getting quite good for most usage.

They also have the advantage that you are not forced to run the software on WINE - like you have to with the Adobe products.

[Dilavercan]

Hi. Thanks for the video. Helpful as always. I have a Nikon d7200 with 18-105mm and a 50mm f1.8d. Do you think i should invest in a 50mm f1.8g or an other lens. 18-105mm is also soft as hell. I usually walk around the city and take pictures and occassionally when we go to holidays i shoot landscapes and nature. Not really wildlife.

I know it's been a year since this video is published but would really love an answer.

[markharris]

I'd get a polarising filter before I bought a sensor cleaning kit. I send all my cameras away in rotation for a CLA, especially my MF 120 cameras, I just don't think it's worth the risk of my damaging them.

[kevinsanabria]

Not sure if someone said but Invest in a good SD card that your camera can take advantage of

[EssenceReidOxley]

I would also say an external hard drive

[marshallgaming]

Is the 70 - 300 mm lens a good beginners lens.

[kieranbooth]

ive just bought a nikon d5300 which came with the AF-P 18-55mm kit lense. would i see a big difference if i bought one of the lenses recommended on this list?

[EdduVaz]

4:03 whats the thing the man is using ?

[jagannathsahoo]

What about the SD Cards? I think its most important.

[stevenhalley]

i came here for the girl in the cover photo?

[jotabe]

well...
That's a lot of sh1t to buy...
I don't think beginners need that much stuffs, for real... 1/2 of this items are ment for professional usage...
My opinion:
0) CAMERA! DLSR/Mirrorless

1) Reflector: Ok on this one, its cheap and can even light in many situations...

2) 50mm 1.8: mmmm yea, it is "ok" but be aware that crop sensors APS-C camera will get around 80mm FoV with the 50mm so maybe a 17-50 f2.8 should be better buy despite the cost...?

3) Sensor cleaner: nope, can't agree here... sensor will get way less dusty if there's just a little or nothing at all of lens change. and for beginners that ain't such a big deal since they have few lenses anyway


4) Air blower: same principle as sensor cleaner, they are usefull but not that much at a beginner degree

5) lens wipes: these are very very usefull, even at beginner degree. There are also non disposables ones


6) off camera flash: yea, it is ok to buy one and to add up to the camera, i will add a diffuser to the flash. But Flash should come way after the 2nd or even 3rd lens and reflector. There's also several ways to make (or even purchase) diffusers for popup flash that can improve the light that integrated flash produces, that's kind of a kickstarter that works pretty well.

7) Led Light: i will suggest a DIY led light, they are at the end of the day more video oriented than photography... but since many people ask photographer to also do video... so so...

8) Tripod: should be in the first 3 items. its the tool needed to help slow lenses like the kit one, and its the only way to get long exposure photos

9) light temperature reference card: completely unnecesary... learning photography is the way to correctly set the color temperature... camera will help a lot but furthermore, there are lightmeters as cell apps that can be downloaded and at the end of the day, changing the color depth is way easy on Lightroom or any Raw processing software. Really? a beginner need that?

10) Photoshop + Lightroom: are they the industry Standars? yes! Are they absolutely mandatory as a Pro? mostly (not entirely) Yes! Are they mandatory for Beginners or amateur degree? NO! There are at least 5 competitive Raw Processing Software that can replace LightRoom, one of them is RawTherapee which is under GNU licence. As for Photoshop, thruth is that it is far ahead from competition, and more on considering the free mainstream free software option (Gimp) that can't replace Photoshop by any means. But this doesn't mean you can't work with Rawtherapee + Photoshop or even RawTherapee+Gimp in a prosumer degree and get very very nice results. So at the end of the day, many people can get away without paying for these programs that costs 120 dollars a year (way expensive for end user that does not gain money out of their pictures).
BUT BEFORE THE SOFT ITS THE PC... A nice pc with at least 4 fast cores or 8 thread CPU(2nd gen i5, Fx8 core or stronger) 16gb of RAM, a lot of HDD Space and a dedicated GPU (not a very strong one but at least 1gb Vram for 1080p display and 2gb vram for 4k) its mandatory for raw processing and JPEG editing. Yes, an old Phenom II with even 4gb of ram will do for a little while, and maybe a 1st gen i5 with 8gb ram will do for a couple of seasons, but at the end of the day, a strong PC will be required, since a photoshoot will end with hundreds of photos and that's a lot of work to put on weak hardware

11) camera case: yea that will grow with the gear...


So out of the mentioned:
.1) camera [+DIY or purchased popup flash diffuser + entry level case] .2) improved lens over the kit one .3) Tripod .4) Reflector(s) kit .5) off camera flash + diffuser .6) PC (i mean photo editing capable PC) with free software clones to Adobe suite

[mikaels-p]

Excuse me, but did you say beginner? I don't have a budget for that

[andresgroove]

THAT GEAR DOES'T LOOK FOR A BEGINNER, ..