I have a nikon D3100 that i have had for several years. I am now just getting more into photography. I have a 18-55mm lense and a 55-300. Looking for more lenses to explore with. Wildlife, landscape and pportrait.any other accessories to try?
Also looking for a good picture editing software thats free without subscriptions.
Any suggestions appreciated
As already mentioned, you can do a lot with your two lenses including all of your stated subjects.
Also as already noted, if you are looking for lower light and shallower depth of field the Nikon AF-S DX 35mm f/1.8 and AF-S 50mm f/1.8G are good options. The 35mm was a bargain (and still is). It is still available new and can be found used at pretty low prices. It is a good all around prime that gives a field of view equal to a 50mm lens on an FX (full frame) body. The AF-S 50mm f/1.8 is an FX lens but works fine on you DX body and the weaker corner areas will not show on your smaller sensor. This is a good portrait lens on your D3100 with a field of view equivalent to that of a 75mm lens on a full frame body. Also still available new, it can be found used at good prices. Note the Nikon AF 50mm f/1.8D lens will not autofocus on your body, so you want the G type lens.
The Nikon AF-S DX 18-140mm f/3.5-5.6G lens is a pretty good all in one walk around lens. You already cover this range with your two lenses, but you need to change to move from the wide angle to the 55-140mm range.
Personally, I don't find 18mm wide enough on DX bodies for some subjects. I'm sort of a wide angle junkie so the 18-55mm or 18-140mm options were not wide enough for me. But 18mm is wide enough for a lot of folks.
Tokina makes or made several 11-16mm f/2.8 and 11-20mm f/2.8 lenses that are excellent. The latest version is still available new and the various iterations are easy to find used. They also made a pretty decent 12-28mm lens for Nikon DX bodies.
Sigma made a couple of 10-20mm lenses that work pretty well. I still use my Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 with my ancient Nikon D40 and even with my D7100 though it doesn't autofocus on the D7100 after the last couple of camera firmware updates.
Nikon made a couple of 10-20, a couple of 10-24, and a 12-24mm DX lens. Avoid the Nikon AF-P DX 10-20mm as this version won't autofocus on your D3100. Stick with the AF-S lenses.
If you want a long telephoto zoom for wildlife the Nikon AF-S 200-500 f/5.6E has a pretty good reputation. You will likely want some support system such as a monopod to use with this lens.The Nikon AF-S 80-400mm f/4.5-5.6G is a bit easier to handhold than the 200-500 and costs a bit more on the used market. Honestly though, I'm not sure I would spend $800 to $2000 on a long telephoto for use with your 14-15 year old D3100. Use your 55-300mm lens and get close to large animals. With care it can even be useful for birds around a bird feeder if you are stealthy.
As for free software GIMP is used by many folks. If you want to work with raw files (Nikon .NEF) you will need a raw development program. Nikon NX Studio and RawTherapee are Free. DarkTable is also free and can do raw processing as well as work on other file types like jpeg and tiff.
Note that Nikon NX Studio is the only program that can produce jpeg files from .NEF files that would look exactly like jpeg files from the camera. That is important to some people, along with the ability to modify and create custom picture controls. But a lot of Nikon users do not use NX Studio.
If you are a Mac user you can do basic editing (colors, brighness, contrast, curves, white balance, sharpening, etc, but no masking and layers) of jpg and .NEF files using the Photos app (same on iPad and iPhone too).
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If cameras and lenses can have autofocus then why can't I?
