Home / Lens

Nikon 28-300mm VR Review

Oct
5
2010
October 5, 2010
By 325 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens that was released in August of 2010 along with the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G and 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR DX lenses. It is no secret that Nikon released the 28-300mm largely due to the popular demand of the 18-200mm lens. The large zoom range of the Nikon 18-200mm and its generally good performance made it a lens of choice for those, who wanted to have a good lightweight travel lens or only wanted to use one lens on their DSLR cameras. Despite the fact that the lens suffered from some serious issues such as lens creep, heavy distortion and sharpness issues beyond 105mm, some photographers and reviewers praised the 18-200mm so much, that the demand increased significantly, resulting in heavy lens shortages around the world. During this time, Nikon had a hard time keeping the lens on the shelves and the only way to obtain it was to either pay a premium and buy it from Ebay, or order and wait for months until Nikon sent another batch to retailers. I remember this period of time very well, since I had to wait for 3 months to get my copy of the lens. Ever since Nikon released the FX full-frame sensor, more and more photographers have been switching from DX to FX. Since Nikon 18-200mm is a DX lens, an FX camera would fall back to DX mode, giving less than half the resolution – a problematic situation for most photographers that use the current 12 megapixel cameras. Therefore, photographers that made the switch from cropped sensor cameras to full-frame, ended up selling or trading their DX lenses for the above reason, including the much loved Nikon 18-200mm.

Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR

In response to the popular demand, this year Nikon released an FX version of the Nikon 18-200mm lens, the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR. Nikon retained most of the lens design, but did make some modifications, to reach good performance levels on FX cameras. In this review, I will do my best to provide a detailed analysis of the lens’ performance, including sharpness tests in various conditions and provide comparison tests against the Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G DX VR II lens and other pro-level FX lenses such as Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G and Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , , , ,

Nikon 85mm f/1.4G Review

Sep
23
2010
September 23, 2010
By 129 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S lens that was announced with three other lenses in August of 2010. Ever since the manual focus AI-s version of the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 lens was introduced back in 1981, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 lenses have been used as references for superb sharpness, best-looking bokeh and beautiful color renditions. The last autofocus AF-D version of the lens produced in 1995, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4D, was often called the “king of bokeh”, yielding extremely pleasing out-of-focus areas, in addition to producing tack-sharp, colorful images when shooting wide open at maximum aperture of f/1.4. Its legendary performance made the Nikon 85mm f/1.4D lens a must-have for portrait photographers and many professionals have been heavily relying on this lens for their commercial work. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S lens is the latest update to the 85mm f/1.4 line, which replaces the outdated AF-D version with the latest optical and technology innovations from Nikon. In this review, I will not only provide information on the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G lens, but will also compare it against the older Nikon 85mm f/1.4D and the Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II lenses.

The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

Nikon 85mm f/1.4G

The highly anticipated Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S is a professional-grade lens that is specifically designed for portrait, studio and wedding photographers that need an ultra-fast, high quality lens with a large aperture of f/1.4 for low-light situations and shallow depth of field to isolate subjects from the background, without compromising image quality and sharpness. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G is built to work extremely well on both FX and DX sensors, yielding very sharp results in the center frame, as shown in the following pages of this review. Nikon has incorporated the latest technology and optical formulas to this lens, including AF-S silent-wave focus motor and Nano crystal coating. Just like most Nikon professional lenses, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G has a 77mm filter thread and is also sealed against dust and tough weather conditions for outdoors field use.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , , , ,

Nikon 200mm f/2G ED VR II Announcement

Sep
16
2010
September 16, 2010
By 15 Comments

It surely has been a busy year at Nikon, with a total of 9 lens releases, which is quite high for the company. A large number of the released lenses are prime lenses, certainly a good move by Nikon, since prime lenses are quite popular among professionals specializing in different types of portraiture work. The Nikon 200mm f/2G is no exception – it is a popular lens among portrait and sports photographers that need to work with fast apertures and isolate their subjects from backgrounds with soft and creamy bokeh. Similar to the Nikon 300mm f/2.8G VR II lens, the Nikon 200mm f/2G ED VR II is a minor update to the legendary Nikon 200mm f/2G VR lens.

Nikon 200mm f/2G ED VR II

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,

Nikon 35mm f/1.4G AF-S Announcement

Sep
15
2010
September 15, 2010
By 6 Comments

NOTE: A full review of this lens can be found in my Nikon 35mm f/1.4G Review article.

Along with the Nikon D7000, Nikon today released two more lenses – Nikon 35mm f/1.4G AF-S and Nikon 200mm f/2G ED VR II AF-S, both pro-level upgrades to the existing 35mm f/1.4 and 200mm f/2 lenses. The Nikon 35mm f/1.4G has been long overdue, since the last f/1.4 version of the lens was released back in 1982 with no autofocus. The 35mm line of lenses was later changed to f/2.0 and the last “D” version of the lens, known as “Nikon 35mm f/2.0D” has been the only 35mm lens that can autofocus on current Nikon DSLRs. The Nikon 35mm f/1.4G re-establishes the 35mm line with an ultra-fast aperture of f/1.4 and sets new standards with the latest optical technologies from Nikon. It is the third professional prime lens Nikon has updated this year (Nikon 24mm f/1.4G and Nikon 85mm f/1.4G were released earlier), which shows Nikon’s commitment to upgrade the entire line of popular prime lenses that have not been touched for years.

Nikon 35mm f/1.4G AF-S

The Nikon 35mm f/1.4G is an ultra-fast, FX wide-angle lens that is suitable for many kinds of photography such as landscape, architectural, wedding, photojournalism and astrophotography.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , , ,

Nikon Lens Comparison

Sep
12
2010
September 12, 2010
By 26 Comments

I will soon start to provide sample images from the new lenses and will be posting reviews of older and newer Nikon lenses, one at a time. The lens comparison I’m working on is quite extensive, covering over 10 Nikon lenses, most of which are Nikon DX lenses:

Nikon Lens Comparison

Nikon Lens Comparison

From left to right:

  • Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 85mm f/1.4G
  • Nikon 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 16-85mm f/3.5-5.6G
  • Nikon 55-200mm f/4-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G VR II
  • Nikon 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 18-105mm f/3.5-5.6G VR
  • Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G

I have not yet received the Nikon 24-120mm f/4.0G due to a backorder situation, but hoping to get it within the next week. I also have the Nikon 85mm f/1.4D to compare against the new 85mm f/1.4G, so I will be posting a comparison between the two in the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G review. Most of the above lenses have been in my camera bag for several weeks now and while I will be returning the older lenses this week, I will take the new lenses with me to a 4 day trip to mountains this weekend.

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,

New Nikon Lenses

Sep
10
2010
September 10, 2010
By 10 Comments

I have not been posting for more than a week now, so I wanted to let our readers know that we have been extremely busy with moving to a different location and heavily testing Nikon gear (cameras and lenses). The new lenses have arrived and I will be out testing them under all kinds of conditions and will do some traveling next week.

The good thing is, I not only have the newly released lenses, but also some of the older DX lenses such as Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G, Nikon 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G and Nikon 55-200mm f/3.5-5.6G to compare against. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G will get a special treatment and Lola will be shooting heavily with it to get a good number of shots for my review. The new Nikon D3100 will be compared against the Nikon D5000 and D300.

Sunset shot with Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G

Sunset shot with Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G

More to come!

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,

Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR DX Announcement

Aug
19
2010
August 19, 2010
By 9 Comments

NOTE: A full review of this lens can be found in my Nikon 55-300mm VR Review article.

The last announcement from today is the Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR DX lens, an update to the existing Nikon 55-200mm f/4-5.6G IF-ED VR DX lens that was announced back in March of 2007. The lens was announced together with the Nikon D3100, because it is a DX lens and will most likely be a part of the future two lens kit for the D3100.

Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,

Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR Announcement

Aug
19
2010
By 29 Comments

NOTE: A full review of this lens can be found in my Nikon 28-300mm VR Review article.

When I first heard of a possible release of the Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G VR lens for FX, I did not believe it, simply because it is extremely hard to design a superzoom lens with such range that would perform well on a full-frame sensor. Today, Nikon responded to the popularity of the Nikon 18-200mm lens by announcing the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens for FX sensors.

Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: ,

Nikon 24-120mm f/4G ED VR Announcement

Aug
19
2010
By 31 Comments

NOTE: A full review of this lens can be found in my Nikon 24-120mm VR Review article.

Another lens that has been released today is the Nikon 24-120mm f/4.G ED VR – an update to the Nikon 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED VR lens that has been out since 2003. The lens has been completely redesigned with a constant aperture of f/4, now coming with a gold ring around the front of the lens barrel, which is an indication of Nikon’s professional line of lenses.

Nikon 24-120mm f/4.0G ED VR

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,

Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S Announcement

Aug
19
2010
By 19 Comments

NOTE: A full review of this lens can be found in my Nikon 85mm f/1.4G Review article.

Along with the Nikon D3100 DSLR camera, Nikon also released the long-expected and overdue Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S – an update to the legendary Nikon 85mm f/1.4D that has been our top choice for portraiture and wedding photography. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4D has always been the “king” of bokeh and because of this, has been considered to be one of the best lenses for portraiture and low-light photography.

Nikon 85mm f/1.4G

[Read more...]

Filed Under: Cameras and Lenses Tagged With: , ,