Nikon 180mm f/2.8 AF ID-ED...to buy or not to buy?

[DScience]

Hi there,

So I am considering this lens from a person on Craigslist, for $600. What are peoples thoughts on this lens? Any with direct experience?

Another thing i'm curious, is the DOF with this lens. Would you say that i'll get a similar DOF with the 180mm at f/2.8 as I would get with my 105mm at f/2?

 

[djacobox372]

you should consider buying a 80-200 af 2.8, they can be had in near mint condition for 600.

im a fan of primes but the optical quality of the 80-200 is so good that i dont see a need for a 180 prime

 

[DScience]

Thanks, but if I get a long range zoom i'll only get the 70-200. Otherwise, primes are what i'm all about.

 

[Sachphotography]

ITs a great lens. I would offer him 500 for it. I see them go on ebay for 450-550. It is a great lens. A nice thing is it is lighter than the 80-200 and it is tack sharp. I almost bought a used one back in OKC when I was there. The only down side is the focusing speed is not super fast like AFS but it is a good lens. The lighter weight is a def plus as I think it is a ful lb lighter. Super super tack sharp lens though.

 

[Derrel]

Focusing speed of this lens in quite slow. I own the lens, and owned the pre-D version before the AF-D model; there is no significant optical and no real performance difference between the late AF model and the AF-D version. THis is an older design than you might be comfortable with. To use it in manual focus mode, you need to flip the A/M switch on the lens barrel AND the AF selector on the body, meaning that this is one of the most mechanically-kludgy lenses in the entire Nikon lineup; this lens is either an AF lens, or a Manual focusing lens, because it's a two-step process to go each way between AF and MF.

The lens is light weight and pretty sharp. It suffers from clear, strong purple fringing on high-contrast out of focus areas, and on really bright highlights like windshields, highlights on water, bright metals, or any other type of bright, harsh highlights--this lens brings with it some strong,very obvious purple fringing in those types of conditions. I would never pay $600 for this lens; that price is too high and the lens is not worth that kind of money. One thing that this lens is not too bad at is when used with a 12mm or 25mm extension tube; it makes a decent field macro lens. It's much smaller and less-conspicuous than a 70-200/2.8 zoom lens. The shallow DOF of this lens at f/2.8 is probably pretty close to the 105 at f/2, but on a 1.5x body with a 180mm lens, you will be shooting at longer distances to encompass many subjects, and as you know DISTANCE from camera to subject is the fastest-acting factor in increasing (or decreasing) depth of field.