Prime vs Zoom 28mm, 50mm, 85mm vs 24-70 2.8

[astroNikon]

I have the 28 and 85G, and the 50 and 60D.

I also have two older zooms, the 35-70D and the 28-200D. I barely use them, but keep them around for my film camera, which I never use anymore either, lol.

The 35-70D is an interesting lens because it's also a macro. You have to manually turn it on to macro. The zoom on it is one of those push-pulls. It gives a very contrasty image and I quite like the way it renders color, especially outdoors.

But I use primes 99.9% of the time. This morning I went out shooting and brought the 28 and 60. The 28 for wider shots and the 60 for closer shots and just in case I needed macro.

I have the 35-70/2.8 AFD too and I have a hard time using it but not becz of my primes but becz I have a 24-85 AFD - just more reach both ways on my d600.
I use the 80-200/2.8 AFD all the time for my kids sports, its the lens on my d7000 half of the time.

 

[Coasty]

I adore my 28-70 f2.8 & 80-200 f2.8, but my 50mm f1.8d is my favorite and it was only $99.99!!!

As much as you love your 1.8D I love my 1.4D even more-so there :mrgreen:

You guys may love your 1.8’s and 1.4’s, but I’m having an affair with my 50mm f1.2.

 

[goodguy]

I adore my 28-70 f2.8 & 80-200 f2.8, but my 50mm f1.8d is my favorite and it was only $99.99!!!

As much as you love your 1.8D I love my 1.4D even more-so there :mrgreen:

You guys may love your 1.8’s and 1.4’s, but I’m having an affair with my 50mm f1.2.

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

 

[astroNikon]

I adore my 28-70 f2.8 & 80-200 f2.8, but my 50mm f1.8d is my favorite and it was only $99.99!!!

As much as you love your 1.8D I love my 1.4D even more-so there :mrgreen:

You guys may love your 1.8’s and 1.4’s, but I’m having an affair with my 50mm f1.2.

:cheers: . . . :geek:

 

[boomer]

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

That's what focus confirmation is for

 

[Coasty]

As much as you love your 1.8D I love my 1.4D even more-so there :mrgreen:

You guys may love your 1.8’s and 1.4’s, but I’m having an affair with my 50mm f1.2.

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

I was hoping to have several 20 year old Seeing Eye girlfriends to do all the heavy work when I’m that old.

 

[goodguy]

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

That's what focus confirmation is for

Absolutly great, I never knew that, thank you for the informative link.

 

[goodguy]

You guys may love your 1.8’s and 1.4’s, but I’m having an affair with my 50mm f1.2.

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

I was hoping to have several 20 year old Seeing Eye girlfriends to do all the heavy work when I’m that old.

LOL good luck with that , looks like you have good eye sigt and good sense of humour.

 

[Coasty]

Not for a long time!!!
You reach my age and you will see your eyes will betray you and you will need the camera to AF for you and then bye bye 50mm f1.2 :mrgreen:

Sorry dont want to be mean its just the way our body works

I was hoping to have several 20 year old Seeing Eye girlfriends to do all the heavy work when I’m that old.

LOL good luck with that , looks like you have good eye sigt and good sense of humour.

I was going to say one, but my wife said go big or stay home.

 

[iPwnF00lz]

I really love primes! Besides the size and weight difference I feel like having to physically frame your shots by either moving closer or further away helps my creative thought process before deciding when to pull the trigger. It helps keep a sharp eye for everything through the frame, you really start to see the world the same way after using them enough hah.. I'm using the 35 1.8 and 40 2.8. nikkor lenses for my d90 & although some may say it's dumb to have such similar focal lengths it does show a significant difference.

 

[djacobox372]

It wasn't worth the extra cost to me, I was willing to sacrifice that in order to get OS, save a bit of weight/size and a lot of $$$. The Nikon still suffers from the same in comparison to a prime, it's like science or something.

Extra cost?

U can get a 24mm 2.8 afd, 50mm f1.4 afd, and 85mm 1.8 afd for about half the cost of a 24-70mm f2.8 afs. And the af primes focus as fast as the afs zoom.

 

[PaulWog]

It wasn't worth the extra cost to me, I was willing to sacrifice that in order to get OS, save a bit of weight/size and a lot of $$$. The Nikon still suffers from the same in comparison to a prime, it's like science or something.

Extra cost?

U can get a 24mm 2.8 afd, 50mm f1.4 afd, and 85mm 1.8 afd for about half the cost of a 24-70mm f2.8 afs. And the af primes focus as fast as the afs zoom.

Pretty sure the 24-70 focuses a fair bit faster?

 

[Braineack]

It wasn't worth the extra cost to me, I was willing to sacrifice that in order to get OS, save a bit of weight/size and a lot of $$$. The Nikon still suffers from the same in comparison to a prime, it's like science or something.

Extra cost?

U can get a 24mm 2.8 afd, 50mm f1.4 afd, and 85mm 1.8 afd for about half the cost of a 24-70mm f2.8 afs. And the af primes focus as fast as the afs zoom.

I was comparing the extra cost of the Nikon 24-70 over the Tamron 24-70. I spent ~$1100 on it open box, where the Nikon would be still roughly $1500 used.

So I was saying that I saved a few hundred bucks getting the Tamron over the Nikon, sacrificing a *little* IQ and corner sharpness at the extremes, to gain a smaller/lighter lens with Vibration Control.

I paid significantly more for a 24-70 f/2.8 over the slower/older prime lenses you listed off, sure, in order to have one lens that covers the entire focal range.

But what if I wanted the 24/28mm f/1.4G or 1.8G, the 50mm f/1.4G or 1.8G, and the 85mm f/1.4G or 1.8G. That's roughly ~$1400 for all the 1.8Gs and roughly ~$4,500 for all the 1.4Gs.

 

[Derrel]

It wasn't worth the extra cost to me, I was willing to sacrifice that in order to get OS, save a bit of weight/size and a lot of $$$. The Nikon still suffers from the same in comparison to a prime, it's like science or something.

Extra cost?

U can get a 24mm 2.8 afd, 50mm f1.4 afd, and 85mm 1.8 afd for about half the cost of a 24-70mm f2.8 afs. And the af primes focus as fast as the afs zoom.

Pretty sure the 24-70 focuses a fair bit faster?

No, not really...those AF-D prime lenses focus quite rapidly, and the 50 and the 85mm let in more light. The 85/1.8 AF-D uses a rear-group, internal element AF system, so its focusing group is small and light. The 50mm uses front-cell focusing, which moves the entire front element group back and forth, but it's smallish, and the lens has shallow DOF so the focusing data is very much "in" or "out", so it focuses pretty quickly. I would not characterize the small Nikon primes as "slow focusers" really.

 

[Solarflare]

I've been told that these standard AF f1.8D primes focus faster than the corresponding AF-S f1.8G lenses, but the AF-S motor in the lens is apparently more accurate and realizes even small changes in focus without problem, which the AF lenses dont.