80-400 f/4.5 VR Popularity

[sapper6fd]

Im thinking of picking up this lens for wildlife and cant find many reviews on the net about it. There are only a handfull compared to the millions of reviews on everything else. Does anyone own this lens, if so how do you like it? How good is it for wildlife photography (without spending thousands more $$$ for a faster f/2.8 zoom lens)? Does anyone have any photos they can post taken with this lens?

Cheers,

Sapper

 

[Infinite_Day]

For the money you may want to consider the 300mm f/4 + 1.4TC combo that I use. It ends up giving you a 420mm f/5.6 that still is quite sharp when used correctly. Of course, you don't get VR with that set-up. I was heavily considering the 80-400 as well as some of the long Sigmas but ultimately ended up with the 300mm f/4. It had the best reviews and I figured it would have the best re-sell value should I ever choose to change to something different. They both use the same tripod collar which is not very good and the biggest gripe with the 80-400 was focus because it's never been updated to AF-S.