Am I making a good Lens Purchase decision for a NIkon D7000.

[Kyle R Williams]

Hello, I have started a part time job for several months till my season starts back up with some of the money I will be putting towards lenses and I landed on these 2 ones.

NIKON 50MM F/1.4 AIS MANUAL FOCUS LENS

and NIKON 80-200MM F/2.8 D ED IF AF-S AUTOFOCUS.

The 50 MM is for Video and Music.

The Nikon 80-200 MM is for Music and Lifestyle Photography and Video.


Am I making a bad decision or did I hit the nail on the head theirs about $1 grand in len's minus new gear I am buying.

 

[KmH]

Did you know your D7000 has a manual focusing aid?
It's called the Electronic Rangefinder and you can read about it on page 100 of your D7000 user manual.

I've never used the 50 f/1.4 AiS, but I have used the AF 80-200 mm f/2.8D IF ED 2-ring which is a great lens for it's price. Good used copies go from $600 to $675. Check KEH.com becuase KEH includes a 6 month warranty on most of their used gear.

I'm currently using the 2-ring 80-200's predecessor - the AF 80-200 mm f.2/8 ED 1-ring (push-pull to zoom). Good used copies of the 1-ring ED 80-200 are $300 to $350 or so.

 

[Derrel]

Well, the 50.1.4 Ai-S is still a decent 50mm lens. See this test: Nikon 50mm Lens Comparison

It's fine. The 80-200/2.8 AF-S is the most recent lens I have bought. It has good handling, and the focus lock buttons on the barrel, at the mid-point of the barrel,make this the best Nikon lens ever made for portraiture where you want to focus, and re-compose and lock the focus point when shooting TALLS. It focuses fast; maybe not as fast as the 70-200 VR, but still, quite fast. It has an aperture ring on the lens, which is handy for video. A 50 1.4 Ai-S plus a clean 80-200 AF-S is worth $1,000, yes. The 80-200 AF-S has FIVE ED glass elements, and is a better lens wide-open than the two-ring, much cheaper, much more-common AF-D model. It has better, more-expensive optics, and always retailed for much more money.

If you plan on shooting at f/4 or f/5.6 or whatever, the 80-200 AF-D "two-ring" lens is okay, but the focus will be whiny. If you want a higher-grade lens though, the 80-200 AF-S is a fgood lens on FX Nikon. The 70-200 VR lens handles GREAT, but is not very good on FX 24MP: the corners are poor on it on FX. Modern, high-MP d-slr cameras., especially FX format bodies, are starting to show the issues some of the older lenses have.

I had a couple older 80-200/2.8 ONE-ring zooms. Doggy. Loud, slow focusing. PLENTY of uncorrected color fringing at the longer end. LOTS of light fall-off. Not nearly good enough for modern high MP cameras. Very light though-15 oz lighter than other 80-200 Nikkors. Approaching 30 year old design, and mechanically a lot of these things are like a beat-to-**** old farm truck. Mechanically very clunky, kludgy.

Read the Thom Hogan 80-200 2.8 AF-D lens review, and pay careful attention to what he says; as he notes now, we are no longer in the 6-megapixel d-slr era, and a lot of lenses that are fine on low-rez, older cameras can no longer cut the mustard, especially at f/2.8. If you are at 24- or 36-MP now, do not sink money into stuff that ONCE was good, but now is not good enough.

THE REAL SLEEPER is actually the new 70-200 f/4 AF-S VR-G; now there is a modern, affordable lens, one of the best zooms on the market. Yes, it's f/4 but it's far better than anything older at f/4.

 

[Kyle R Williams]

Read the Thom Hogan 80-200 2.8 AF-D lens review, and pay careful attention to what he says; as he notes now, we are no longer in the 6-megapixel d-slr era, and a lot of lenses that are fine on low-rez, older cameras can no longer cut the mustard, especially at f/2.8. If you are at 24- or 36-MP now, do not sink money into stuff that ONCE was good, but now is not good enough down the road


Reply I do plan down the road to get a fx cam soz.

 

[Derrel]

I really LIKE the 80-200 AF-S. I stopped using my 70-200 AF-S VR-G aka "the original 70-200 VR" because the older 80-200 AF-S is a markedly better lens at the corners and outer parts of the 24-MP frame. The 80-200 AF-S was the BEST 80-200 Nikon could make at the time, and it was designed for full-frame, 35mm film. The 70-200 VR-G was designed for crop-body digital, and has a really skinny barrel and it has a really high central sharpness, but the edges are very weak on FX, especially at landscape distances, and with the 24 and 36 MP cameras; it is a beautiful lens on APS-C. The 80-200 AF-S is seldom reviewed, and not that many were sold. It is a BIG-barreled lens. The focus lock buttons really set it apart from other lenses. They sell for $895 or so to $950.

 

[dannylightning]

I have the 35mm AFS 1.8G DX lens and I have been extremely happy with it. I also have the 50mm FX AFS
1.8G but I have never really used it so I cant really comment on how good that lens is. even with the 35mm I often find my self backing up to get the whole image in the shot I guess that is why I have not put the 50mm on my camera, one of these days I need to do that and try it out.

here are a few shots I got with that 35mm lens. I cant really comment on any of the lenses you are looking at. but I really like my 35mm lens. not sure how it does for video but it does very well for photos.

 

[Mr.Photo]

Only thing to note on the 80-200 2.8 lenses is that on modern DSLR camera's the lens has a tendency to be quite "soft" beyond 150mm when at closer focus distances. This is actually due to a prominent back focusing issue. Even with my D7000's AF Fine Tune capability it cannot be tuned out.

However with this in mind my 80-200 is fantastically sharp from 80mm to around 160mm at any focus distance. Beyond 160mm if I keep the subject beyond around 9' focusing distance (which isn't a huge amount from the nearly 6' minimum focus distance of the lens), it is quite sharp.

 

[MikeFlorendo]

I have used the 50mm 1.4 G and I like it a lot. Nice fast crisp lens.

 

[JoeW]

I have a D7000 and most of my shooting is with a 35mm DX f1.8, a 50mm f1.4, 18-70mm f3.5, a Tamron 70-200mm f2.8 though I've got about 7-10 other lens (like a lens baby, great Nikkor macro lens, fisheye, a 300mm, and so on).

Derrel's advice is excellent--the guy knows of what he speaks so absolutely consider what he has to say on this stuff. My advice on buying lens--think about what it is you want to shoot. Do you want to do primarily street photography? Or landscapes or buildings? Portraits? Sports? I know you may shoot a bit of everything but if you have a sense of what your primarily interests are, then let that guide your buying for now.

 

[shadowlands]

my AF 80-200 f2.8D (two ring) rocks on my D800, even at 36mp & f2.8.