Next lens...

[Jmm91]

Hello everyone!

First time poster here...if there' a better spot then please direct me!

I'm looking at my next lens purchases and am wondering if I could get some direction.

I currently use a nikon d7000. I have:

• Sigma 17-50 f/2.8
• Nikon 50mm f/1.8g
• Nikon 85mm f/1.8d

Wondering if I should pick up the tokina 11-16 f/2.8 or something at a longer focal length than my 85 prime...

I shoot travel, cities, landscapes, and candid people.

Let me know if any other info is needed to make a suggestion

Thanks in advance!

 

[Derrel]

I would buy a used Nikkor 70-200mm f/4 AF-S G lens. NOT any of the f/2.8 models, but the lighter, newer, sharper f/4 model. But hey, that's just me.

I find that travel and landscape and scenics look better when photographed "big", with telephoto focal lengths, and that very short focal lengths, like 11mm to 20mm, make things look small, far-away, and insignificant, at any distance beyond 20 meters.

Most professional travel shooters shoot a LOT of telephoto lens images. A tele helps narrow the field of view, magnifies the size of distant objects, and helps to create a sense of foreground things and background things being physically closer together. A telephoto lens is much easier to use than a very wide-angle lens is.

 

[480sparky]

I'd go with a longer FL lens first. Or maybe a micro/macro lens. Like a 105mm or so.

 

[Jmm91]

I would buy a used Nikkor 70-200mm f/4 AF-S G lens. NOT any of the f/2.8 models, but the lighter, newer, sharper f/4 model. But hey, that's just me.

I appreciate the suggestion. I will look into it! I had been checking out one of the 2.8 models as well, why do you suggest not one of them?

 

[Derrel]

I would buy a used Nikkor 70-200mm f/4 AF-S G lens. NOT any of the f/2.8 models, but the lighter, newer, sharper f/4 model. But hey, that's just me.

I appreciate the suggestion. I will look into it! I had been checking out one of the 2.8 models as well, why do you suggest not one of them?

The f/4 G-series is newer and sharper than the first two f/2.8 models; at f/2.8 image quality is compromised compared to f/4 on the newer lens; f/2.8 offer substandard image quality AND substandard pictorial quality; most landscape and scenic and candid people and studio people pics will be shot at f/4.8 to f/8...the f/4 lens is handier, less-obtrusive,and easier to carry...

The f/4 is designed to be good on the 36-45MP Nikon's...it's 15 years newer than the first 70-200/2.8 VR, which I shot for a decade, and which is NOT good enough to migrate forward. The 70-200 f/4 VR-G was designed for both DX AND FX-Nikons,and is designed to be a 20-year lens. When you buy a 70-200, you're buying a lens that needs to be forward-compatible.

At day's end, carrying any of the 70-200/2.8 models leaves the feeling that you've been lugging around a stovepipe...the SMALLER lenses were always handier, and get better pictures, IMHO. An 80-200 f/4.5 or f/4 was always a "smallish" lens....the 80-200 2.8's and then the 70-200 2.8's got much bigger and heavier...

The smaller and lighter and more-nimble a lens is, the better it shoots.

 

[Jmm91]

I would buy a used Nikkor 70-200mm f/4 AF-S G lens. NOT any of the f/2.8 models, but the lighter, newer, sharper f/4 model. But hey, that's just me.

I appreciate the suggestion. I will look into it! I had been checking out one of the 2.8 models as well, why do you suggest not one of them?

The f/4 G-series is newer and sharer than the first two f/2.8 models; at f/2.8 image quality is compromised compared to f/4 on the newer lens; f/2.8 offer substandard image quality AND substandard pictorial quality; most landscape and scenic and candid people and studio people pics will be shot at f/4.8 to f/8...the f/4 lens is handier, less-obtrusive,and easier to carry...

At day's end, carrying any of the 70-200/2.8 models leaves the feeling that you've been lugging around a stovepipe...the SMALLER lenses were always handier, and get better pictures, IMHO. An 80200 f/4.5 or f/4 was always a "smallish" lens....the 80-200 2.8's and then the 70-200 2.8's got much bigger and heavier...

The smaller and lighter and more-nimble a lens is, the better it shoots.

Appreciate it. Thank you derrel!

 

[Jmm91]

I'd go with a longer FL lens first. Or maybe a micro/macro lens. Like a 105mm or so.

Do you think 105 is enough variance from the 85 or should I go further?

 

[480sparky]

Do you think 105 is enough variance from the 85 or should I go further?

135, 150 or even 200.

..............At day's end, carrying any of the 70-200/2.8 models leaves the feeling that you've been lugging around a concrete-filled stovepipe...............

Fify.

 

[Derrel]

^^^Agreed on the FIFY, 480sparky!!!

"At day's end, carrying any of the 70-200/2.8 models leaves the feeling that you've been lugging around a concrete-filled stovepipe..............."