Understanding pricing of lenses and gear.

[AnimalHunter]

I'm about to be off and buy a 300mm lens for my 5100 to catch little animal and critter shots. My budget is about 600.00$ and I know I can buy used, I'm in a area where used lenses are difficult to come buy. South Korea and shipping etc. When I'm back in Canada I'll hit the used market for sure.
But I'm examining the 3 300mm lenses nikon has to offer and although I'm noticing you can take other lenses like sigma and use it on a nikon, I'd like to keep it all the same right now just for narrowing down the choices.


#1
AF-S 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED VR
Zoom range of 4.3
Another note is this: Equivalent to 105-450mm when used with a DX format D-SLR camera.
-540.00$


#2
AF-S DX 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR
Zoom range of 5.5
-430.00$

#3
AF-S 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR
Zoom range of 10.7
-1200.00$


I think the range of options of the lenses after reading the specs leads me to believe that #1 is probably the most flexible as it's like a multi purpose lense by the sounds of it.

But I'm curious about the definition of this zoom measurement.

My point and shoot had a zoom range of 3.5 zoom. These lenses don't seem to be offering more of a close up option. Am I wrong in this assessment?

Thoughts on what would be your choice of the three for a first time buy of a DLSR zoom lens for capturing nature and animals?

 

[480sparky]

Have you considered size & weight, filter sizes, and details like chromatic abberation : pincushioning/barreling : vingetting : resolution?

 

[AnimalHunter]

Size and weight are not an issue as I plan to be non moving and tripodding it.
as for the rest, I'm too new to fully understand said qualities listed but checked out that site. Awesome review tables. I'll bookmark that one! Thanks.

 

[480sparky]

No better time to study up on them now, and make a smart investment instead of just a 'purchase'. Good glass makes the image!

 

[AnimalHunter]

I do know that i intend to plan it out this way.
This is my 1st lens purchase now....need to start getting animal subjects now as they abound here while i'm still here.
To learn about things.
And then when I have a little more cash I'm wanting to go with a prime zoom lens eventually. And that kind of investment is a little out of my pocket book currently. =)

 

[Scarecrow]

I used to think people were making that up when they said a good glass makes a good picture until I got my hands on a 24-70mm L f/2.8

 

[Village Idiot]

I'm not familiar with the quality levels of Nikon glass, but generally, the more range there is between the short and long focal length, the more elements that have to be added to the lens, this brings up cost. The wider the maximum aperture, the more expensive the lens usually is. Also, the wider the zoom range, the lesser the quality of the lens at one end or another.

 

[Scarecrow]

since we are on the subject of lenses Im thinking of either a 100-400mm L f/4 or the 70-200mmL f/2.8 . I want the long range of the 400 but its an f/4 which means a bit slower than 200 with the f/2.8. shoting aircraft taking off from a cat system on a carrier I am not sure which to invest in both are is and both are L serries lenses. A little help from you pros.

 

[djacobox372]

"Zoom range" is not always a good thing, in fact you won't find pro-level glass with massive zoom ranges because image quality suffers when they push lens design that far.

Point and shoots always have massive zoom ranges, because you can't change the lenses--so they engineer the lenses to do both very wide and telephoto, at a cost of image quality.

BTW: you can get a non-vr version of the 70-300mm ed for around $90usd on the used market, you might consider it.

 

[jritz]

How about a 300 prime? Nikon Telephoto AF-S Nikkor 300mm f/4.0D ED-IF Autofocus 2124 A little more expensive than what your range is, but you my find a good used one!

 

[molested_cow]

How serious are you in terms of getting the best result you can?

If budget isn't the biggest issue ( I see a wide range of prices you've chosen here), I'd recommend the F2.8 70~200mm ( VR or non VR depending on your budget) and add telephoto converter to make up for the focal length. The lens is faster than the F4.5-5.6 even with a 1.6x converter.

I have the regular ED AF 70~300 and it's pretty much only good at F11~13. At that speed, it's almost impossible to catch still images of moving targets. Otherwise you have to crank the ISO really high.

 

[jaomul]

My point and shoot had a zoom range of 3.5 zoom. These lenses don't seem to be offering more of a close up option. Am I wrong in this assessment?

Your zoom range is from your initial starting wide point to the telephoto point. Your point and shoot probably starts at an intial pont of 28mm (at 35mm film equivilant) and finishes at about 100mm. Taking your D5100 crop factor etc into consideration the #1 lens of 70-300 will start at equivilant length of 105mm and finish at 450mm, so where your p+s at full zoom would approx be the view at which the 70-300 will start. You can then zoom approx 4 times closer than this