Aarggghh! What lens?

[D4VE 3LL]

Evening all,

I have a Nikon D80 and with the airshow season coming up I thought I'd get a bigger lens. I also want to use it to take photos of the RAF Low Level flying round North Wales.

I've seen Nikkor 80200mm f2.8, which is the best version? will the lack of VR really be an issue at airshows?

Thens there a whole load of Sigmas I've looked into. Would I be better off buying a lens of say f2.8 and then buying a 1.4x or 2x teleconverter or going the whole hog and getting one with a much longer focal length?

aiming to spend around £600 excluding teleconverters.

If you could, can you post example shots from airshows/wildlife/motorsport events please and state the lens/camra used.

Many thanks,

Dave

[miniman]

I would say for aircraft work there will be little benefit from VR. There certainly isn't much benefit for motorsport work either. I have a Canon 70-200 f/2.8 IS and I never use the IS. One day I will buy the 2x teleconverter for it, giving me (on a 40D body) 224-640 at f/5.6 which is as good as you will get a 600mm lens unless you spend proper money.

ETA couple of shots:

350D / 70-200 2.8 IS

Edited by miniman on Tuesday 21st April 19:15

[D4VE 3LL]

miniman said:

I would say for aircraft work there will be little benefit from VR. There certainly isn't much benefit for motorsport work either. I have a Canon 70-200 f/2.8 IS and I never use the IS. One day I will buy the 2x teleconverter for it, giving me (on a 40D body) 224-640 at f/5.6 which is as good as you will get a 600mm lens unless you spend proper money.

So maybe get the 80-200mm f2.8 and at a later date buy a teleconverter. With TC's do you lose any quality? I know you lose f stops.

[miniman]

Not sure about the quality to be honest. Ultimately there's more glass between the subject and the sensor so one would assume so, although the Canon extender is L glass so should be pretty good. 1.4x loses 1 stop, 2x loses 2 stops. Again, not sure about the Nikon but cheaper lenses will lose AF with the teleconverter attached.

[SamHH]

I can't offer any first hand experience but a couple of points on tele-converters:

Yes, they do impair quality. Have a look here for an example: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/lenses/4...

As I understand, Nikon do not make teleconverters that retain autofocus with ordinary 'AF' lenses, of which the currently on sale 80-200mm is one.

[Simpo Two]

For airshow work (ie for fun not money) I use a Nikkor 70-300VR.

There'll be plenty of light and you'll get a shallow DOF effect from the focal length, so I'm not sure why you'd need f2.8 in this instance.

Edited by Simpo Two on Tuesday 21st April 19:34

[beano500]

A secondhand version of the 80-200mm f/2.8 AFS, I reckon.

Cheaper than the 70-200mm, no VR but that's no loss, fast to focus - faster than the AF-D version anyway.

I got a secondhand 70-200mm, I use it with a 1.4TC quite often and the results are very good. Sometimes I use a 2.0TC and there's a noticeable drop in quality, but it will still happily autofocus and meter at the equivalent of f/5.6. The compromise is, of course, the 1.7TC.

And if you ever go full frame, they say that the 80-200mm isn't quite the vignetter that the newer 70-200 is!

Oh, and some examples here Heron is with 1.4TC Swans and Geese without. 70-200mm f/2.8 and 80-200mm f/2.8 in AF-S guises are probably very similar in results.

Edited by beano500 on Tuesday 21st April 22:52

[D4VE 3LL]

Simpo Two said:

For airshow work (ie for fun not money) I use a Nikkor 70-300VR.

There'll be plenty of light and you'll get a shallow DOF effect from the focal length, so I'm not sure why you'd need f2.8 in this instance.

Edited by Simpo Two on Tuesday 21st April 19:34

Any chance of seeing a range of examples please Simpo Two?

I have to get this lens choice right because my mate wants one of the same aswell!