Product Information

 

1. 50mm f/1.8D AF (versions from 1978 – today)

Prime lens | Nikon F (FX)

Manufacturer description: This compact and fast, f/1.8 lens is versatile and perfect for travel and portrait pictures as well as general photography.

Nikon‘s least expensive lens is also among its sharpest. It has no distortion, focuses almost instantly, and it’s Nikon‘s smallest and lightest lens. It is among Nikon‘s fastest lenses, and covers film and the full FX frame. Except that the D40, D40x and D60 can’t autofocus with it (neither can the F3), there is no reason not to own one of these, unless you opt for the twice as expensive 50mm f/1.4 D. All the earlier 50mm f/1.8 lenses since 1978 are also all excellent, including the 50mm f/1.8 AF (non-D), 50mm f/1.8 Nikkor manual focus, and the 50mm f/1.8 Series E.

 

2. 24mm f/1.4 AF-S G (2010-today)

Wideangle prime lens | Nikon F (FX)

Manufacturer description: Compelling wide-angle perspective combined with an ultra-fast f/1.4 aperture serves the needs of demanding professionals in exacting conditions.

Nikon‘s newest lens is among their best. This is not only the world’s best 24mm lens, significantly better optically than the LEICA SUMMILUX-M 24mm f/1.4 that costs three times as much, it’s also an extremely useful lens. If low light is your interest, I’d suggest getting this 24mm f/1.4 instead of a wide zoom. For many people, this could be the only wide lens you’d ever need. Its performance is unequalled at any aperture.

Because it has half the focal length of a 50mm lens, it can be hand-held at for exposure times twice as long. This lets me shoot hand-held in light twice as dim as with a 50mm f/1.4 lens, or in the same light as a 50mm f/1 lens.Unlike a 50mm lens, it has far more depth of field at the same f/stop. This additional depth of field also contributes to sharp hand-held photos at night. This 24mm lens at f/1.4 has a useful depth of field, while 50mm f/1.4 lenses have only paper-thin depths of field.

 

3. Nikon 18-55mm DX (2006-today)

Zoom lens | Nikon F (DX)

Manufacturer description: This compact, lightweight 3X zoom, designed exclusively for use with Nikon’s DX-format, is perfect for a wide variety of shooting situations.

Even as a cheap, plastic lens, the 18-55mm is sharp, sharp, sharp, and focuses so close that few people will need a dedicated macro lens. Included as a kit lens with Nikon‘s cheapest cameras, lenses this good and this cheap ask us what would happen if Nikon put some of this same mojo into its more expensive lenses. It only covers DX digital; it can’t cover film or FX.

 

4. 18-200mm VR DX (2005-today)

Lens | Nikon F (DX)

Manufacturer description: This versatile, 11x zoom with VR image stabilization, is designed exclusively for use with Nikon’s DX-format, and makes for a perfect one-lens solution.

The Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G IF-ED AF-S VR DX Nikkor was introduced in November 2005, and rapidly became a much sought-after lens for the Nikon shooter’s armoury. With its hugely useful 11.1x focal length range, ‘silent wave’ focusing, and Nikon‘s second generation vibration reduction system to combat camera shake, this lens aims to be the ultimate single-lens ‘walkaround’ solution, which photographers who wish to travel light can simply leave on the camera all the time.

Of course the all-in-one ‘superzoom’ concept isn’t new; the first such lens was Tokina’s 35-200mm from 1982, but early designs were plagued by excessive size and weight, poor optical quality, and unacceptably long minimum focus distances. Indeed it wasn’t until the mid-1990s that the likes of Sigma and Tamron introduced truly practical superzooms which substantially overcame these issues, and delivered acceptable quality across the range (for the casual vacation photographer at least). Since then, the rapid progress of computer-aided lens design has resulted in continued improvements in optical quality and extensions in zoom ranges, whilst shrinking lens sizes still further, making the superzoom concept more tempting than ever before.

However much of the early snobbery surrounding superzooms as poor quality ‘snapshot’ lenses still persists, and perhaps for that reason the major camera manufacturers have apparently been reluctant to add them to their own lens ranges. This makes the Nikon 18-200mm a pretty unique beast, as a superzoom designed in-house by a major player, and incorporating all their latest technology and know-how. So does this lens finally elevate the superzoom into the big league of lenses which ‘serious’ photographers should be happy to own and use, or is it still an unacceptable compromise? Read on to find out.

Headline features :

• 27-300mm equivalent focal length range; F3.5-5.6 maximum aperture

• VR II optical Vibration Reduction – 4 stops

• Compact Silent Wave focusing with M/A for rapid switching between auto and manual focus

• F mount for Nikon DX dSLRS only

 

5. 135mm f/2 DC AF (1990 – today)

Telephoto prime lens | Nikon F (FX)

Manufacturer description: This high-performance, large telephoto features Defocus Image Control allowing for control of the degree of focus in the foreground or background.

Americans just don’t get this lens, because Nikon messed up its name. The 135mm DC, or “Defocus Control,” lens, is among Nikon‘s sharpest lenses ever. Defocus control doesn’t mean soft focus, it means “background softness control.” The DC feature is really Bokeh optimization. The DC feature always keeps the subject ultra sharp, and allows the photographer to defocus just the background (or foreground) into the softest, smoothest, dreamiest and creamiest pastels ever. The 135mm DC is Nikon’s best hand-held portrait lens ever, as well as a killer-sharp 135mm lens for everything.

6. 14-24mm f/2.8 AF-S (2007-today)

Wideangle zoom lens | Nikon F (FX)

Manufacturer description: Fast aperture, high-performance, ultra-wide-angle zoom optimized for FX- and DX-format sensors featuring Nikon’s exclusive ED Glass and Nano Crystal Coat.

The big, heavy 14-24mm f/2.8 AF-S just rewrote the book on ultra-wideangle lens performance. It raises the performance bar about 20 years ahead of every other ultra-wideangle SLR lens. The 14-24mm is sharp, sharp, sharp, even wide open, and even in the corners. It’s so good that people are buying special adapters just to use them on Canon cameras! The 14-24mm is excellent on amateur DX cameras like the D300, but doesn’t really start pumping until you use it on film or a full-frame FX digital camera.

I’ve shot a lot of fixed 24mm, 20mm, 18mm, 17mm, 15mm and 14mm lenses in my days, and this zoom smokes them all. It lets me do things I never could, like jump into a dark, abandoned building without a tripod, shoot away at f/2.8 and high ISOs on a D3, and get out with excellent photos for which I don’t need to make any excuses.

7. 85mm f/1.4 AI-s (1981-2006)

The optics of most of Nikon’s earlier AI-s manual focus lenses have been exceeded in Nikon’s newer AF lenses. This isn’t the case here. This manual focus lens outperforms its newer 85mm f/1.4 D autofocus sibling. In fact, its so good that even after the f/1.4 autofocus lens came out, for about the about the same price, Nikon kept making these for 10 more years!

It’s sharper than the new AF lens, and it has much better bokeh than most other Nikon lenses. If I’m photographing moving people and kids, of course I’ll prefer the AF lens, but if I’m hugging a tripod, the King is still the King.

 
 

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