Made in 1995, this lens introduced the feature of built in autofocus to the Nikon big lens. As such it pre-dates the AF-S and AF-S II models, and while perhaps not quite as quiet or fast I have found it quiet enough and fast enough for me. It is also a lot cheaper.
As an f4 it comes with a 125mm front objective, and the first thing that you note through the viewfinder is the brilliance of the image. Using this lens on my Nikon D100 the autofocus bites and tracks very effectively, but the brightness of the image makes it easy to shift to manual when you need to compensate for close-by vegetation or depth of field. I have found both of these features very useful, and you can see illustrative examples on my website under
http://www.pbase.com/image/26495752 and
http://www.pbase.com/image/26495898. Similarly, if you wish to lock autofocus in order to re-compose your shot, the lens has four focus lock buttons spaced around the main objective.
Optically it seems capable of producing sharp images from f4 to f22, with the best (to my eye) at about f5.6. I suspect that if I used it with an F5 body I could shave with the results. In the digital environment the colour rendition is rich and the results need minimal post processing, a common factor I have found with the best Nikon lenses. All of my results to date were taken using a non-coloured glass internal filter, and have been cropped and slightly sharpened using Unsharp Mask in Nikon Capture Editor.
Metering is highly effective with the D100 set to centre-weighted, but I still intend to test spot.
The combination of lens and camera is 4,900g and as a result I use a Wimberley gimbal mount on a Gitzo 1325 carbon fibre tripod for support. Using this set-up, along with a short shutter release cable and the D100 anti mirror shock setting I have not experienced any standing wave vibration, and as a result I rarely bother to lock the Wimberley for a shot. The lens balance is affected by the weight of the lens hood, so it is worth fitting in all cases.
Heartily recommended. As mentioned above it is a bit more expensive than a new Sigma (I got it for 2,700 second hand), but Nikon fans may consider it an option worth following up on.
Regards,
Graham Checkley.
