upgrading lens! (d3300)

looking into buying a telephoto lens!

i currently only have my kit lens that came with the d3300, and as i was looking through youtube videos, i came across the NIKKOR 135mm f2.8. now i know it is a manual lens, and i am willing to learn, so that's not a problem for me. i'm interested in this lens because of the quality & price.

will it work well with my d3300? or should i just skip on it?

It all depends on what you want to shoot I guess! Assuming the kit lens you have is the 18-55mm, a good cheap zoom for the beginner could be a Tamron or Nikon 70-300, or a Nikon 55-300 - Both will work great on your camera and will auto-focus. If you specifically need a fast aperture at a cheap price, then the lens you mention could do the job, but I have no experience in using one, or what the image quality is like.

sellarim said:

looking into buying a telephoto lens!

i currently only have my kit lens that came with the d3300, and as i was looking through youtube videos, i came across the NIKKOR 135mm f2.8. now i know it is a manual lens, and i am willing to learn, so that's not a problem for me. i'm interested in this lens because of the quality & price.

will it work well with my d3300? or should i just skip on it?

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Well, it's a GOOD lens, but I have a hard time getting excited about it. Sharpness is okay, but nothing extraordinary and it lacks contrast. Have you considered something like the Nikon 85mm f/1.8G for your D3300? I would consider that a better match, personally.
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Hey everyone...

I am guessing OP is talking about the ol' AI or AIs, and found one for chump change.

It's a nice piece of glass, top notch build quality... but you will not even get metering with this lens. Do you plan to carry a light meter, or simply shoot trial and error with it?

The lens is excellent, but with D3300 every thing will be manual
. Focus
. Exposure settings
. Flash

I suggest that you get AF-S lenses (those with inbuilt AF motor). 85mm F1.8 is a decent lens and reasonably priced. If you really need a longer focal length, save for the excellent 300mm F4 AF-S, it beats practically all the zooms (that reach 300mm) in sharpness.

Owned that lens for many years. It is a nice performer. Wish I still owned it as it would work perfectly with my current kit.

As @aroy states above no good for D3300 need AF G glass for full function w/o frustration. I'd rather see you invest small $$$ in a used Nikkor AFS 55-200 good copies can be outstanding....and you have everything covered on a walkabout in good light. Nikon kit glass is good stuff.

I've just bought a D3300 with kit 18-55 VR II lens and I have a Nikon 18-105 VR zoom from my old D40.
I've seen plenty of new Nikon 55-200 VR II lens available for £95 and would like a bit extra zoom so is it worth getting the 55-200 as I've heard the 200 has much better IQ?
Is there really much difference between them? I could keep the 105 and add the 200 but would the 105 be of any use? So many questions!



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Martinbanshee said:

I've just bought a D3300 with kit 18-55 VR II lens and I have a Nikon 18-105 VR zoom from my old D40.
I've seen plenty of new Nikon 55-200 VR II lens available for £95 and would like a bit extra zoom so is it worth getting the 55-200 as I've heard the 200 has much better IQ?
Is there really much difference between them? I could keep the 105 and add the 200 but would the 105 be of any use? So many questions!
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Again, great lens and pairs perfectly with your 18-55 VR II kit glass. Add a f1.8 prime and you pretty much can shoot anything.

Sell the 18-105 and do it.

Thanks, I think I'll get the 200 and if I don't use the 105 after that I'll sell it.


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Martinbanshee said:

Thanks, I think I'll get the 200 and if I don't use the 105 after that I'll sell it.

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AF-S 55-200 VR is a good choice. The lens is small and light and optically decent and the VR is useful, especially as the aperture is quite dark (small). The focusing speed is slow, but not unbearably so. And it is a Nikkor.

On the other hand the 55-300 autofocus is a joke, so slow that when trying one out I wanted to commit a seppuku in less than a minute. The fastest moving thing a 55-300 can track is a grandma with a walker.

If you like mid length telephoto lenses with wide(ish) aperture, Nikon has only a few AF-S G lenses:
* 70-200/4
* 70-200/2.8
* 85/1.8
* 85/1.4

Some third parties also have affordable lenses like 150/2.8 and 50-150/2.8 and 100-300/4. Some of them come with stabilizer too. I would have a look to see if they are optically passable and if they fill all the other requirements.

I'm still learning so it's difficult to know what to get.
I don't want to carry tons of lenses so would ideally like a versatile lens that starts at 18 and goes further than the 105 I've got and also one known for being nice and sharp. I'd happily sacrifice a bit of zoom for improved IQ.
The Nikkor 55-200 VR gets good reviews and is nice and cheap but it means swapping lenses more.
The Nikkor 18-200 VR is apparently very good but is still a bit expensive.
The Nikkor 18-105 VR I have at the moment is ok but isn't the sharpest, don't know if it's worth keeping.
The Nikkor 18-140 VR might be a good compromise?

Whatever lens I get has to be sharper than the Nikkor 18-105 VR I've got at the moment to make it worthwhile changing. Anybody compared these various lenses?

So far the Nikkor 55-200 VR is top of the list.


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Fact of Life
. the shorter the zoom range the better IQ
. Professional Zooms are not only built tough they have better IQ and are faster
. 18-55 VR-II is one of the best zooms as far as IQ and sharpness goes for zooms less than $300

If you are not printing large, that is more than 8x10, then use the D3300's 24MP to the hilt. Crop the images to 1500x1000 pixels (you can get excellent 6x4 prints) instead of getting a telephoto zoom which is soft at the long end. I regularly shoot a resident owl pair with my 18-55 and crop to 800x800. It is sharp and perfect for Web views and forums.

To get decent IQ beyond 200mm you should get either 300mm F4 AFS prime or the new 200-500 F5.6 zoom, no other zoom will come any where near that IQ and they will all be pretty slow at the long end. Another good lens is the 150-600, but that is one stop slower than the 200-500 and two less than the 300 F4.

Having had the 55-200, 18-105 and the 18-140 by far the best of the group was the 18-140. I also have the 18-200 that my wife uses on her D7000 and the does a pretty good job but I still think the 18-140 outperforms it. She does not want to change lenses so that is the reason for that choice. My daily lenses for a while were the 18-140 and the 70-300 along with the 11-16 Tokina I was able to cover most every thing I needed. I did drop the 18-140 recently in favor of the AF-S NIKKOR 24-120mm f/4G ED VR The reason for this lens is that it IQ is great and it is a Full Frame lens so that when I move to a FX camera I will have the glass already.

Don Kuykendall said:

Having had the 55-200, 18-105 and the 18-140 by far the best of the group was the 18-140.

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This matches my experience. I've owned all three of those lenses in the past but the lens I *still* own... Is the 18-140mm.
.....

Thanks for the info folks, looks like the 18-140 is my next purchase as IQ is preferable over the extended reach of the 55-200 and I can always crop.

Martinbanshee said:

Thanks for the info folks, looks like the 18-140 is my next purchase as IQ is preferable over the extended reach of the 55-200 and I can always crop.

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There is no single lens that will do it all: If you have a wide angle on, you'll find yourself wishing you could zoom in. If you have a zoom, you'll find yourself wishing you could shoot wide. The 18-140mm will walk the middle road about as well as it can be walked. When it comes time for a big zoom, consider the the Nikon 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G IF-ED.

Do I understand correctly that the D3300's meter won't work in manual mode with Ai lenses?

vics said:

Do I understand correctly that the D3300's meter won't work in manual mode with Ai lenses?

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Your understanding is perfect. D3xxx and the D5xxx do not meter with non cpu lenses, that is the reason for getting either D7xxx or an FX body. They meter with AIS lenses.

aroy said:

Your understanding is perfect. D3xxx and the D5xxx do not meter with non cpu lenses, that is the reason for getting either D7xxx or an FX body. They meter with AIS lenses.

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But on the plus side the D3000 series and D5000 series as well as the predecessors (D40/D60) can mount virtually ANY Nikkor SLR lens. This includes all the Non-Ai (aka Pre-Ai) lenses that would damage the Ai indexing tab in the higher models.

With digital cameras metering or an external meter are not necessities, since one can make a couple of test shots, determine the correct exposure via histogram, and shoot away. There used to be a lot of great Pre-Ai optics that could be had for a song, but currently it looks like the prices are increasing rapidly beacuse of the proliferation of adapters for mirrorless cameras.