New guy question.....lens recommendation

co2jae

Senior Member
Can I pick your brain?Im a new D7000 owner And loving every minute! I'm trying to figure out the difference between the title micro and macro on some lenses. I see some "zoom" lenses are listed as macro and some are micro. Can a 200 mm zoom be either? If so, how are they different? Also, I would like to solicit opinions on a good zoom lens for shooting my daughter while she competes outside, in winter at snowboarding competitions. I would like to use one lens but sometimes she will be 500 feet away and sometimes 50 feet. My friend uses a sigma 150-500 on his D90 and I love the results but I'm not sure I can justify a grand for a lens to my wife. She's already jealous of the time I spend reading the manual....lol. Would a 300 mm nikkor zoom be good enough? Thanks in advance!
 

Rick M

Senior Member
"Macro" is the industry term for essentially close up photography. Nikon likes to use the word "micro" to refer to it's macro lenses, not sure why, but they mean the same thing. For sports many prefer "fast" lenses, Aperature down to 2.8 on the expensive zooms. The ideal "fast" zooms for sports are expensive. If you want to be around or below $500, you are looking at zooms starting at f3.5-4.5. These are a bit slower, but you can crank up your ISO to compensate and still get great shots.

The most commonly recommended in this price range is as follows,

$200-nikon 55-200 vr
$400-nikon 55-300 vr
$450-Tamron 70-300 vc
$580-nikon 70-300 vr

The vr and vc are very important, do not buy the cheaper versions. Good Luck!
 

Rick M

Senior Member
I have the nikon 70-300 vr and it is worth the extra (to me). One advantage is that it is actually a Fx lens, if you ever decide to go Fx it will work.
 

evan

Banned
i have had this version of the 70-300vr for a few years now and will never replace it. nice performance all round. at its best in good light at f8-f11. i tend to avoid dx lenses, the only one i own is the 18-105mm,(supplied with my d90, my backup camera).
 

N_Addy

Senior Member
I've got a 70-300VR and love it. My only concern for sport shooting would be its (relatively) slow auto-focus. Once it locks onto a moving target it does a pretty good job of keeping focus (assuming you can pan well) but getting the initial focus sometimes takes a bit of hunting. That can be frustrating when you're trying to lock onto a moving object.
 
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