Just some fun updates! Nikon 80-400VR thoughts

I've been spending time away from Houdini and work in general, spending most of it out in the field taking pictures of Singapore before I head away to my next assignment. I also have 200gbs of RAWs to go through slowly in Bibble! It's amazing what exposure bracketing can do on a 2 week holiday :P I'm not only just selecting my images, I'm also spending time re-tweaking the raws again and again, and oh, also trying to figure out which photobook provider to print my stuff from.

My current kit is a Nikon D200, Sigma 10-20 for my ultra wide, Nikon 16-85 for my normal use lens, and the Nikon 70-300VR as my tele/wildlife toy. 300mm for wildlife isn't enough for me imo, even with the crop factor giving about 450mm equivalent. So yesterday, I rented out the 80-400 for a test drive! I thought if the lens checked out fine I'd get a copy for my use and sell off the 70-300.

This is day 1 of 3 of my rent, and at the moment, I'm already leaning on just using my 70-300. Why?

Two things, first is the handling and autofocus on my D200

First, the lens itself is quite balanced with my D200. The focusing ring though, is located closer to the lens mount, and is quite stiff, at least the copy I rented. MF simply needs to slide a ring from AF to MF (and unlock the ring, if you locked it before). Tripod mount was in the way, so took it off even before I left for my shooting "expedition". Perhaps I'm just used to the 16-85 and 70-300's arrangements for the focus/zoom rings, so I can't adapt yet for the 80-400.

But enough of the handling, what's troubled me most was the AF on my D200 body. Apart from it being slow, I think I could get used to the AF speed, was the AF on the outer sensors were hit and miss. Alot of times I shoot in Continuous AF mode, and use my 11 AF points to help my framing. Subjects with low contrast were particularly prone to focus hunting. I rarely use Single Shot mode nowadays for focus lock -> recompose as sometimes the subject is moving, and Single Shot doesn't work very well for me. I've also yet to use the AF-On technique.... one day...

Using the center sensor, it generally works very well, but in low light conditions (e.g. ISO 800, F5.6 1/60 kind of exposure levels), even the center sensor hunts. While my 70-300VR also will annoyingly hunt at 300mm (exactly like the kit 55-200), the AFS speed kind of makes up for it, plus, you won't hear it grind through the AF range.

Many forums report the D300 plus the 80-400 makes an excellent combo, no surprise with the many, many cross sensors on the D300. I think for now, since this is the only lens in my budget (no 3rd party lenses for me, at least for now...), I'll just stick with my 70-300 and rent like the 200-400 if I really need it.

I leave you here now, with some pics from the Sungei Buloh Wetlands Reserve. Note: All pics shot using the 80-400 are shot at full aperture from 4.5 to 5.6...



I think this reserve is the favorite haunt of many bird lovers, unfortunately, I do not have the skill to take much bird photos. So I'll lead with... a Monitor Lizard! Which there are tons wading about. I was unable to shift to a different location to frame it without the grass in front of its snout; it had moved on by then :(



No bird, but a Mud Skipper is up next lol!



Here starts a few bird shots!



More...



More little furballs...



Panning shot. It's not so bad as long as the sensor latches on. If it does that hunting thing then yeah, pain in the ass.



Closeup on a monitor lizard leg! It was raining quite heavily when I spotted this guy probably about 20 metres away. I inched bit by bit under the pouring rain. Ended up having a whole series from far to near. (NB: This is using the Nikon 16-85! The 80-400 doesn't have a gasket around the mount; I wouldn't try that lens in the rain. Plus, the 16-85 + D200 combo has been though a few thunderstorms with me, protected only with a lens cap :P So I know it can take it.)



"Portrait" of the lizard about a meter away. These guys don't seem to be bothered when you inch up to them crouched; walk up to them standing upright and they bolt.

My plan will be to do the Singapore Bird Park, followed by the Singapore Zoological Gardens with the 80-400 to further gauge it in different shooting conditions, before I make up my final, final mind (I'm already complaining to my kakis online about the lens, you know who you are ;) )

Last I went to the Bird Park, was using a Contax G1 and 45mm lens, and I was able to take some reasonable shots; which makes me wonder how annoying it will be to try to maneuver a lens with a 2 meter plus minimum focusing range :(

Tech Note: All photos processed with Bibble 4.10 on Ubuntu. Resized for web in Gimp. I generally tend to crop from 3:2 to 16:9 by removing the top and bottom, rarely the sides. If you take a look carefully, you will see the sides of some of the images will have some black lines. These are the lines that appear in bibble after lens distortion is corrected. I usually do not bother to crop them out. Finally, vignetting. I vignette all my stuff in bibble! The lenses are great! Don't worry!