Nikkor 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 AF-S VR

As I'm planning on traveling a fair amount this year, I leapt on the chance to get this lens at almost half off MSRP when I found a refurbished one available online.

If you've shot with me for any length of time, you know that I prefer prime lenses to zooms, mostly because it helps me think more about composition. Primes also have the advantage of being lighter, faster, and generally smaller than their zooming cousins.

That said, there are times when your feet won't get you there, and zooms are undeniably handy for their convenience. I had the DX 18-200mm VR super-zoom and rarely used it, and I gave my DX 55-200mm (part of a trade+cash sale of the 18-200) to my sister with the d40. I opted to get this FX monster as the replacement.

Testing the D7000's Intervalometer

Pardon the noise pollution:

Just a test of the d7000's intervalometer. Shot with a 28mm f3.5 AI-S at f5.6, ISO 1000. 30-second exposures at one-minute intervals beginning at midnight and ending around 5:30am.

Raw conversion was done using ucraw. Manual WB setting in camera was 3030K for a blue affect but automatically adjusted by UCRaw to somewhere north of 4000K. Exposure compensation was adjusted +1.5 stops during the batch process.

The light pollution is obviously pretty bad. I kept this because I accidentally pointed at Polaris. I'll try this again, but most likely with my 50mm f/1.8 and shoot a bit more wide-open (say f/2.8) with more frequent intervals and shorter exposure times.

Full video here (I notice the video is basically black on the blog).

Nikkor 28mm f/3.5 AI-S Review

My thoughts on the d7000 are still coming, but I wanted to share a few on a recent acquisition: the Nikkor 28mm f/3.5 AI-S. I got this for $50 (+$5 shipping) off of EBay, and it was well worth the price. The d7000 treats this just like any other lens thanks to its "non-CPU lens" data features.

If you've paid any attention to my previous posts, you'll know that I have a 24mm f/2.8 Non-AI lens as well, which isn't compatible with the d7000—it won't mount. I was pretty disappointed by this. The reason I got the 28mm f/3.5 was to replace the 24 in my line up. While I'm sorry to say that the 28 so far hasn't been quite as nice, I'm pretty pleased by its performance (especially for the price).

Most remarkable in my experience is the excellent ghost control (these are shot with a plain-jane $10 Tiffen UV filter):

Philadelphia

Some months ago, I got some friends and family together and recommended that we try to do some photography together. It sounded like a good time, and so we planned to hit Philadelphia in the first of a few trips this year.

It was good. Rey put up a gallery for us, and Dave also put up some shots. It was a group of about six of us. (Ed: Rey says Gallery is horrible, so we're probably going to skip it.)

I'll be posting my own shots as time and commentary permits, both here and in Rey's add on.

My Hot Little Hands

The d7000 has arrived. I'll be doing some testing with it (shooting around) and adding some review-style comments as time allows.

Initial impressions:

• my Non-AI lens does NOT fit; I had simply mistaken the marketing text. I'm debating about doing a DIY AI conversion, which will be less expensive than buying a new lens.
• The action button is a lot spongier than the d40's or even the d90.
• AF is fast and nice to have on the 50mm.
• The ability to change things with buttons instead of menus is nice, but maybe not $1200 nice.
• Silent mode really is pretty quiet.
• 6fps is pretty fast.
• That LCD is good!
• Dual card slots? Sweet.
• High ISO performance? Pretty performant.

I'll have more later, with some reference photos and thoughts.