F/2.8 At Night

I decided to run downtown and take a few shots with my new Tamron SP AF 28-75mm F/2.8 lens. I described the lens in an earlier post. This is the lens I now keep on my camera versus my Nikkor 18-135mm F/3.5-5.6 G standard zoom. Thought I would give you a run down on how the lens works during a night photoshoot.

There are compromises with this lens versus its Nikkor closest cousin the AF-S 24-70 F/2.8 G ED. The one compromise is focus speed. A caveat is this was a night photoshoot so lower light often translates to slower or more challenging focusing. Even with this caveat I feel the Tamron focuses slower than all of my Nikkor lenses. Also it has a bit of an annoying sound when it focus. OK, OK, I'm nit-picking. Even with these compromises I like the Tamron as its good value for money. Remember my earlier post that cost was one of my purchasing decisions when I decided to buy this fast lens. I'll give the lens a good workout in full daylight and flash settings to see if the focus issue is across the board. I know, I can't wait either !!

All of the shots taken tonight used my tripod.

I shot a number of images through the entire 28-75mm zoom range, different apetures, and speeds. The lens worked well in all settings. All images were crisp (only out of focus or blurry when I purposely set the speed slow). The lens is smooth when adjusting focal lengths with no sticking. The zoom ring is well placed and wide enough so you don't need to look at the lens to see if you have the ring in hand. I was able to take much faster shots due to the wide F/2.8 apeture. Also, I was able to use my lowest ISO setting throughout the photoshoot, both due to the wide apeture, but also the tripod ... OK mainly due to the tripod, but the F/2.8 definitely helps.

Oh yes, one other annoying thing...I hate the Tamron lens cap. Its shaped weird, and tends to pop out of my fingers. The Nikkor style cap is uber better. I might buy a Nikkor cap as a replacement and just put some black electical tape over the name.

One other thing, I promise this is the last "other thing". It's not directly related to this lens, but I'm surprised how much value having a lens (especially in DX mode) go down to 18mm adds. Especially when you are only toting one lens like I did tonight. That extra 10mm really makes for a more flexible photoshoot. Size DOES matter.

This image was shot in apeture priority. F/9 to get deep DOF, ISO 100 and Mr. Tamron set at 40mm. Speed was 1/40 of a second.



This shot was also at apeture priority, 1/10 of a second, F/7, ISO at 100 and the lens at the end of the zoom range of 75mm. I purposely shot with motion blur. Image was converted to B&W post processing.

Overall, I give my Tamron an 8 out of 10 for night photoshoots.

Get up, get going its time to pick up your camera and shoot some pictures. I do !