Nikkor 50mm Vs 50mm ...

Recently I am searching for a high speed lens for my Nikon D200 camera, and had looked at options like the Tamron 17-50 mm F2.8, Nikon 50mm F1.4, Sigma 30mm F1.4, etc. And recently when I visited Nikon's website, I found a new variant of Nikon 50 mm F1.4, which is costing atleast twice as much as its older counter part.

I will have to look into the details, .... As for now, I am zeroing in on the Tamron 17-50mm F2.8. Recently one of my friend wrote the following about the lens

"I have been using Tamron 17-50mm for almost two years now and it is one damn good general purpose lens other than my nikon 50mm f1.8.

As far as image quality goes, It is a fantastic lens... may be pretty close to Nikon 17-55 at one third of the price. You will not regret spending on this lens.

But, the built quality is not something to boost about, i do take extra care about my equipments - but two years of travel and use (not very extensive -no time for that!!) clearly shows up on the lens. There are no marks or dings on the body, but you can hear & feel the front element and lens barrels shaking. But, i guess we can ignore it for what it gives in terms of flexibility and the quality of images!! And it comes with 5 years warranty (in US), that i think a reasonable deal.

AF is bit slow if you compare to nikon AF-S lenses, but pretty acceptable since the zoom range is small."

You can see some of his wonderful photos in flickr and picasa.

Macro droplets

I love Macro photos, and last year, I bought the Nikon 105mm F2.8 VR, Micro lens. Whenever it rains I always try to shoot the hanging droplets. Today, early in the morning it seems that there was a slight drizzle, I happened to venture out and take some snaps. Here are they ...

The above photo of a grass with some water droplets was snapped without a tripod. This photo of the droplet has the camera reflection (it was shot by my friend Nanda) From droplets The above photo does not have any droplets, but I like the color combination, so I posted it ... enjoy !!!

Tamron Vs Nikon (Expensive 1 to 5)

One of my class mates (Dennis) from Engineering college days is getting married. Thinking of taking some snaps for the wedding, I thought of buying a lens with a large aperture for portraits. For a long time I had been eyeing the Nikon 15-55 F2.8, but it's highly expensive (JPY 150K) that I was postponing the purchase. Especially with JPY clocking its peak.

But then recently when I was checking the Tamron's website, I came across the Tamron 15-50 F2.8 AF. Man, it costs around JPY 33K. Which is roughly 4 times cheaper or a 5th of the price of its Nikonese counterpart. I can't believe my eyes. Now its time to start reading the reviews ...