Neocon

For the money, you can't go wrong with this lens.  It falls mid-way between 18 and 55 of kit lens.  It is over two stops faster, so available light photography will be much easier.

My first dSLR was the D80.  Got the D7000 one year ago; it is so much better than the older model.  So I would strongly suggest you purchase the D7000 along with an f1.8 35mm or 50mm lens.

Dittos.  It is even better than I could have hoped.

Here is DOF for the 24mm lens.  At f5.6, set focus to 12 feet and everything from 5.8 ft to infinity is in focus.  At f8, set focus at 8 feet and everything from 4 ft to infinity is in focus.

I have the Nikkor 18-35D.  Keep in mind it is slower than you want.  An f2.8 zoom will be more costly.  Mostly use it on my DX Nikons.  Put it on my film camera when I need true wide angle...

Sorry for the mix-up. My bad.  Guess I just have the f1.8 zoom lens on my mind.

From the Dpreview site, see below - Sigma 18-35mm F1.8 DC HSM specifications  Maximum format size  APS-C

Thanks for posting.  So, you shot a DX lens on an FX body in cropped format.  How bad is the vignetting on full frame?

Going to the Sigma site, the distortion looks minimal and the vignetting is great at f4.  Based on this, it should be super expensive.

This is 2 stops faster at the wide end and and 2-2/3 stops faster at the long end.  But, how is the image quality??

Looking forward to seeing some of your shots.  Especially at 18-24mm using wider f-stops.

When I tried to have Nikon repair it last year, they no longer had parts.  The erratic auto focus, I could live with.  My main problem was cloudy element(s).  I asked them to take the zoom apart...

Very satisfied with my G lens.  It will not work on my old Nikon film cameras and there is too much CA, but I can live with that.  Below is a real world photo, shot wide open -

Excellent work showing what one can expect.  Particularly like that you used wider aperatures.  Personally believe that at f11 the size of the hole is more important than the glass.

With the kit lens, you have a great start.  See if you are shooting mainly at wide, mid and long range.  Check this out on your EXIF data.  The one thing you are missing is fast glass.  The two...

The point about a good lens shade is important.  I lost my lenshood and substituted a hood from a 135mm Rokkor.  With the cropped sensor of the DX camera, there was no vignetting.

Glad to hear it is now working.  In the future, please keep in mind that new Nikkors comes with a five year warranty.  So if the savings are not major, I would pass on buying used.

Here is the correct link.  Sorry -https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/PaTWuiINyYI9gNHsFDWfBdMTjNZETYmyPJy0liipFm0?feat=directlink

I found my 50mm f1.4 Nikkor (cica 1991) to be problematic shooting wide open.  It was rare for me to nail accurate focus.  Here is a lucky example when it works.  Taken with my D80...

Glad to see that you resolved your problem.  On my D80 I hated to use ISO 1600.  From what I heard, ISO 1600 should produce more than adequate results with your D90 as long as you don't under...