Longer telephoto for birding/wildlife

Hi,

I own a D7100 which I use to take a lot of bird pictures, and some other wildlife. I also use it for airshows. I mainly use a Nikon 70-300mm VR, but I feel the need for a longer lens to get closer to the animals. But I'm torn as to what to get.

I'd still like to have a zoom lens, for the sake of versatility. I've looked at the Sigma 80-400mm, 120-400mm and the Nikon 80-400mm VR (old version), but feel 400mm at the top end wouldn't give me enough additional reach.

So now I'm looking at the Sigma 150-500mm and 50-500mm, and the new Tamron 150-600mm.

I can get the Sigma 150-500mm for a decent price used. The 50-500 is nearly twice as much (even used), and the Tamron is somewhere in the middle, but seems impossible to find at the moment. I don't want to spend more than about $1500 US.

Of these three, which one offers the best image quality at the top end of the zoom range? Which has the fastest/best autofocus performance? Is the image stabilization good enough to shoot handheld at all? Do you think I'd be happy with the Sigma 150-500mm, or should I hold out for the Tamron for the extra 100mm?

Thanks.

80-400 is 600mm equiv. focal length on your D7100, pretty long.

The Tamron 150-600 seems like very good value and produces good results.

Pretty soft at 600mm at F8 (its best).. not too bad shorter... according to DXO...

I think that you wukk need ti get to 500mm to nitice a significant difference over the 300mm. Been there.

I use to have sigma 150-500, and had great results with it. Like some one said before, the best results are at f8 or F9, its a great lens with some Af limitations.... However at this point if you are not desperated on getting rightnow a lens, then i would recommend you to wait few more months until you can get or rent the tamron (birding pictures on flickr look great for me specially with the d7100-tamron combo).

The tamron is on top of my wishlist but now things got more interesting because of the recently announced sigma 150-600. If the price is around 1500 dol, then i will wait more months for reviews and tests of that lens

Alex

You can do pretty well judging the IQ of the lenses (relative to each other) by comparing prices. There is a reason the 50-500 is so much more expensive than the 150-500 - and it's not just to get the wider end.

Of the ones you listed, the 150-500 is probably the worst of the bunch.

The Nikon 80-400 AF-D is better, but marginally worse than the 50-500.

The Tamron 150-600 is a bit of a wild card as yet. Reports of its IQ are all over the map, and you have to allow for early adopters to be in love with it; (Happens with most new lenses). It's probably better than the old Nikon 80-400 in the overlapping range, though the 80-400AF-D is pretty nice around 300mm.

Remember too though that you are well into diminishing returns when trying to align prices with IQ in these (and similar lenses). If the 150-500 is half the price of the 50-500, it's not half the IQ - more like 85% of it.

The Nikon 80-400g is better than any of those lenses, save perhaps the new Tamron if reports can be believed), but you do pay for the privilege.

There are two other lenses you might consider. One is the old Tamron 200-500 - probably about like the Sigma 150-500, but very light and not expensive. No VR though.

Another is the Nikon 300F4 AF-S, with a 1.4TC. It was Nikon's best (affordable) ~400mm option (420mm). It's really a very, very good 300mm lens, and it doesn't lose much with the 1.4 TC E-II.

As for 400mm not being enough focal range, you're right, but 500mm is really only marginally longer. And on a DX camera you want a lens that stands up well to cropping in the center.

If you really want focal length, but still have affordability and something you can carry all day, a Nikon V1/V2/V3 with 300F4 AF-S (or the new 70-300CX) on it gives you an equivalent 810F4. With a 1.4TC, that gives you 1134mm F5.6. I can tell you from experience that 1134mm is STILL not long enough for small birds, or most any bird that doesn't let you get that close, but it's really too long to hand hold, and it's a difficult focal length to work with in the field. I draw the line at 810mm - if I'm not close enough for that, too bad!

jambalawa said:

Pretty soft at 600mm at F8 (its best).. not too bad shorter... according to DXO...

Click to expand...

Oh, I keep hearing pretty soft at 600mm F8, I guess some consider these soft... Handheld













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My sober voyage into bird photography

V1/V2/V3 with 300F4 AF-S (or the new 70-300CX) on it gives you an equivalent 810F4.

You will really miss VR with this combi - I know I did - but I can't vouch for the 70-300CX for the V1/2/3 as it seems to be untested and a bit slow.

On a tripod, the 300mm f/4 + V1/2/3 is very good indeed even with the TC 1.4 ii added, use electronic shutter and IR remote.

Luck!