Saturday, September 18, 2010

New Travel Companion

"What lens should I bring for the trip?"... "What is the best lens I should get if I wanted to start nature photography?"... "Should I bring macro lens or zoom lens?"...

Regardless the level of photographer, one of the question I received the most about nature photography no other than type of lens to buy or to carry. Before I can answer this question, I always ask back "What do you intend to take then?". Types of lenses to bring very much depend on what we intend to take. Landscape, insects, birds or simply portrait. Each subject require a different lens as the distance between the subject and the camera is different. By identify the subjects, it helps to decide what lens to buy or to carry. Usually I will carry two lens with me, one zoom lens & one standard lens (that can act as macro too). However, if you intend to buy a Nikon camera, you can consider the new lens that just launched last month AFS-Nikkor 28-300mm / 3.5-5.6G ED VR. After years of feedback finally Nikon came out this lens that cover from landscape/portrait to even birds photography! You can use this lens as your travel lens or standard lens!
These are the photos I took using my this new travel companion without tripod as I wanted to try how good it is if I wanted to travel light.
Since this lens can zoom up to 300mm, I use it to shoot birds. I have no problem shooting both Mynas!Since this is a travel lens, very high chance that I will see something small and beautiful.... so I use this lens to shoot as macro. First this caterpillar. I then give it a more challenging task. The lens didn't fail me, look at the details of the photo above! So as this tissue paper like flower that just about 1.5cm wide.
More macro shots!
I then use it for landscape. I first shoot it with F22 with shuttle speed of 1/15sec. I then lower it to 1/2 sec to test the optical stabiliser (VR). Without tripod & filter I managed to create the effect as above.
Taking night shots is a breeze with the VR stabiliser. So if you are looking for a travel lens or simply want a 'multi-purpose' lens. Get this new lens from Nikon (if you are using Nikon camera...) This is my first choice of lens whenever I wanted to travel light.

2 comments:

  1. Great review, Samson!! Glad that you've got this gem!!

    -Hong

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  2. I would like to buy this lens after my graduation.

    ReplyDelete