I am looking for a replacement for my 35-70mm f3.5-4.5 AF Nikkor. Does anybody know how good the various Nikon D 35-80mm, 28-80 and 28-70 lenses are. The 35-80 looks useful because of its light weight but it also seems very flimsy and plasticky (even more than the old 35-70) and I wondered what the optical quality is like. I can't find any reviews of this lens anywhere. I want an AF zoom for convenience, as I have a number of prime lenses and a 90-300mm zoom. The 28-105 looks good, but if any of the lighter zooms are as good they might be more suitable. I generally use Kodachrome 64 and Kodachrome 200 and an F801 or F3. Sorry if this question is a bit basic, but I haven't bought a lens for ten years and I'm a bit out of date with equipment.

-- steve adams (steve_z_adams@hotmail.com), November 12, 2000

Answers

You pretty much get what you pay for. Some of Nikon's more 'economical' zooms aren't up to much these days, and if your budget limits you to the bottom end of the range, I'd say that you're better off buying a reputable independent lens, like Tokina or Sigma.
I can personally vouch for Tokina's ATX 28-70mm f/2.8. It's excellent.

-- Pete Andrews (p.l.andrews@bham.ac.uk), November 13, 2000.

Buy the 24-120! incredible lens, great range and very sharp. As for the other lenses I haven't used the 28-105 so I can't comment on it. 28-70 great lens 35-70 older style w/metal mount good cheap alternative the 35-80 doesn't even make a good paperweight however it can also be used at family picnics for the egg toss

-- john (dogspleen@juno.com), November 13, 2000.

Hi Steve,

The following is a whimsical post on the subject "Nikon's Four Grades of Zoom Lens" that I wrote for the Nikon Mailing List a couple of months ago. I think it will give you a reasonable background to the eternal debate. The archive for the NML is not working to well at the moment, so I'm taking the liberty of crossposting my note here.

The serious material is bracketed by asterisks; please either enjoy or ignore the whimsy and in-jokes that make up the rest of the note.

----------------------------------------

"What does it mean?" asked Pooh.

"It means one of Owl's Occasional Essays," answered Piglet.

All of the animals in the Hundred Acre Wood had just joined the Nikon Mailing List and were trying to make sense of its contents. Pooh and Piglet; Eeyore, Owl and Kanga; baby Roo and Tigger; Rabbit and all his Friends and Relations; all of them had joined ... though it must be said that Tigger joined only because he thought it had something to do with running shoes: he bounced so much that, not only did he suffer from camera shake, but so did any other photographer near him.

It was Rabbit who had called them all together, so he explained: "When an animal joins the Nikon List, this often means that it has just bought a Nikon camera, and is wondering what lenses to buy next. All the grown up animals then tell him that he ought to have started with a large format camera, black-and-white film, and single-focal-length lenses. So I have asked Owl to talk about those maligned things -- autofocus zoom lenses."

All the animals nodded in agreement. Not that they all understood Rabbit, but they had learnt that it was always best to nod in agreement when he said something. And they all knew that Owl was very clever: he was the only animal in the Wood who could spell Tuesday.

All the animals ... except Eeyore of course.

"It's all very well if you like that sort of thing" he said, "which I don't. Encouraging people to buy cameras and lenses makes for heavy luggage. And what do people do with heavy luggage? Put it on a donkey of course. With never so much as a by-your-leave, let alone a thank-you."

Owl ignored him, cleared his throat, and began:

F/2.8 ZOOMS

"Why is he speaking in capital letters?" whispered Roo.

"Because it's a title," whispered Kanga.

"Is that something like duke, princess, or doctor?"

"No, dear. Just sit still and listen."

"What's 2.8?" Pooh asked Rabbit.

"It's the square root of 8," answered Rabbit, who always liked to be helpful.

Owl cleared his throat again, and restarted:

********************************************************************** ***
*
* F/2.8 ZOOMS
*
* All zoom lenses are a compromise, but if one sticks to a zoom range
* of 2.5 or less, and doesn't try for a lens wider than f/2.8 (which
* would also involve a compromise), then the compromise can be
* remarkably good. Better than some prime lenses, though probably not
* better than the very best primes.
*
* Nikon has two types of f/2.8 zoom: those with and those without AF-S.
* In this first grade of zoom we have those without AF-S:
*
* Wide-angle zoom: 20mm-35mm f/2.8D IF
* Standard zoom: 35mm-70mm f/2.8D
* Tele-zoom: 80mm-200mm f/2.8D ED
*
* Because these are lighter than the AF-S zooms -- and especially
* because they are cheaper -- these top-quality lenses are on the wish
* list of many an amateur photographer. The f/2.8 aperture makes them
* better in low light, and better for separating a subject from its
* background. The constant aperture is a help when using a incident
* light meter or a complex flash set-up, since it avoids the need to
* reset the exposure when one recomposes the picture.
*
********************************************************************** ***

"Gosh," squeaked Piglet. "Has Owl tried all these lenses himself?"

"Oh, no," replied Rabbit. "Very few people have tried all Nikon's zooms, and are able to be a primary source, recounting only their own experiences. Owl is a secondary source, combining some experience with what other people on the List have said, plus a lot of reading."

"Wouldn't a primary source be better?"

"Yes, it would. But one of the ideas of the List is that everyone else can add their primary experiences, and comment in a mature and friendly way on what Owl has said. That's the value of an analyst like Owl."

"Is 'analyst' anything to do with 'Brahms and Liszt'?" asked Tigger quietly, but Kanga hushed him so that Owl wouldn't hear.

Owl continued:

********************************************************************** ***
*
* AF-S ZOOMS
*
* The AF-S zooms, with "Silent Wave" motors in the lenses themselves,
* focus more quickly and quietly than the other f/2.8 zooms. But some
* of the AF-S users on the List have found that the most useful thing
* about them is the ability to use manual focus immediately. If, for
* example, the autofocus has focused on the model's nose, then the
* photographer can turn the focusing ring without taking the camera
* from her head, and refocus on his eyes.
*
* Wide-angle zoom: 17mm-35mm f/2.8D IF-ED
* Standard zoom: 28mm-70mm f/2.8D IF-ED
* Tele-zoom: 80mm-200mm f/2.8D IF-ED
*
* Optically, the first two grades of lens are as good as each other:
* comments on the List imply that people who have had the chance to
* compare them prefer the AF-S wide-angle zoom and tele-zoom to their
* non-AF-S counterparts, but that keeping to a 2x zoom range makes the
* 35-70 better than the 28-70.
*
* All six of them are awfully good lenses.
*
********************************************************************** ***

"And what about the weight?" enquired Eeyore. "It's all very well to say that the quality of the lenses makes the weight worth while ... if you aren't the pack donkey."

"Why does Owl always speak as though all photographers were women and all models were men?" Roo asked Kanga.

"He calls it an idiosyncrasy, dear," said Kanga, "but it's actually a minor affectation. We allow him to do it, because it makes him more PC."

"What's PC?"

"Pooh Correct."

"Well, I think he is still being speciesist," said Piglet. "He should say '... the model's nose, snout or beak'."

"Hang on, Owl," said Rabbit. "You're going to have to stop for a moment and then start again."

"Why did Owl have to stop and start again?" asked Pooh.

"Technical considerations," replied Rabbit.

Pooh thought about this for a moment. He knew that he was a bear of very little brain, and that long words bothered him. Two long words next to each other was doubly bothering. In the end, he decided that he Really Didn't Want To Know Anyway ... which was just as well because Owl was continuing:

********************************************************************** ***
*
* EXTENDED RANGE ZOOMS
*
* One can make a good zoom with a range of more than 2.5x ... as much
* as 4x if one is willing to give up the constant aperture. And many
* amateurs prefer these lenses because of their much lighter weight.
*
* Are they good lenses? Yes. Are they as good as the f/2.8 zooms?
* Not really.
*
* Wide-angle zoom: 24mm-50mm f/3.3-4.5D
* Standard zoom: 28mm-105mm f/3.5-4.5D IF
* Tele-zoom: 70mm-300mm f/4.0-5.6D ED
*
* Obviously, with the overlap in focal lengths, it is not common for
* anyone to own both the wide-angle and the standard zoom.
*
* The two new ordinary zooms announced recently --
* 18mm-35mm f/3.5-4.5D IF-ED
* 24mm-85mm f/2.8-4.0D IF
* -- will presumably be in the same category.
*
* There are only a handful of good zooms with a ratio of 5x or more.
* At present, from Nikon, there are probably only two; one of them --
* 24mm-120mm f/3.5-5.6D IF
* -- is an alternative to the 28-105. This lens has its fans and its
* detractors on the List. Someone who wants just a single lens will
* find this one more flexible. Someone who wants a pair of zooms will
* find that either the 24-50 or the 28-105 is lighter and takes the
* same filters as the 70-300.
*
* (The other good long zoom from Nikon is a 6x manual-focus zoom --
* 50mm-300mm f/4.5 ED
* -- for which the main compromise seems to be not worrying about its
* being heavy: it weighs nearly 2 kilogrammes.)
*
* Presumably the announced Vibration Reduction lens --
* 80mm-400mm f/4.5-5.6D ED VR
* -- will be in this category too.
*
********************************************************************** ***

"By the way," said Pooh. "Where's Christopher Robin?"

"He's gone to Greece to meet the Great Alexander," replied Rabbit.

"Isn't Alexander the name of a character in 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer'?" asked Piglet. "Is the Great Alexander a vampire?"

"I don't think so," replied Kanga, "though he does seem to be at his computer screen throughout the hours of darkness."

"We'll be able to tell when Christopher Robin gets back," said Rabbit. "If he's a vampire, his image won't be reflected by the reflex mirror, and all Christopher Robin's pictures will be out of focus."

********************************************************************** ***
*
* LIGHTWEIGHT ZOOMS
*
* There is a market for inexpensive lightweight zooms. The compromise
* made is to use a largely plastic construction to save weight. The
* optical quality is good and, for family photography, these can give
* better quality results than almost all point-and-shoot zoom cameras.
*
* Standard zooms: 28mm-80mm f/3.5-5.6D
* 35mm-70mm f/4.5-5.6D
* Tele-zooms: 80mm-200mm f/4.5-5.6D
* 75mm-240mm f/4.5-5.6D
* 70mm-300mm f/4.0-5.6D Series G
*
* Sometimes people on the List are apologetic about these lenses, but
* they needn't be ... unless, that is, they are putting them on an F5.
* That would be a mismatch -- better lenses should have been put on a
* less expensive camera.
*
* There is less enthusiasm on the List for the 7x zoom --
* 28mm-200mm f/3.5-5.6D IF
* There are those who value its convenience and say that it is good
* for their needs (fair enough -- after all, it they who decide what
* their needs are). But most find that the single zoom is too much of
* a compromise, and upgrade to a suitable pair of zooms.
*
********************************************************************** ***

-- John Owlett (owl@postmaster.co.uk), November 13, 2000.

The new (plastic mount) 35-80 4-5.6 is optically ok. Distortion and light fall-off are minimal and sharpness and contrast are suprisingly good. It is prone to flare, so you'll want to use the lens hood.

Mechanically speaking, it's horrible. Forget about DOF guides, there isn't even a focussing scale. The front element rotates, and focusing is very loose (AF is fine and pretty fast). For less than $100 it is a good value.

Nikon just released an new AF 24-85 mm f/2.8-4 Nikkor, it's supposed to be a pretty good lens. It's still pretty expensive for a "cheap" zoom and it's pretty big too ($700 19.2oz). I would expect the price to start to drop in six monts or so.

-- Geoffrey S. Kane (grendel@pgh.nauticom.net), November 13, 2000.