Test of the New Nikkor 28-300mm VRII Lens

[Norm Dulak]

Nikon D300, ISO 250, uncompensated Matrex Metering

After reviewing comments on another posting, and after learning that the Nikkor 70-300mm VR lens is also an excellent lens, I decided to order and test the new Nikkor 28-300mm lens. The results are shown here.

To conduct my test, I taped a page of The Wall Street Journal to my barn door today, and set up my camera with the lens on a tripod about 50 feet away. At that distance, the WSJ page occupied a very small part of the barn door image at 28mm.

I set my aperture at f/5.6, which I might use for BIF, and made sequential exposures with the lens zoomed as indicated in the accompanying image. Then I repeated the process at f/11, which should produce greater sharpness.

The only PS CS5 adjustments were simple levels adjustment and really trivial smart sharpening of my composite image for posting. Please excuse the less than optimal contrast on some of the exposures, since my interest was only lens sharpness.

To stress-test the images shown, each was zoomed to 100% to magnify sharpness deficiencies, and it was those images that I used to make my composite to show you.

Based upon the results shown, Linda and I are seriously considering taking only two of these lenses plus our Tokina 11-16mm super wide angle lens with us on our upcoming Antarctica trip.

What do you think of this lens?

Norm

[Tom Graham]

28-300, nice zoom range, more useful than the 70-300 I've been using. It and a wide angle zoom would make great travel combo. And since it is a FX lens it should perform well on a DX sensor body.
As for lens tests like this, I really can't tell here with such images. And generally I don't try tests like this at home unless I have another known good lens to shoot identical shots and then compare results. And of course in addition to sharpness there are what, 4-5, other important parameters involved?
Tom

[Norm Dulak]

28-300, nice zoom range, more useful than the 70-300 I've been using. It and a wide angle zoom would make great travel combo. And since it is a FX lens it should perform well on a DX sensor body.
As for lens tests like this, I really can't tell here with such images. And generally I don't try tests like this at home unless I have another known good lens to shoot identical shots and then compare results. And of course in addition to sharpness there are what, 4-5, other important parameters involved?
Tom

Tom:

You're right about potential problems with my test. I thought I'd try to get some info on the lens that might be useful to me and to others. But I won't be quitting my day job (retirement ;)) to become a professional lens tester!

Norm

[Norm Dulak]

I now have bird images captured with the excellent new Nikkor 28-300mm lens. While my newspaper lens test may not have been persuasive to some, the new images have convinced me that Linda and I need another copy of this lens for our trip to Antarctica, and for many other uses.

Thanks for looking, but I wish that more of you had offered some comments on my original posting. :( If my approach to testing the lens was wrong, I'd like to know that. If it provided some benefit to you, I'd like to know that also.

BPN works best with the active participation of its members. :)

Norm

[Arthur Morris]

The stuff at f/5.6 looks at least as sharp as or sharper than the stuff at f/11. It is hard to judge critical sharpness from JPEGs. If I had gone to Antarctica with a long focal length of only 300mm I would have missed tons of great opps (for my style). I used the 500 with the 2X often and if I ever return it will be with the 800 and a 1.4X II TC (or with whatever super-tele I am using at the time).

As tame as the birds are there are still limitations on how close you can get. And you cannot make images like the attached with a 300 :)

[Arthur Morris]

ps: I do recommend your test to folks who write stating that they have a bad camera and/or lens....

[Norm Dulak]

The stuff at f/5.6 looks at least as sharp as or sharper than the stuff at f/11. It is hard to judge critical sharpness from JPEGs. If I had gone to Antarctica with a long focal length of only 300mm I would have missed tons of great opps (for my style). I used the 500 with the 2X often and if I ever return it will be with the 800 and a 1.4X II TC (or with whatever super-tele I am using at the time).

As tame as the birds are there are still limitations on how close you can get. And you cannot make images like the attached with a 300 :)

Thanks. As always, your comments are helpful and incisive.

There always are some advantages to big glass, including capture of the image you've posted. But physical limitations unfortunately preclude my lugging such heavy artillery to remote places, and onto and off of zodiacs. So I'll just have to be content photographing those critters at a bit more of a distance, hopefully engaged in a caress, nursing a chick, or some other, interesting situation. :) In saying that I feel that I'm sacrificing very little if anything, because I have always been more interested in bird behavior than morphological details. Our styles do differ. ;)

But I'm pleased to learn that you see some utility in my lens test! :D

Thanks for the comments!

Norm

[Arthur Morris]

YAW. Different strokes..... And yes different styles.

[Roger Clark]

Norm,

I would say your test is a good first order test. If a lens shows softness in such a test, then one knows for sure that it is not a top performer. The disadvantage of such a test is the dynamic range is quite limited. Another (companion) test would be a real world test with a bright background. For example, a black bird on a white cloud sky background. In that case, how much flare and chromatic aberration shows? A real challenge for lenses is a bright moon high in a dark sky. The edge of the moon to black sky has more stops of dynamic range than most cameras and will show such problems.

Roger

[Norm Dulak]

Thanks Roger. As usual, your informed comments have been very helpful!

Norm