Nikon 10-24mm f/3.5-4.5G ED AF-S DX Nikkor Wide-Angle Zoom Lens for Nikon Digital SLR Cameras..
GET Nikon 10-24mm f/3.5-4.5G ED AF-S DX Nikkor Wide-Angle Zoom Lens for Nikon Digital SLR Cameras By Nikon
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274 of 282 people found the following review helpful.
By Webtrance
Upon first inspection, fit & finish are on par with Nikon's own 18-200, 16-85, etc. I would say that it's very-very close to the build, size/weight of my 16-85. It's a very decent build, solid plastic, and has smooth operating zoom and focus rings. This lens has a metal mount, weather seal gasket, and a focus distance window.
Why I didn't buy the 12-24 f/4: The Nikon 10-24mm will give me 10mm at f/3.5, which works fine for me. The 12-24mm will give me 12mm at f/4, which is neither wide or bright enough. I hear so many folks state "but the 12-24 is a constant f/4." I've also heard people say that "variable aperture" lenses are indicative of cheaper or consumer-grade lenses. I don't necessarily agree with that. I believe most lenses are a touch sharper when stopped down from their maximum aperture anyway, therefore a constant f/4 with the 12-24mm doesn't necessarily attract me to that lens. I wouldn't shoot the 12-24mm at f/4 anyway, especially for landscapes. In my opinion, the 10-24mm makes more sense with it's wider field of view.
I choose the Nikon 10-24mm for the following reasons:
1. Versatility. This is one of its best attributes. The 10-24mm is versatile due to ultra wide views for landscapes, yet can zoom to a more natural focal length for a quick snapshot or portrait at your home gathering or outing.
2. Landscape photography. For me, it comes down to real-world applications and benefits of having a wide angle. I love landscape shots and though you can make decent landscapes at 18mm, having an ultra wide in your bag allows you to capture expansive vistas, whether at the beach or the mountains.
3. Perspective. The perspective you're able to get with this lens is tremendous. Though there is fair distortion on the 10mm side, it's easily correctable with DxO or Photoshop, among other graphics programs. To be creative with wide angle, read Ken Rockwell's page on using a wide angle lens. He and others will explain that a wide angle is for drawing people into the picture. Use your wide angle to emphasize the main subject. As Ken says, ultra wide lenses are for getting close and bringing the viewer into the photo, not for fitting a subject into a photo.
4. Range. Opting for the Nikon 10-24mm gives more range than both the Tokina 11-16mm and Sigma 10-20mm. It can easily be left on the camera all day, allowing landscape shooting and a decent portrait lens from 18-24mm without the need to switch lenses.
So how's the lens? It's outstanding, given the nature of ultra-wides. You'll notice distortion in the far corners/sides of your images below 15mm or so. Those corners will be a little soft at times, depending on your aperture setting. Wide open at f/3.5, you'll get softness away from the center of the image. Depending on your shooting habits, the large aperture will not detract from your images if you place your main subject in the center. Even wide open the main subject or center of the image will be sharp. Stopping down to f/5.6, f/8, and smaller apertures sharpens entire image. For landscapes, I routinely shoot at f/5.6-f/11 or smaller for optimal sharpness across the entire image.
Alternatives to Nikon:
A. Tokina 11-16mm. In my opinion the 11-16 at f/2.8, though a fine lens, is not necessarily a landscape lens. I don't shoot landscapes at f/2.8, f/3.5, or f/4 for that matter. If I want captivating ultra-wide shots with foreground/background in clear focus, I'd set f/5.6 through f/16 or beyond, depending on the lens I'm using. This is not to say you can't bring the Tokina to the Grand Canyon and shoot at f/11 to capture an expansive view at 11mm. You can surely do that with the Tokina, but you can see where I'm going with this. The Tokina's maximum aperture of f/2.8 is not utilized when shooting in a landscape setting. The Tokina makes for a superb low light interior ultra-wide, whereas it's hard to use a flash and light the entire room properly. I believe that lens serves a different purpose all together and you may find the zoom range too limited.
B. Tokina 12-24mm. It's definitely a contender at half the price. Superb build - better than Nikon. However, wouldn't you rather have Nikon for the ultimate in quality, dependability, and resale value?
C. Sigma 10-20mm. It's worth looking at due to fair reviews, better range than the Tokina 11-16mm and its low price point compared to Nikon.
D. Tamron 10-24mm. I wouldn't write it off completely. However the reviews I've read do indicate it's too soft, so and check the user reviews and Ken Rockwell's review as well.
The filter for this lens is a 77mm. I opted for a B&W multi-coated UV filter. B+W 77mm UVA (Ultra Violet) Haze MRC Filter #010 Filters in this size can be pricey, especially a 77mm circular polarizer, which isn't recommended for this lens due to uneven darkening of skies. You'd be better off grabbing a Cokin Z or for UWA lenses, the X-Pro series filter. The Lee foundation kit utilizing 4x6 filters or Hitech's 4x5's would be a good option.
Neutral Density (ND) Filters. Many of you may wish to make cool wide angle shots of a waterfalls, creeks, rivers, or oceans with the silky smooth water movement you see so often in these pictures. To do that you need a neutral density filter if shooting in daylight conditions. I would recommend an inexpensive Hoya 77mm ND8X. Hoya HMC NDx8 - Filter - neutral density 8x - 77 mm If you're worried about vignetting with the Hoya, please don't. I use it on the Nikon 10-24mm and see absolutely no vignetting at 10mm. The ND8x is a 3 stop filter and will allow you to get between 1-2 second shutter speeds during broad daylight. With those speeds and by using a tripod, you're able to get the silky water movement in your waterfalls and such. Better still would be to wait until later in the evening or find a shaded cove or dense foliage location with a waterfall or creek. Your shutter speeds in those conditions may be upwards to 5-6 sec or more.
Circular Polarizer's (CPL): Not recommended for UWA lenses due to uneven darkening of skies. However, I carefully and strategically use a 77mm Marumi Super CPL with no issues with uneven darkening and no vignetting. The Marumi is fantastic with a solid 5mm thin build, superb polarization quality, and smooth operation. It's almost equivalent to B&W's top end CPL and less than half the price. What I mean by strategic use of a CPL is to use clouds, trees, buildings, etc, to "mask" any uneven darkening of skies. Moreover, you don't have to use your CPL with its maximum effect. It works very well at giving you a touch more blue in your skies, while helping to bring out details is clouds and brighten & saturate your foregrounds. On cloudy days, the CPL can help you with your reflections, so it's not only good for those sunny days. I would avoid using it for landscapes with clear blue skies that fill the frame. If you are to do that, you'll clearly see a dark striation down the center of your image. The CPL effect can't cover the field of view at 10mm and there's no getting around it, less "masking" your shot with clouds, trees or buildings as mentioned earlier. Marumi CPL is here: Marumi DHG Super Circular Polarizer CPL PL.D 77 77mm Filter Japan By the way, I can stack the Marumi and the Hoya ND8x down to 11mm with no vignetting.
Regarding my copy of the 10-24mm, with thourough testing, 10mm seems sharpest at f/5.6 - f/8. Depth of field appears as broad at 10mm f/5.6-f/8 as it is at smaller apertures. At 24mm, my sharpest setting is f/11.
Bottom line: The Nikon 10-24mm is a superb ultra wide lens for DX cameras. Its build quality is typical Nikon with a solid plastic feel, smooth zoom & focus, weather sealed gasket, metal mount, and quick/quiet auto focus. It's capable of sharp landscape pictures and offers any photographer the ability to take creative pictures with tremendous perspective and depth.
148 of 158 people found the following review helpful.
By Doctor.Generosity
Another work of Nikon lens genius which gives the ability to take dramatic, unusual, never-before-available, super-wide pix. As recently as a few years ago, before Nikon learned to mass produce aspheric elements, manufacturing this complex 14 element lens at reasonable cost would have been impossible. Compared to the earlier 12-24mm, significantly wider angle.
A nice suprise is that this DX lens can also be used FX, with some limitations of course. Although it will give the full zoom range only when used on the smaller DX format, it actually covers the frame of an FX camera - not over the full range but from 24mm down to about 18mm focal length, with acceptable vignetting (edge darkening). I am using it that way on my film Nikon F6 and digital D700. (For the D700, turn the DX Crop default OFF and turn the Vignette Control to HIGH.) This is pretty cool because it means that someone who wants only occasional use of an 18-24mm lens on a full frame camera does not have to go out and buy a new lens if they already have this one.
I disagree with the reviewers who complain about the plastic, Made in China construction. If this lens were made of brass and steel like a Leica, it would weigh twice as much, cost much more, and be no better photographically. Is it more important to have the controls be smooth than to capture new kinds of photos? In my opinion Nikon has taken the right approach - state of the art computational design, innovative manufacturing of aspheric elements, good enough construction, and breakthrough capability affordable for the amateur photog.
115 of 132 people found the following review helpful.
By GroovyGeek
I have owned and shot with the Nikon 12-24, Tokina 12-24, and three copies of the Sigma 10-20. With the exception of one recent bad copy of the Sigma they were all notably better than the 10-24 in the corners. My copy of the 10-24 is nice in the center, but all four corners were uniformly degraded. Every other WA lens I have owned cleans up very fast in the corners at 10-12mm and by f/5.6 was nearly as good as f/11. Not so with 10-24, which is mushy in the corners at f/3.5 and improves only gradually as it is stopped down, with peak sharpness at a bit over f/11. At f/11 it mostly catches up with the third-party lenses mentioned above and Nikon's own 12-24. I have posted sample images on DPR, photo.net, [...], look them up to see what I am talking about.
The 10-24 range is ideal for my needs so it is a shame that the performance is not as good as the 12-24, even at 12-14mm. The MTF numbers would have suggested that it would be better. My copy is not. Since all four corners are nearly uniformly degraded I don't think that I have a lemon, it may be just inherent in the lens design. I am tempted to call it curvature of field, but with the extreme DOF at 10mm even at f/5.6 I am not sure this would be a reasonable explanation.
While not as terrible as the sample images I have seen from the Tamron 10-24mm, my copy of this lens would not seem to be as good with flat-field subjects (aka brick walls :-) as the other WA lenses I have owned. However, in real-life images with variable depth the corner softness is very difficult to see. Not sure if this is because of the possible field curvature mentioned above, or because it is very rare that I shoot something that has good detail all the way to the corners.
Overall I am a bit disappointed. Given the price it should have been unambiguously better than the competition. Not 2x better as other reviewers have suggested, I am prepared to pay a decent premium to Nikon just for the consistency of color rendition I would get between this and my other most used lens (70-200). However, my expectation was to be able to say "about the same as the Sigma 10-20 in most respects, better at X and Y". Right now I am not sure what X and Y would be, at least in comparison to the excellent copy of the Sigma 10-20 I used to have.
I will probably end up keeping the lens. The 10-24mm range is just too convenient for me, and there is no way I would consider replacing this with the Tamron 10-24, which is absolutely terrible in the corners at 10mm according to numerous reviews.
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Update on 1/7
I need to amend the review. I am leaving the original text unchanged for reference purposes, so it is clear what I said earlier and how my views have evolved.
After using the lens for a few months I need to retract my "soft in the corners" assessment. Not sure how I came to this conclusion with the original tests, the softness was clearly there, but try as I might I cannot reproduce it now with careful focusing. My best guess is that I slightly mis-focused, AF can be unreliable on WA lenses. If you test it against a brick wall make sure to be square and use LiveView with manual focusing. With careful focusing the lens is at least as good as the Sigma 10-20 that I loved so much. Not corner-corner sharpness, that would be a small miracle at 10mm, but slightly better than anything I have seen from the competition. Overall the lens is still not a great value for the quality delivered, but if price is a secondary concern you will love the range and consistency of color rendition with your other Nikon lenses. If you want the absolute best bang for the buck go for the Sigma, just make sure you test it carefully, there are many documented instances of significant copy variation. The colors a slightly different, not better or worse, just different.
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