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Zeiss Distagon T* 35mm f/2.0 ZF.2 Review

May
4
2011
May 4, 2011
By 27 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the manual focus Zeiss Distagon T* 35mm f/2.0 ZF.2, a second generation 35mm f/2 prime lens from Zeiss for Nikon and Canon mounts. The lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I and many other photographers use to buy photography gear. The lens sample I tested was for the Nikon F mount, although you can get the same lens for the Canon EF mount.

Zeiss Distagon T* 35mm f/2.0 ZF.2

The Zeiss 35mm f/2.0 ZF.2 is a professional-grade fixed wide-angle lens targeted at enthusiasts and professionals that need high quality optics for different types of photography, including landscape, architecture, portrait and astrophotography. Similar to other Zeiss prime lenses, the lens is designed to work on both FX and DX sensor cameras (equivalent of approx 52.5mm on DX) and yields amazing clarity and contrast throughout the frame. The all-metal Zeiss 35mm has a very tough and high quality build and is sealed against dust and tough weather conditions. When compared to the latest generation Nikon AF-S lenses like Nikon 35mm f/1.4G with plastic exterior, it feels much more solid in hands – even the lens hood is made of metal. The focal length of 35mm is a good compromise between ultra-wide angle lenses and standard lenses. Thanks to the 9-blade diaphragm, the Zeiss Distagon 35mm f/2.0 ZF.2 renders background highlights in round, circular shapes, making it a good candidate for portraiture and street photography.

Zeiss 35mm Sample #10

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Nikon 35mm f/1.4G Review

Apr
26
2011
April 26, 2011
By 57 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the new professional Nikon 35mm f/1.4G prime lens that was announced in September of 2010. The lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

Nikon 35mm f/1.4G

The Nikon 35mm f/1.4G is a professional-grade lens for enthusiasts and professionals that need the highest quality optics of a fixed wide-angle lens with a large aperture of f/1.4 for low-light situations and shallow depth of field to isolate subjects from the background, making it an ideal candidate for many types of photography, including portrait, wedding, landscape and astrophotography. The lens incorporates the latest optical technology destined for both FX and DX sensors (equivalent of approx 52.5mm on DX), yielding amazing clarity and contrast in most challenging lighting conditions. The Nikon 35mm f/1.4G follows the release of the excellent Nikon 24mm f/1.4G lens, having similar lens characteristics. Although the lens exterior and construction seem to be almost identical, the Nikon 35mm f/1.4G has a simpler optical design when compared to the Nikon 24mm f/1.4G (more on this below). The focal length of 35mm is a good compromise between ultra-wide angle lenses and standard lenses – it is not too wide or too long. As for the lens interior and optics, Nikon integrated the latest technology into this lens, including AF-S silent-wave focus motor and Rear Focus (to eliminate front barrel rotation and lens length changes) and enhanced the optical formula of the lens by incorporating Nano crystal coating and Super Integrated Coating (SIC) to reduce ghosting and flares. The lens is of high quality build, similar to other AF-S Nikon primes and is sealed against dust and tough weather conditions. Thanks to the 9-blade diaphragm, the Nikon 35mm f/1.4G renders background highlights in a round, circular shape and the maximum aperture of f/1.4 makes this lens a great portrait lens for both images and video, especially in low-light conditions.

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Nikon D3100 Review

Mar
20
2011
March 20, 2011
By 15 Comments

Overview

This long overdue Nikon D3100 review is based on my 30 day experience with the camera. I get plenty of comments and emails from our readers asking about the Nikon D3100 and whether they should buy it over the older Nikon D3000 and Nikon D5000 cameras, so I decided to post a review of the D3100 with some sample images and comparisons with other Nikon DSLRs to hopefully make it easier for our readers to make the right choice. Please note that the sample images provided in this review are “test” shots that have not been heavily modified in post-processing.

Nikon D3100

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Nikon D7000 Review

Feb
8
2011
February 8, 2011
By 373 Comments

Overview

This long overdue Nikon D7000 review is based on my 3+ month experience with multiple samples of the camera. Due to my busy schedule and a very high demand on the D7000, I was not able to obtain a copy earlier to test. I actually thought it was a good thing to wait, because I did not want to get one from the initial production (which seemed to be rushed, resulting in lots of bad samples out there). Ever since the Nikon D7000 was released, I have been getting many questions from current and potential buyers, asking about backfocus issues, overexposed images, bad video quality, autofocus problems, image quality at low and high ISOs and hot pixels. For this review, I made a note to myself to test the camera against each of the listed potential problems and report on my findings.

Nikon D7000

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Drobo S Review (USB 3.0, 2nd Generation)

Jan
30
2011
January 30, 2011
By 37 Comments

This is a review of the new Drobo S second generation 5-bay storage array by Data Robotics. Although the Drobo S is officially known as the 2nd generation unit, my PC recognized it as a 3rd generation Drobo S, so I’m not sure what I should call it. I guess I will simply call it the “new Drobo S” for this review. There are several reasons why I decided to write this review. First of all, Drobo products are gaining more and more popularity among photographers and in many cases are becoming a part of their workflow. While some well-known photographers have already endorsed Drobo as a photo storage solution, I wanted to see exactly how fast and reliable this unit is for storing photographs, compared to internal and much cheaper single/dual disk external storage. Second, I have been working with some of the best DAS/NAS/SAN storage solutions during the last 5 years (from small business to enterprise-level storage solutions like EMC Clariion) and having a pretty good idea on what to expect from a storage array, I wanted to see what Drobo has to offer compared to other similar products like Netgear ReadyNAS Pro. Lastly, I wanted to test and see how well the new Drobo S works with the latest technologies like USB 3.0 and how the new eSATA port performs in comparison. I will do my best to make this review as objective as possible, with plenty of data and screenshots to back up my words.

Drobo S

1) Introduction to Drobo S

Drobo S is a 5-bay Directly Attached Storage (DAS) device developed by Data Robotics, targeted at “creative pros, photographers, videographers, small office/home office”, as stated on their website. While designed with simplicity and reliability in mind, the Drobo S uses a fairly complex, proprietary “BeyondRAID” technology with a single or dual drive redundancy, which means that your data would be safe even if two drives were to fail at the same time, as long as dual drive redundancy was enabled before drives failed. On top of that, “BeyondRAID” has some great features like mixed drive size utilization, which allows mixing any size SATA hard drives, and instant expansion, which allows users to insert additional drives when more storage is needed. Traditional RAID technologies such as RAID 5 and RAID 6 have certain limitations and do not provide as much storage as BeyondRAID, especially when mixing small and large hard drives of various sizes. Lastly, the self-managing and self-healing features of the Drobo family are very attractive – if a drive experiences a failure such as a bad block, the system switches to a “self-healing” mode, where it will try to work around bad sectors and return to normal state. During such failures, the system will blink with red lights in front of the unit and will prompt you with warnings (through Drobo Dashboard), indicating which drive must be replaced. Drobo S also proactively monitors the amount of free space available on the unit. If you get to near full capacity, Drobo S will notify you through lights and its dashboard software.

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Nikon 24-120mm VR Review

Nov
5
2010
November 5, 2010
By 283 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 24-120mm f/4G ED VR lens that was released in August of 2010 along with the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G VR, Nikon 85mm f/1.4G and Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR DX lenses. The lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

The constant maximum aperture, mid-range Nikon 24-120mm f/4 VR zoom lens is a major update to the Nikon 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G VR that was released back in 2003. The older, variable-aperture 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6 had some optical problems that did not make it a popular lens among photographers, so Nikon decided to address those problems by releasing this highly-anticipated Nikon 24-120mm f/4.0 lens. Why highly-anticipated? Because the 24-120mm focal range is very useful for photographers who use full-frame cameras like Nikon D700/D3s/D3x and who find the 24-70mm f/2.8 either too short on the long focal end, or too heavy for everyday use. In addition, having VR on a mid-range lens like the 24-120mm is crucial for low-light photography, even on the wide end.

Nikon 24-120mm f/4 ED VR

Did Nikon address all problems the Nikon 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G had in this new f/4 update? How does it compare to the legendary Nikon 24-70mm and the new 28-300mm lenses? Is it really on par with the 28-300mm when it comes to performance, making it a worse buy than the 28-300mm like some of the reviewers stated? In this review, I will do my best to provide a detailed analysis of the lens’ performance, including sharpness tests and comparisons against other mid-range lenses and answer the above questions.

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Nikon 55-300mm VR Review

Oct
17
2010
October 17, 2010
By 111 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR lens that was released in August of 2010 together with three other lenses – Nikon 85mm f/1.4G, Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G VR and Nikon 24-120mm f/4.0 VR. The lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED VR

The Nikon 55-300mm VR lens is a major update to the existing Nikon 55-200mm f/4.0-5.6G ED VR lens that was released in 2007. Just like the 55-200mm VR, it is designed to be used with the Nikon 18-55mm DX VR kit lens to provide expanded focal range for telephoto shots. Nikon 55-300mm is currently the cheapest way to get to true 300mm focal length in Nikon’s current line of lenses, with a little more shorter range to work with than the Nikon 70-300mm VR lens. It is an ideal lens to be used for family events and vacations to capture distant subjects, and the use of Vibration Reduction (VR) technology makes it easier to get sharp photographs at slower shutter speeds, especially when shooting at 300mm. Similar to the Nikon 28-300mm VR lens, the Nikon 55-300mm VR comes with two Extra-low Dispersion (ED) Elements, which due to less air bubbles and glass deformities within the glass elements help minimize chromatic aberration and deliver sharper images at large apertures. The Nikon 55-300mm VR lens is only designed to work on Nikon DX (cropped) sensors and has an equivalent field of view of approximately 82.5mm-450mm (in 35mm equivalent), which makes the lens particularly good for reaching distant subjects. Autofocus is practically silent, thanks to the Silent Wave Motor (AF-S) within the lens.

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Nikon 28-300mm VR Second Lens Sample Test

Oct
15
2010
October 15, 2010
By 4 Comments

One of our readers, Nicholas, was kind enough to send his copy of the Nikon 28-300mm lens to me to perform some additional testing and compare his version with mine. The first copy of the 28-300 he obtained was soft, so he sent it back and got it replaced with a different one that was much sharper. Since some of the reviews on the Internet praise the 28-300mm so much, I thought that mine was a bad copy, so I really wanted to perform another test with another sample.

My findings and head-to-head comparisons are posted on the 4th page of the Nikon 28-300mm Review. I also added one more comparison against the Nikon 70-300mm VR that you can find on the 10th page of the same review.

I am also almost done with the Nikon 55-300mm DX VR Lens review, which I’m hoping to post tomorrow night.

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Nikon 28-300mm VR Review

Oct
5
2010
October 5, 2010
By 315 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens that was released in August of 2010 along with the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G and Nikon 55-300mm f/4.5-5.6G VR DX lenses. The lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

It is no secret that Nikon released the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR lens largely due to the popular demand of the Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G VR DX. The large zoom range of the Nikon 18-200mm and its generally good performance made it a lens of choice for those, who wanted to have a good lightweight travel lens or only wanted to use one lens on their DSLR cameras. Despite the fact that the lens suffered from some serious issues such as lens creep, heavy distortion and sharpness issues beyond 105mm, some photographers and reviewers praised the 18-200mm so much, that the demand increased significantly, resulting in heavy lens shortages around the world. During this time, Nikon had a hard time keeping the lens on the shelves and the only way to obtain it was to either pay a premium and buy it from Ebay, or order and wait for months until Nikon sent another batch to retailers. I remember this period of time very well, since I had to wait for 3 months to get my copy of the lens. Ever since Nikon released the FX full-frame sensor, more and more photographers have been switching from DX to FX. Since Nikon 18-200mm is a DX lens, an FX camera would fall back to DX mode, giving less than half the resolution – a problematic situation for most photographers that use the current 12 megapixel cameras. Therefore, photographers that made the switch from cropped sensor cameras to full-frame, ended up selling or trading their DX lenses for the above reason, including the much loved Nikon 18-200mm.

Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR

In response to the popular demand, this year Nikon released an FX version of the Nikon 18-200mm lens, the Nikon 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6G ED VR. Nikon retained most of the lens design, but did make some modifications, to reach good performance levels on FX cameras. In this review, I will do my best to provide a detailed analysis of the lens’ performance, including sharpness tests in various conditions and provide comparison tests against the Nikon 18-200mm f/3.5-5.6G DX VR II lens and other pro-level FX lenses such as Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8G and Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II.

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Nikon 85mm f/1.4G Review

Sep
23
2010
September 23, 2010
By 116 Comments

Overview

This is an in-depth review of the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S lens that was announced with three other lenses in August of 2010. Ever since the manual focus AI-s version of the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 lens was introduced back in 1981, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4 lenses have been used as references for superb sharpness, best-looking bokeh and beautiful color renditions. The last autofocus AF-D version of the lens produced in 1995, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4D, was often called the “king of bokeh”, yielding extremely pleasing out-of-focus areas, in addition to producing tack-sharp, colorful images when shooting wide open at maximum aperture of f/1.4. Its legendary performance made the Nikon 85mm f/1.4D lens a must-have for portrait photographers and many professionals have been heavily relying on this lens for their commercial work. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S lens is the latest update to the 85mm f/1.4 line, which replaces the outdated AF-D version with the latest optical and technology innovations from Nikon. In this review, I will not only provide information on the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G lens, but will also compare it against the older Nikon 85mm f/1.4D and the Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8G VR II lenses.

The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G lens was kindly provided by B&H – the largest photo reseller in the world that I use more than any other to buy my photography gear.

Nikon 85mm f/1.4G

The highly anticipated Nikon 85mm f/1.4G AF-S is a professional-grade lens that is specifically designed for portrait, studio and wedding photographers that need an ultra-fast, high quality lens with a large aperture of f/1.4 for low-light situations and shallow depth of field to isolate subjects from the background, without compromising image quality and sharpness. The Nikon 85mm f/1.4G is built to work extremely well on both FX and DX sensors, yielding very sharp results in the center frame, as shown in the following pages of this review. Nikon has incorporated the latest technology and optical formulas to this lens, including AF-S silent-wave focus motor and Nano crystal coating. Just like most Nikon professional lenses, the Nikon 85mm f/1.4G has a 77mm filter thread and is also sealed against dust and tough weather conditions for outdoors field use.

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