dEaringfilm reviews the
12-24mm f/4G ED-IF AF-S DX Zoom Nikkor Lens
AKA: Go Wide and wait for a pass
It's like sitting in a audience in a Barnum and Bailey Circus, lots of ooooohhs and ahhhhhhas. That is what this lens is all about in the 12-15mm rage, it's not perfect like Mr. Jones's lawn next door but it delivers in a area that no other zoom lens can deliver in digital at such a high quality in this range. As you stretch it out to the 18-24mm range it becomes the perfect normal wide angle to normal range lens. It does not deliver the color and low distortion that the excellent 17-35mm F2.8, nor the build quality, but it goes super wide where the 17-35 and 17-55 is simply just wide on a digital 1.5x size sensor.
It has a Silent Wave motor, which basically means that you won't hear all those R2D2 and C3PO noises while auto focusing the lens. AF-S is very nice for telephoto lens where your subject tends to be a whole lot faster but for this lens it just makes it more pleasurable to use. It also has a couple of ED elements like all of Nikon's new lenses that are worth anything. You can read all the rest of the technical information at Nikon's Website here. I would like to note that this lens does have a smart 77mm front filter thread, which is great if you use all Nikon's other great zoom lenses, I can't stand having to get the 72mm and 62mm filters that I already have in 52mm and 77mm.
This lens balances really well on just about every Nikon digital body from the D40 on up, but it feels a little bit light for a medium size lens on a D2H(s) and D2x(s). Actually I feel it's much closer of a match with a D80 through D200 and D2x due to the increased resolution, than with a high speed D2H(s). This is a city/landscape lens its not really made for portraits like the excellent 85mm Nikon lenses, and usually people that take landscapes love detail to death hence the higher resolution sensor. This lens does shine on a D2X. I recently took this lens to Salton Sea with me and loved the results it got me.
It does what it is made to do, stopped down a bit that is. I would still consider it a pretty good low light lens due to the fact that you can hand hold wide angle lenses for longer at the same apertures than you can with normal and telephoto lenses although it lacks VR. Realistically speaking it really would never need VR. In theory you could probably hand hold this lens at 12mm in low light about the same as the lovely 28mm 1.4 classic. Even though this lens starts at F4 I would say that the aperture I get best results is around F8-F11 with tripod support.
Reccomendation: No other lens is this good at this focal length for a Nikon Digital (1.5x) Sensor, the 3rd party ones are good but this edges them out slightly. So yeah I like this lens.
| Performance Wide Open |
|
3 (f4 at 12mm) |
| Performance Stopped Down |
|
4 (f8-11 all focal lengths) |
| Build Quality |
|
4 (usual nikon great feel, but all plastic) |
| Value and Features |
|
4 (no VR but it has real AF-S and ED glass) |
Here are a few examples of what I have gotten out of this lens, of course you mileage will vary. When you click a image it will open in a new window. (Tip: I use Firefox and have new windows open as new tabs, really nice feature)
Links to other reviews of this lens:
Thom Hogan
Bjørn Rørslett
For reviews of other lenses see:
Nikon Lenses Link Collection
Official Nikon USA Page
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