Which is better travel lens: Nikon 18200 or Tokina 1224

[samueltan99]

Thank you all, yr comments have helped greatly clarified my thoughts process.

Thanks for the suggestion of Nikon 1685. I have nver thot of the lens before. I googled and found out its a sharp lens with excellent performance.

Versus Nikon 18200, which has received mixed review. Furthermore 18200 does not resolve my need for wider angle.

With tokina 12-24 which is also reviewed as a sharp lens, my consideration is i would imagine I wld need to shuffle betw tokina 124 and a zoom lens fr time to time, and under some circumstances while changing lens, I may introduce dust or lints. .

In final analysis, Nikon 1685 would serve me better as a walk around lens. If I need a wider angle lens, I would just save up for Tok 116, after I use Nikon 1685.

At this point, with Nikon 1685 purchase, i thot I need to exercise some restraint not to overspend haha, and learn to take good photos with 1685 range.

Btw I have been advised by Nikon 124 user, that a wide angle lens even a good Nikon 124 introduces distortion for eg straight lines are curved, facial features are distorted etc, unless I take pics of landscapes without lines or beams. I read Nikon 124 is superior wide angle lens than Tok 124. I am pretty surprised with the comments because it is quite different from some of the very amazing wide angle pictures I have seen. I have also seen wide angle pictures with distortion too. Wonder why some wide angle pics show distortion and some dont.

 

[sf_kang]

Currently I alrdy have Nikon 35 mm f1.8 and will be acquiring Nikon D7K. Have previously used Nikon D5k and Nikon 1855, and found the angle frequently not wide enough, and the zoom occasionally limited when I traveled to nature places like jiuzhaigou. For landscape, I shoot mostly during the daytime. If any low light situation, it would be during the sunrise and sunset.

I am deciding between Nikon 18200 and Tokina 1224.

For travel photography, you're likely to be shooting landscapes, cityscapes (buildings, architecture), people, sometimes nightscapes.

You soon coming D7000 has good ISO performance. So you are not forced to buy expensive fast zoom lenses. Here are my suggestions

1) Keep a 35mm/f2 or 35mm/f1.4. This is the lens that would probably stay on the camera most of the time. This is good for most normal shooting. It big aperture allows you to blur out the background when appropriate. It's big aperture also allows low light shooting w/o flash. Anything you want to shoot in the mid range, you can 'zoom' by walk a little in front, a little back.

2) Get the AF-S 18-200 VR2. This will give you good working range from wide to tele in good lighting. This also can be the lens to leave on the camera most of the time, except it's more bulky than the 35mm. This covers the cityscapes, some buildings and allows you to zoom in to capture shots of people, even close ups (without intruding into their privacy).

3) Get a fixed UWA from like between 10mm to 14mm, or a 12-14 or something similar. This is very useful for composing paranomic shots of sceneries, etc.

Take a look at some shots done with the Nikon 12-24/f4 on a D200.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5233987838/in/set-72157625406964425/

Here are some other shots done with the Nikon 14-24/f2.8 but on a D700.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5233998624/in/set-72157625532446002/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5233403671/in/set-72157625532446002/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5233996354/in/set-72157625532446002/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5233996050/in/set-72157625532446002/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/28858702@N07/5234021444/in/set-72157625532446002/

Hope this helps. Happy Shooting.
Fred

 

[brapodam]

Thank you all, yr comments have helped greatly clarified my thoughts process.

Thanks for the suggestion of Nikon 1685. I have nver thot of the lens before. I googled and found out its a sharp lens with excellent performance.

Versus Nikon 18200, which has received mixed review. Furthermore 18200 does not resolve my need for wider angle.

With tokina 12-24 which is also reviewed as a sharp lens, my consideration is i would imagine I wld need to shuffle betw tokina 124 and a zoom lens fr time to time, and under some circumstances while changing lens, I may introduce dust or lints. .

In final analysis, Nikon 1685 would serve me better as a walk around lens. If I need a wider angle lens, I would just save up for Tok 116, after I use Nikon 1685.

At this point, with Nikon 1685 purchase, i thot I need to exercise some restraint not to overspend haha, and learn to take good photos with 1685 range.

Btw I have been advised by Nikon 124 user, that a wide angle lens even a good Nikon 124 introduces distortion for eg straight lines are curved, facial features are distorted etc, unless I take pics of landscapes without lines or beams. I read Nikon 124 is superior wide angle lens than Tok 124. I am pretty surprised with the comments because it is quite different from some of the very amazing wide angle pictures I have seen. I have also seen wide angle pictures with distortion too. Wonder why some wide angle pics show distortion and some dont.

You shouldn't be too worried about the distortions. Look around for reviews that describe the distortion. You want a lens that produce distortion that is easy to correct, not necessarily the lens with the least distortion.

 

[samueltan99]

2) Get the AF-S 18-200 VR2. This will give you good working range from wide to tele in good lighting. This also can be the lens to leave on the camera most of the time, except it's more bulky than the 35mm. This covers the cityscapes, some buildings and allows you to zoom in to capture shots of people, even close ups (without intruding into their privacy).

3) Get a fixed UWA from like between 10mm to 14mm, or a 12-14 or something similar. This is very useful for composing paranomic shots of sceneries, etc.

Thanks for yr suggestion. I like your pics esp Turkey very much.