Lenses
Camera Lenses Reviews and Articles
With a variety of camera lenses on the market, how do you choose the one that's best for your outdoor camera? Check out our digital camera lens reviews. From wide-angle lenses and telephoto zooms, trust advice from the experts.
Fast Lenses
In the digital age, the advantages of a big maximum aperture are greater than ever
 When Kodachrome 64 and Fujichrome Velvia 50 were the mainstays of outdoor photographers, a fast lens was a critical advantage, especially when handholding in early-morning or late-afternoon light. Lenses like the 300mm ƒ/2.8, 70-200mm ƒ/2.8, 105mm ƒ/2 and 50mm ƒ/1.4 or ƒ/1.2 were the workhorse lenses that propped up shutter speeds as light deteriorated.
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Tamron AF28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 VC Zoom
There's a new player in the stabilization game: Welcome to Tamron‚’s Vibration Control zoom
 It becomes a challenge to lug a lot of gear into the field. On the other hand, it’s nice to have wide-angle, telephoto and close-up capability, as well as a tripod for support. So the dilemma is always to either travel comfortably or be prepared for anything.
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Choosing Your Tele-Zoom
Some of the best nature photographers share thoughts and tips on their favorite medium telephoto zoom lenses
 The versatility of medium tele-zooms is just incredible. With ranges that vary from around 50mm to between 200mm and 400mm at the high end, these lenses provide a tremendous variety of framing options for landscape, wildlife, sports action and macro work. Between one of these lenses and a good wide-angle, you can travel most anywhere and be confident that your bases will be covered for nearly any situation. And you can travel light—an absolute necessity if you fly anywhere these days, given the weight restrictions on baggage, not to mention how much easier it can be on your back.
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Zeiss F-Mount Lenses
A trio of new high-quality optics are available for the Nikon line of cameras
 A new player has entered the arena of digital SLR nature photography. While it’s a name synonymous with exceptional quality and performance in its optics, that reputation has mostly centered on medium-format camera lenses, binoculars, spotting scopes and motion-picture lenses used by Hollywood’s movie industry.
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Tamron AF18-250mm f/3.5-6.3 Di II LD Aspherical (IF)
Closer than ever to “one lens does it all”
 My favorite photo subjects are birds, and I like to travel light, so I do most of my shooting with one lens, a fast telephoto. But between close encounters of the bird kind, I often come across lovely landscapes and flowers that require a much wider or closer viewpoint. The 18-200mm zoom lenses for my small-sensor digital SLR aren’t quite long enough for most birds and other distant wildlife, while the 28-300mm lenses aren’t really wide-angle on such D-SLRs. So I have to carry another lens or two or miss out on those non-bird photo ops.
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Tokina AT-X 107 DX AF 10-17mm f/3.5-4.5 Fish-Eye
A creative approach to nature photography provided by this ultra-wide-angle zoom
 Tokina’s AT-X 107 DX AF 10-17mm ƒ/3.5-4.5 fish-eye zoom lens is the most fun I’ve had with a lens in a long while. It features an incredibly wide 180-degree field of view, and with its zoom, something unique for fish-eye lenses, it also acts effectively as a wide-angle lens (albeit with some barrel distortion).
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Sigma APO 50-150mm f/2.8 EX DC HSM
This fast, versatile tele-zoom lens adds to your shooting options
 Transitioning quickly from one shot to the next using a variety of focal lengths—it’s one of the features I appreciate most in the new APO 50-150mm ƒ/2.8 EX DC HSM telephoto zoom lens from Sigma. One moment you can get down low to compose a close-up of a lizard and the next you can zoom in tight on a bird about to burst into flight 50 feet away. In addition to its quick response time, the Hyper Sonic Motor (HSM) autofocus is remarkably silent. And the manual focus override switch makes changing from one mode to the other simple, even while shooting.
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Does Lens Speed Matter?
Pros love their fast glass. Maybe they're onto something.
 When shopping for a new lens, you might encounter the desired focal length (or focal-length range, in a zoom lens) in more than one speed. For example, one camera manufacturer’s lineup includes 400mm ƒ/2.8, 400mm ƒ/4 and 400mm ƒ/5.6 supertelephotos. The ƒ/2.8 is 4.5 times larger in volume, 4.2 times heavier and costs $5,000 more than the ƒ/5.6. Is it worth it? Many wildlife and action photographers think it is.
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Sigma Macro 70mm f/2.8 EX DG
A versatile lens with a fast aperture and popular focal length for D-SLRs
 When we all shot film, one of the favorite focal lengths for a macro lens was 105mm. Sigma’s new 70mm ƒ/2.8 macro lens fits that tradition for digital cameras. All photographers using digital SLRs with small-format, APS-C-sized sensors will find that this lens acts like a 105mm lens with a 35mm camera because of the crop
or multiply factor.
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