Nikon Teleconverters - yes or no?

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Sigmamark

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Mark
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Following a question in an earlier post, it was suggested that Nikon Teleconverters wouldn't work with my lenses (18 - 105 and 70 - 300 Nikon DX AF-S VR) and even if they or an alternative brand would, the results would be disappointing.
Since I would like to extend the range of my bigger lens without spending thousands, can the power of talk photography provide some help to a newcomer? :help:
For the avoidance of doubt, if the TC's will work and I lose a bit of sharpness at the edges of images, I really don't think it will spoil my day too much!
 
You will need to use a Kenko Pro 300 1.4x TC.

Nikon TC's will not even fit to either of the lenses you have. Can't mount the lenses.

Neither lenses are designed to work with TC's and while they will "work" in the literal sense woth Kenko, image quality will be disappointing.

TC's are designed to be used on high quality f/2.8 or f/4 lenses.
 
I've been thinking about this.

A tele converter is going to "optically crop" while your D90 has 12 million pixels so you have plenty of pixels to crop your self. So it depends on the optical resolution of the center of your lens.

If to attach a 2X to a 70-300 your maximum aperture is going to be f/11.2! If you set it to 300mm at f8 you will and crop I think you will have a better image.


I would like somebody with a tele converter to do a review and see which produces the sharper results.

Stuart
 
I have done just such a test with the 70-300 VR and a Teleplus 1.5x converter.

The cropped image with no converter is sharper and is a more natural colour than the same shot with the telecon fitted. The test shots were done with a Nikon D70 and the lens was at f/8. Focus was slower to be aquired with the telecon fitted as well (in bright light) and the outfit hunted when the light got poor, especially on a low contrast target (a tangle of honeysuckle twigs). Pixel peeping at the images would probably show even more problems with the converted image - my comparison was done on prints at A4 size. Sorry, the test images have been deleted since I had learned what I wanted to know so didn't need them any more.
 
The replies posted so far are very informative and should have put you off of using a teleconverter with your present lenses. So it would help to know what sort of photography you're interested in and what focal length will suit your needs.

On the off-chance that 600 mm, albeit manual focus, would do, have a look at this Nikon 300mm f/4 review and note the comments (and links) about its use with a teleconverter. Or perhaps a 500 mm Nikon reflex lens would suffice? Neither of these options will cost thousands as you'd be looking for used equipment.

If you have a specialist need, you might be better off simply saving up for a longer telephoto lens.
 
All.

Many thanks for your comments and advice. Since I carry my camera with me a lot, it sounded attractive to have the TC in my pocket (like I used to with my Canon 35mm FD lenses) to give a greater range albeit with the loss of light. It seems I will not be doing this with my new system, but at least with digital and 12 Meg, I can at least crop the images. Now I need to start saving for a bigger lens.:thumbs:
 
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