Sports lens for D300

Sgt_Major

Sgt_Major

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Name
Tony Smyth
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I do quite a bit of sports work for papers:

football (soccer)
gaelic
hurling
motorsports

Currently I have a Sigma 50-500, but I find it's ofte slow to focus, and I miss a potential shot. It's got to the stage where I'm planning to sell it and replace it with something faster focusing.

I regularly use it at around 300-350mm, so would need a lens with decent reach, but I rarely use the full 500mm, and if I did want it, I can buy a 2x converter.

So, what's my options?

Nikon 70-200 f2.8 VR?
Anything else? I'd probably prefer nikon, as all my other lenses are nikon, but its not 100% required.

Cheers in advance for reading + replies.
Tony
 
Sgt_Major said:
I do quite a bit of sports work for papers:

football (soccer)
gaelic
hurling
motorsports

Currently I have a Sigma 50-500, but I find it's ofte slow to focus, and I miss a potential shot. It's got to the stage where I'm planning to sell it and replace it with something faster focusing.

I regularly use it at around 300-350mm, so would need a lens with decent reach, but I rarely use the full 500mm, and if I did want it, I can buy a 2x converter.

So, what's my options?

Nikon 70-200 f2.8 VR?
Anything else? I'd probably prefer nikon, as all my other lenses are nikon, but its not 100% required.

Cheers in advance for reading + replies.
Tony
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Really depends on your budget, if money no object and you say you work mainly in the 200-400 range then the Nikon 200-400mm f4 (£3000) is the perfect lens for you.

The problems with TC's are, they slow your focus speeds down, the 70-200mm is a great lens on it's own, but add a TC and performance starts to drop off especially for sports.

The 70-200 would give you the speed, but not the range, add a 2x TC on to that lens and it doesn't give you much better than you've got, because you lose 2 f-stops of light.

The only other way to go is primes, Nikon also make a very good 300mm f2.8 (£3000), but again pricey. Unfortunately you've got to the point were the budget lens has fallen down because their too slow, especially if the light is not good, the next step up in lenses is quite significant.

If you wanted to go for sigma, they offer the 100-300mm f4 (£700), great lens, very sharp and the 120-300mm f2.8 (£1600), fast focusing and good lens, but does have some issues with build quality.

Peter
 
mattyh said:
70-200 f2.8 would be the bestest choice imo, with a TC if required
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pete.rush said:
The problems with TC's are, they slow your focus speeds down, the 70-200mm is a great lens on it's own, but add a TC and performance starts to drop off especially for sports.

The 70-200 would give you the speed, but not the range, add a 2x TC on to that lens and it doesn't give you much better than you've got, because you lose 2 f-stops of light.

Peter
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The 70-200 will work with the shortest converter without loss in IQ
 
Oli R C said:
The 70-200 will work with the shortest converter without loss in IQ
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Not loss in quality of image, you lose F-stops of light and in sports photography shutter speeds are important, thats why he's having problems with his bigma..... f6.3 not good. Unless you can guarantee wall to wall sunshine everytime you go out, losing light slows the focusing down and I like my canon 70-200 plus 1.4x TC combo, but only in good light.

Peter
 
pete.rush said:
Not loss in quality of image, you lose F-stops of light and in sports photography shutter speeds are important, thats why he's having problems with his bigma..... f6.3 not good. Unless you can guarantee wall to wall sunshine everytime you go out, losing light slows the focusing down and I like my canon 70-200 plus 1.4x TC combo, but only in good light.

Peter
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Yep. Not disagreeing, just adding.

Double quote was an accident by the way :bonk:
 
the lighting on the bigma is ok, I can work with that to an extent, it's more the speed of the focus thats annoying me.

Thanks for the replies guys, keep em coming, this is just want I wanted, a good in + out discussion.

Should say my budget would be pretty much capped at £1200-£1500 :~(
 
Sgt_Major said:
the lighting on the bigma is ok, I can work with that to an extent, it's more the speed of the focus thats annoying me.

Thanks for the replies guys, keep em coming, this is just want I wanted, a good in + out discussion.

Should say my budget would be pretty much capped at £1200-£1500 :~(
Click to expand...

Thats the problem with the bigma, in good light it's OK, but you lose the light when trying to take photo's the speed of your focusing will slow down and sometimes won't focus the lens will just hunt. If your budget is capped at £1200-1500, the 70-200mm plus 1.5x TC (I think for Nikon) would give you a 105-300mm f4 lens, or there's the sigma 100-300mm f4 (OK no IS), but you don't need it for sports, this is a great lens and around £700-800 will save you some money, probably one of the best budget zooms for the money or the Nikon 80-400mm f4-5.6 (£1000) which would be significantly better than your bigma and give you the range you require.

Peter
 
the 80-400mm is no where near fast enough, the 70-200mm in british weather is superb, my mower shots were taken with it on a right nasty overcast wet day but focusing was fast and the images sharp as a button, i understand the tc 1.4x convertor is not bad on this lens but havent got one

mower shots here all at 2.8 i think
 
Another option in the 300mm range is the Sigma 300mm 2.8 I was loaned one whilst waiting for my Nikon 200-400mm.
I was very impressed with it. fast and sharp. It was an 'as new' lens and priced at about £1100 at the time. (I would still buy one of those if one came up)
I use my nikon 70-200mm with the nikon 1.7 conv and its still fast and produces excellent shots.
Now as already said, if budget isnt an issue, then the 200-400mm is awesome! But very heavy for panning handheld.


Kev.
 
What about using manual focus on the Bigma or would that be too awkward?
Or, Mpbphotographic have a Nikon 500mm ( £1699) and a Nikon 80-400 VR( £549) lens in their used lens section here.

Allan
 
kevshore said:
Another option in the 300mm range is the Sigma 300mm 2.8 I was loaned one whilst waiting for my Nikon 200-400mm.
I was very impressed with it. fast and sharp. It was an 'as new' lens and priced at about £1100 at the time. (I would still buy one of those if one came up)
I use my nikon 70-200mm with the nikon 1.7 conv and its still fast and produces excellent shots.
Now as already said, if budget isnt an issue, then the 200-400mm is awesome! But very heavy for panning handheld.


Kev.
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Us canon user's are only jealous :D a 200-400mm would be great on a canon mount, it keeps popping up on many forums as a lens canon should make, but obviously they're not paying much attention. :shake:

I've heard good things about the sigma 300mm f2.8 prime, not as good as the canon/nikon offerings, but not bad for 1/2 the cost, also the sigma 120-300mm f2.8 is within budget if bought from HK.

Peter

Peter
 
Only one lens to consider and that is the 300mm F/2.8.

And a 70-200 F/2.8 on a second body.
 
There's another two...both Sigmas. The 120-300mm f/2.8, or smaller and lighter, the 100-300mm f/4. Both will take the 1.4TC nicely, and give you some more options to consider
 
Willing to shop second-hand?

I picked up my 80-200 2.8 AF-S for £500, was lightning quick and didn't notice any drop in performance with a 1.4 (taking it up to 280mm), may be a bit short I guess, but you will have a constant f4 which is very useful.

Other than that, Sigma 120-300 2.8 seems ideal (I got mine for £900 second hand), a bit slower AF than my old 80-200, but still very quick.
 
I used the sigma 100-300 f4 on a D300 with and without the 1.4tc and it was fast and sharp.
 
I have been using the sigma 120-300 f2.8 with a x1.4TC and there is a just noticable slowing on the focus speed with the converter in place, but I have used for motorsport easily enough but it depends how quick you want it to be. When I was shopping for this, the general consensus seemed to be that x2 converters of any make do suffer noticable IQ loss, but this is not a problem with 1.4/1.7 TC's, hence I opted for the 1.4 giving a relative 420mm at F4. I have used the Nikon 70-200 a few times and its a fabulous lens, IF its ok with a TC on, then that might be your option, or as suggested earlier, the v.pricey 200-400.

Howabout seeing what you can hire from Stuart at Lensesforhire and seeing which combo you prefer before splashing out a lot of money of something that isn't quite what you wanted?
 
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