{"id":1107,"date":"2015-07-03T07:09:17","date_gmt":"2015-07-02T23:09:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ywo.id.au\/blog\/?p=1107"},"modified":"2025-02-23T21:48:49","modified_gmt":"2025-02-23T13:48:49","slug":"a-breath-of-life-for-the-nikon-dx-range","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/2015\/07\/03\/a-breath-of-life-for-the-nikon-dx-range\/","title":{"rendered":"A breath of life for the Nikon DX range"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nikon has just announced a new DX\u00a0zoom lens for its cropped frame sensor cameras\u2014the Nikkor AF-S 16\u201380 mm f\/2.8\u20134 DX VR<\/a>. If we\u00a0were being optimistic, this might be the first sign of\u00a0a breath of life for the Nikon DX range of DSLR bodies and lenses.<\/p>\n

This new lens, in and of itself, isn’t\u00a0particularly exciting for low light action photographers. It presumably replaces the well regarded Nikkor AF-S 16\u201385 mm f\/3.5\u20135.6 DX VR lens that’s been around for several\u00a0years already. Optically, it’s noticeably faster (f\/2.8 vs f\/3.5 at the short\u00a0end; f\/4 vs f\/5.6 at the long\u00a0end), but its focal length range is slightly smaller (80 mm vs 85 mm at the long end).<\/p>\n

What makes this lens exciting is that its\u00a0specifications suggest\u00a0that it’ll\u00a0be a high quality<\/em> DX lens\u2014probably a professional quality DX lens. It should be a significant step above\u00a0the many consumer-grade DX zoom lenses Nikon has produced. If so, it would be the first professional quality DX lens Nikon has made since the 12\u201324 mm f\/4 and 17\u201355 mm f\/2.8 DX lenses from a decade ago. In short, I don’t think Nikon would have made\u00a0this lens if it intended to keep the DX system for non-professional photographers.<\/p>\n

For some photographic tasks, a DX (or EF-S in Canon terms) sized sensor is the best fit for the job. Let’s not forget that sensor technology has been improving quickly over the past decade; DX sized sensors are capable of much better image quality now than they were in the past\u2014certainly sufficient for low light action photography. But Nikon’s DX system will only be viable for serious photography if all parts of the system are treated seriously by Nikon, and this new lens is a possible sign of that.<\/p>\n

\"Nikkor<\/a>
Nikkor AF-S 16\u201380 mm f\/2.8\u20134 DX VR image \u00a9 Nikon 2015. Used under Copyright Act 1968, Section 41.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I believe this is the first Nikkor DX lens with a gold ring around the lens barrel, near the front element of the lens in the image above. The gold ring\u00a0originally indicated\u00a0the use of Extra-low Dispersion (ED) glass within the lens, but seems to have become more of a badge of\u00a0prestige\u00a0for Nikon’s lenses\u2014much as Canon reserves a red ring around the lens barrel for its Luxury (L) lenses. I think this is also the first Nikkor DX lens to use Nikon’s nano crystal coating (anti-reflection), as marked by the large N above the lens mount in the image above.<\/p>\n

Could this indeed be a breath of life for the Nikon DX system? It looks like it just might be.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nikon has just announced a new DX\u00a0zoom lens for its cropped frame sensor cameras\u2014the Nikkor AF-S 16\u201380 mm f\/2.8\u20134 DX VR. If we\u00a0were being optimistic, this might be the first sign of\u00a0a breath of life for the Nikon DX range of DSLR bodies and lenses. This new lens, in and of itself, isn’t\u00a0particularly exciting for… Continue reading A breath of life for the Nikon DX range<\/span> →<\/span><\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[46,41,251,249,250,252,42,30],"class_list":["post-1107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-equipment","tag-camera-lenses","tag-canon","tag-nikkor-afs-12-24-4-dx","tag-nikkor-afs-16-80-2-8-4-dx-vr","tag-nikkor-afs-16-83-3-5-5-6-dx-vr","tag-nikkor-afs-17-55-2-8-dx","tag-nikon","tag-photographic-equipment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1107"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1107\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4172,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1107\/revisions\/4172"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ywo.id.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}