Sweating it out ~ Tamron365

Friday, December 23, 2011

Sweating it out

5:45 PM

Work closed early today for the holidays, so myself and two photography friends went to the Wellington botanical gardens to see what we can accomplish at the main hothouse. I must say, I am sure I've dropped a couple of Kgs!

My one friend was shooting with my Canon 18-55mm IS II (his Mk I is in for repairs) and my other friend used his Sigma 17-70mm. Both very capable lenses I must say. The only two areas I think the Sigma wins compared to the Canon is better f-stop and closer focus for macro shots.

All in all we've spent about 2 hours inside taking a lot of pictures. I am sure my friends may beat me on image sharpness, maybe, but I can confirm that I've shot a lot of photos in excess of 100mm, getting nice and "close" to flowers far off. My friends, because of focal length constraints, would have missed those shots.

Even though I may have sacrificed some sharpness by using the Tamron PZD, the day was still a winner for two reasons:

Vibration Control - Even through I took my tripod along I never used it. If I did I am sure I would have taken half less shots. The VC on the Tamron PZD is simply amazing. A lost of my shots were still sharp at shutter speeds of 1/20 - 1/60. I know from experience, doing the same with my Canon 18-55mm IS II, would have resulted in far more out of focus shots.
Focal Length - As mentioned, I cycled through wide angle and fully zoomed images the whole time. This would have been very troublesome if I had to continually swap my 18-55mm and 55-250mm to do the same. It goes without saying that would have resulted in far less shots as well.

One down side again was that I had to keep zoom creep in mind with the PZD, but I find it is starting come natural to always have my hand on the lens with the zoom ring between my fingers when I am actively shooting. Zoom creep solved :-). When I do walk around with the camera around my neck, the little zoom lock button is very handy. Top marks to Tamron for building that into the lens.

So to sum up the day, we've all enjoyed it very much and I cannot wait to see my friend's photos. I am sure they will teach me a thing or two. Both have a very keen eye for photography. For myself, I find the PZD a very fun lens to use, it allows me more time to focus on what I want to shoot, composition and all of that, and less shots are wasted due to not having the right lens on my 600D.