I recently came back from spending a month doing some volunteer work in
Bhutan. On weekends we would make some local treks into the surrounding
hills and shoot pictures. The equipment I took were Nikkor 2.8D zooms
(20-35, 35-70, & 80-200) and an N90s body with SB-26 flash. My associate
took an Elan II and 2 of Canon's "consumer grade" lenses (28-80 3.5-5.6 and
75-300 4-5.6). We both used Fuji Velvia and shot mostly the same material
under similar light.
When we returned and started to assemble our slides for a showing to
colleagues, I was amazed to see that in most instances when we shot the same
subject at the same time, I couldn't detect any discernible difference with
respect to sharpness or contrast when the slide was projected. Furthermore,
I couldn't detect much difference when the slides were compared under loupe
magnification. The bottom line is that we got similar results but I
inherited an additional sore shoulder and back lugging around all my heavy
zooms which significantly compromised the enjoyment factor for me.
My question is to anyone who has done extensive trekking/backpacking where
weight is a premium but quality is important as well. What combination of
Nikon's AF primes and/or "consumer grade" zoom lenses would you recommend
that would cover the range from around 24 to 200-300mm in focal length?
Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post.
jim
