Happy New Year

To put is simply, I wish you all the best in 2008, may all your wishes and dreams come true!

In the spirit of this time of year, I went around town yesterday, with D300, Nikkor 14-24 and a tripod to do some shots. I have mixed feeling about it - concerning lights in town. There were a lot less then previous years and even if this makes a bit smaller lighting effect, power consumption and energy saving is a lot better due to this. Not to mention light pollution. So it's all good :)
Have a great one!

Nikkor 14-24 AF-S 2.8 N

WOW! That's the first thing that comes to mind with this lense. WOW!
I received the Nikkor 14-24 2.8 AF-S N lens along with my demo model of D300 and I just can't stop thinking about it. It's amazingly sharp even when fully open at both ends. It gets you into really cramp spaces, handles low light really well and could be used as a weapon if needed as well. It's makes D3 look small (look image above), not to mention D300. It's HUGE. Weight in at 1kg (35oz) and 131mm (5 inches) length. It's about 98mm (4 inches)in diameter so forget any kind of filter on this one. Lens hood is fixed on. Doesn't work on manual cams, has no aperture ring. But does handle DX and FX sensors.
If you're looking for a sharp and fast wide lens, you can just stop searching. It doesn't get much better then this.
I'd get mine here.
Here are some first test shots. All done in NEF, imported into Lightroom, default settings, no additional adjustments, whole images resized down, details in 1:1.
Nikon D300 + Nikkor 14-24 @ 14mm, 1/50, f2.8, ISO400

Nikon D300 + Nikkor 14-24 @ 14mm, 1/40, f16, ISO200

Edge detail:

Nikon D300 + Nikkor 14-24 @ 24mm, 1/640, f2,8, ISO200

Edge detail:

Nikon D300 + Nikkor 14-24 @ 16mm, 1/100, f10, ISO200

Edge detail: