Wildlife Weekend With The Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6 VR Lens

Chincoteague Light and Snow Geese before dawn; Chincoteague NWR (click to enlarge)
All images in this post were made with the Nikon D810 and Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6 lens
230mm; 1/15th sec. @ f/9; ISO 800

As I have already mentioned in a couple of previous blog posts, some close photography friends and I spent the weekend before last over at the Chincoteague National Wildlife Refuge on Assateague Island on Virginia's Eastern Shore.  We do this annually. 

In the past, I have rented a long lens (which is still a great option), I have used a variety of lens/converter combinations and I have used telephoto zoom lenses that did not quite meet my needs.  This year, mainly because I plan to pursue wildlife photography a bit more actively in the future and because of what I had read about Nikon's new 200-500mm f/.5.6 VR lens, I purchased that very lens for that trip as well as additional trips planned for the future.

In the past, I have used a combination of the Nikon 70-200mm f/2.8 VRII lens with Nikon's latest (at the time) 1.4X and 2X tele-converters.  Both combinations worked surprisingly well.  I had used this combination out in Yellowstone National Park, the Tetons and surrounding states to photograph wildlife as well as in Chincoteague.  It was not the optimum setup, but for someone who did not photography wildlife regularly, the combinations got me out to 280mm f/4 and 400mm f/5.6 respectively.  The image quality was certainly satisfactory but not superb.  I had also used the latest version of the Nikon 70-300mm f/4-5.6 lens with a DX (cropped sensor) body with gave me a field of view of 450mm f/5.6.  That last version is a pretty good lens and served my needs at the time for someone just going out for the first time to photograph wildlife.

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Since I intend on becoming more serious about my wildlife photography, I decided to research and purchase a lens that would best suit my needs.  As I started research in October 2015, I seriously looked at the Tamron 150-600mm f/5-6.3 lens, the Sigma 150-600mm f/5-6.3 Sport lens and the newly announced Nikon mentioned above.  The single focal length primes in the 500mm and 600mm range are way out of my budget, even used.

I had rented the Tamron last year and I was not quite satisfied with the copy I had used so I wasn't particularly interested in acquiring one of those on a permanent basis.  Others seemed to be happy with it, but I can only go on my experience.  The Sigma really intrigued me as did the Nikon.  As I researched the two lenses and read quite a number of formal and informal reviews, I decided upon the Nikon and I am very happy with that choice.

Here are my reasons I decided to go with the Nikon:

-Consistently reviewed as a bit faster focusing

-Consistently reviewed as being a little sharper across all focal lengths (but the Sigma is            no slouch)

-Considerably lighter than the Sigma (6.3 lbs/2860 g vs. 4.6 lbs./2090 g); weight was                consistently a huge issue with most reviewers

-The Nikon seemed to be handholdable and the Sigma, due to weight, not so much

-Due to the ability to potentially handhold the lens (I normally use it on a tripod), most              reviews thought the Nikon image stabilization was better than the Sigma's

-Price—the Sigma, at the time $2000 US versus $1400 US ($2060 if I add Sigma's USB                  calibration system

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Here are some reasons I thought the Sigma was more attractive to me:

-100mm more in focal length at the long end of the lens

-50mm less focal length at the short end of the lens, equalling a bit more versatility

-Calibration—I calibrate all of my full frame lenses to my Nikon body with FoCal software. That only allows me to calibrate a specific lens at one focal length, even zoom lenses. With Sigma's optional USB calibration system, I could calibrate at 3 focal lengths and 3 distances at each focal length, certainly a much more sophisticated system.  It also allows me to calibrate focus speed as well as change focus range.  Sigma hits a home run with that system.

In the end, with a 36mp camera, I felt I didn't need the extra 100mm focal length as, even in Nikon's DX setting, I get a field of view of 750mm with 15mp.  I can deal easily with that.  Also, the faster focusing was important.  Finally, the price was the factor that I couldn't also justify.  $600 US + the USB device was just too much of a difference.

So, how did the Nikon perform?  Marvelously!  I ran some tests at home to get thoroughly familiar with the lens before the trip and I was very happy with the calibrated sharpness. 

Just for reference, the best focus was achieved at a AF Fine Tune of +4 to +5. Also, FoCal will determine for you the lens' sharpest aperture and give you a chart showing you how much image degradation takes place as you move from that sharpest aperture.  Finally, I use FoCal to determine my lens' focus consistency.  In the case of my Nikon 200-500mm lens, the sharpest aperture, contrary to what we were always taught (2 stops down from wide open) is f/6.3, 1/3 stop down from wide open.  F/5.6 is just a hair less sharp, so using the lens wide open is just fine.  Analyzing the charts, I believe the lens will produce excellent images from wide open to about f/9 or f/10.  I'll be testing that more later.  As far as focus consistency, the lens focuses 99.8% of the time accurately.  That is just fine with me.

My setup consists of an Induro CT-414 Carbon Fiber Tripod ( a really large and tall tripod that is very, very sturdy) and a Promaster GH-10 Gimbal Head.  I have had the tripod for many years and I didn't want to spend hundreds and hundreds of dollars on the Gimbal head, so after reading various reviews, I settled on the Promaster.  So far, I'm very pleased with it.  If it starts to deteriorate or fail in any way, I'll report back.

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I arrived on Friday about noon at the wildlife refuge and spent the rest of the daylight photographing and basically testing my system.  All day Saturday and half a day on Sunday I photographed snow geese, Great Blue Herons, cormorants, various types of ducks as well as Great White Egrets, wild ponies and various other birds.  We photographed from before dawn until after the sun set.  I used ISOs from 100-6400.  I kept my shutter speeds, if at all possible, at around 1/1250th second or higher for bird photography, but mainly around 1/1600th to 1/2000th sec for flying birds.

I can happily report the lens performed as expected.  The lens focused fast (but I'm told not as fast as a $9000-$14,000 fixed focal length Nikon lens of 500 or 600mm—nor should it for the price I paid), locked on and stayed locked on my target, whether it was snow geese flying above me at 25-30 mph or ducks/geese/waterbirds sitting eating and fishing in the pools of water.  The gimbal head, which is nicely damped, also performed flawlessly.

I am very happy with the combination I now have.  I am very happy with the images.  As I told my photographer friends, if my images are not good, it isn't the fault of the gear, it sits squarely on my shoulders.

Here are some additional images from that weekend.  I have about 30 or so that I think are worthing of submitting to my stock agency, mainly as illustration images rather than as arty images.

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All in all, I am very pleased.  I look forward to using this combination of gear for many years to come.

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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