Tamron SP 70-300mm F4-5.6 Di VC USD for Nikon with Ultrasonic Silent Drive

Tamron has announced the availability of the Tamron SP 70-300mm F/4.-5.6 Di VC USD zoom lens. The lens will be available starting from September 2010 for Nikon F mount, Canon EF mount and Sony Alpha mount (though, Sony's lens does not include the image stabilization functionality). Many amateur photographers usually buy two lenses for best coverage, a normal zoom lens and a telephoto zoom lens. For many photographer, having just those two type of lenses is more then enough for their needs. Some of them even buy a prime lens with a large aperture (ex. Nikon 50mm F1.4).

Long focal range lenses has always been my favorite ones. Their are very popular for people who travel for vacation, and need a lens with a long focal range coverage. Until now, the most popular Nikon 70-300mm lens was the AF-S VR Zoom-NIKKOR 70-300mm F4.5-5.6G IF-ED lens and EF 7-300mm F4-5.6 IS USM from Canon. It features a 4.3x Telephozo Zoom and a focal range equals to 105-450mm on a 35mm SLR. It also includes a Nikon VR II image stabilization, Extra-low Dispersion glass elements to minimize CA. It costs around $580.

Now Tamron wants a piece of that market. The new Tamron SP 70-300mm F4-5.6 Di VC USD lens for Nikon, is around $100 cheaper and fully featured.  This lens is also Tamron's first USD (Ultrasonic Silent Drive) autofocus motor lens. I remember having Tamron's AF 55-200mm F/4-5.6 Di-II LD Macro lens (Model A15), which was a great optical quality characteristics. My only problem with the lens was that it had a very slow focusing motor. Now with the new SP 70-300mm Di VC USD lens, many photographers hope that this lens will be an all-around great performer.

Furthermore, Tamron has incorporated a Vibration Compensation (VC) mechanism to fight camera vibrations while shooting handheld photos with long aperture settings. It fits both ASP-C and full-frame Nikon dSLR cameras. Tamron 70-300mm VC USD offers very high resolution for Nikon photographers, who search for a telephoto-zoom lens, that can take fill their high resolution CCD with lots of details. SP AF70-300mm Di VC USD (Model A005) suppose to rival Nikon's offering. Being cheaper, having USD and VC and Extra Low dispersion (XLD) elements, it seems that this is one of the best contenders for the "Best Telephozo-zoom lens" category.

Want to see how effective the Vibration compensation (VC) is? - Watch this video:

To achieve the goals that Tamron has set for this lens, it employed its best technologies and high-grade glass. The target, to deliver best-in-class image quality compared to any other telephoto-zoom lenses in this focal range category. This is a milestone for Tamron, having able to implement a Ultrasonic Silent Drive in their lenses. I think that this was the only real obstacle that Tamron has needed to solve in order to progress one big step further. Tamron is a 3rd party lens manufacturer. Many photographers who have tried Tamron's lenses, have decided to but their fairly cheap alternatives, instead of Nikon pricey high quality lenses. It is around $120 less, and for many photographers this will be a great new telephoto-zoom lens to start with.

If Tamron was able to produce, at least the same image quality as the 55-200mm lens, we are talking about a "killer" lens, that will even satisfy enthusiast photographers and semi-pro ones. Overall, I personally prefer a wider range (70-300mm) over the 55-200mm range. I will personally won't miss the 55-70mm focal range. Let's just wait for the lab tests and some sample images of the SP AF70-300mm Di VC USD lens, so we can see how well it stands against its biggest rival, the Nikon 70-300mm VRII lens. Must be very interesting comparison.


Angle of view: 34° 21' - 8° 15'
Lens construction: 17 elements / 12 groups
Minimum focus distance: 59.1"
Diaphragm Blades: 9
Size: 3.2 in. x 5.6 in.
Weight: 27.0 oz
Accessory: Flower-Shaped hood
Optical/Mechanical feature key: SP/DI/VC/USD

More on dpreview, specs on Tamron's website (with Sample images).