Lens_progression

In the beginning, as a congrats for finishing graduate school(circa 2008) I purchased the d40 with the 18-55mm lens kit WITH! the 55-200mm additional lens with the camera carrying bag! woohoo! 

Add on top of that, I decided to take an absolutely amazing trip out west(US) with my dad(Amazing and inspiring guy)... I went to the now defunct Wolf camera and they said that if they were going to the Grand Canyon they absolutely would take the Sigma 10-20mm with them... Actually they said they would take the Nikon 12-24mm with them, but I wasn't ready to spring for $1k on a lens as a newbie... so the clerk backed off to the Sigma 10-20mm lens... What an awesome lens. I read Ken Rockwells How to use ultra wide lensesand was ready to tackle the American West. Snow mobile tours in the American West winter

My dad(Who's photographic arsenal had included a Bronica and, what I remembered, a Nikon film setup) and I had a really, absolutely fantastic tour of America... Insert St Louis Arch, Badlands, Canyonlands, Grandcanyon

When I got back I ordered a 70-300mm Nikkor lens because it was massively affordable at <$100 but it would not autofocus on my d40... What a bummer... After a soccer season with trying to autofocus the 70-300 on the soccer field unsuccessfully and after touring the west with single digit temperatures

there absolutely was no way that I was willing to change lenses again. Compounded with that, my newly wed wife and I went on a fantastic honeymoon where the Sigma lens takes amazing landscapes

but potentially terrible pictures of people to seal the deal... I sold off both the kit lenses (18-55,55-200 and 70-300mm on Ebay and purchased The Tamron 18-270mm to replace and spread the range! I was so excited to have one lens that would cover the range and HOPEFULLY make better pictures than my old Cannon Elph would...

The Tamron did an OK job alongside the Sigma 10-20mm lens. The Tamron color representation was rather poor and the Sigma accuracy versus distortion was also rather poor. A question that cropped up was: I wanted a full frame sensor, will the Sigma accurately represent life on a full frame sensor?

So, with a d40 and the above lenses lots of questions were still open... Oh yeah, I also purchased a manual focus Nikkor 50mm f1.4 and a Nikkor autofocus 35mm 1.8...

I wanted to know what the best possible lens would look like on the cheapest body would do. So I purchased the 70-200mm f2.8 vii to pair with my existing d40.  In full actuality the lens produced amazing portraits even on the entry level Nikon. The lens requires 5' of working space(minimum focusing distance) and either a brilliantly bright flash or a perfectly still subject. For shooting babies and puppies this 5 foot stand off is very difficult to maintain and work with indoors. 

Vacation for summer 2012 I purchased a d7000 to take with us to the Alps. I really liked the autofocus point and controls, but I didn't take the massive 70-200mm with me.

Thanksgiving 2012 I realized that, after using the pro-lens extensively, the 70-200mm f2.8 vII was not the lens to capture the future of my family as an amateur. Initially my intent was to purchase a full frame camera like the d600 but after some thought and experience I realized that I would be better off sticking to crop frame sensors as opposed to paying for entirely full frame sensor lenses as the dX lenses wouldn't work.

 I sold the 70-200mm(full frame, perfect color representation), the Tamron 18-270(Terrible color representation), AND the 50mm Prime manual focus 1.4(Very difficult to actually focus) on Ebay and purchased the newly released Nikkor 18-300mm along with the 50mm f1.4 prime. The Current line up includes: an sb900 to capture ridiculously fast action(along with 4 Energizer lithium AA batteries) a 18-300mm Nikkor lens that captures just about everything... but also the 50mm f1.4 lens that captures the fast awesome stuff. I also held onto the 35mm f1.8 and the Sigma 10-20mm f4.0.