Can you stand another "help me pick a lens" post?

[firsttimemom]

I got an xti for christmas and love it love it love it. I have the kit lens and the 50 f1.8. I had some great pics from our January WDW trip (I think I spent the month of January reading and re-reading all the great tips on this board!). I'm still learning but taking more and more pics on manual than AP.

What I'm really missing is a good zoom. Kids play field hockey and baseball- outdoor sports which help with the lighting issue, but I'm nervous about getting a lens that won't work in low light situations. I have no problem upping my ISO to 1600 and dealing with the noise later, but dont want to wait forever for the lens to lock focus. Also looking for a lens that can handle the annual safari pics, and other long-range WDW pics.

I'm not ready to spend the kind of money I'd need for the awesome L IS lenses out there. For now I'm looking at:

55-250 f4 - 5.6 IS: (clearly the budget option, but will I be happy with the results?)

28-135 f3.5-5.6 IS: This would essentially become my everyday lens other than the portrait lens. I'm happy with the price but concerned that the 135 might not be long enough. Not having to switch lenses a lot on our disney trips is a big plus to me.

70-300 f4-5.6 IS: Starting to get a little heartburn at the price. But if it's significantly better than the others, I'll do it.

70-200 f/4L: Heck, if I'm going to spend $540, I might as well spend $600 and get L glass. But the lack of IS concerns me. I'm not good about carrying a mono or tripod and when I'm taking sports pics I get a little worked up over the action so camera shake is an issue.

Thoughts?

 

[Anewman]

55-250 f4 - 5.6 IS: (clearly the budget option, but will I be happy with the results?)

28-135 f3.5-5.6 IS: This would essentially become my everyday lens other than the portrait lens. I'm happy with the price but concerned that the 135 might not be long enough. Not having to switch lenses a lot on our disney trips is a big plus to me.

70-300 f4-5.6 IS: Starting to get a little heartburn at the price. But if it's significantly better than the others, I'll do it.

70-200 f/4L: Heck, if I'm going to spend $540, I might as well spend $600 and get L glass. But the lack of IS concerns me. I'm not good about carrying a mono or tripod and when I'm taking sports pics I get a little worked up over the action so camera shake is an issue.

Thoughts?

OK while IS does help with slower shutter speed, if SPORTS is your primary use... You want FAST shutter speeds, pretty much canceling out most of the benefits of IS. No sense paying extra for IS with sports.

What you really want is a FAST zoom instead of a IS zoom, but they are expensive. Look at some zooms with F/2.8, there are some shorter zooms that might be acceptable depending on the sport and the access you may or may not have to the field/sidelines.

Tamron just came out with at 70-200mm F/2.8 zoom that has decent image quality, but focus speed does not even come close to the Canon version. It sells for under $600. The Sigma version is respected amongst budget sports shooters, but it sells for almost $800.

 

[fhirleighinn]

The last two are probably the two better choices. 135, just would not be enough to get close enough, and I am not sure about the quality of the "Budget" lens.
as the PP said, you will need faster shutter speeds, so most likely you are going to use higher ISO's, you have to decide if the f2.8 lens are worth the extra cost.
My choice would be the 70-300 (it is what I have for my nikon)

 

[handicap18]

I took a lot of outdoor late afternoon Baseball pictures this past spring. I got great results with my 70-300mm VR lens (Nikons equilivent to IS). I liked having the VR because hand holding a lens that long at the 300mm end can give camera shake and cause blurry photos.

I also have a 70-210mm f/4 Nikkor lens with no VR. I used that lens a few times as it got later in the afternoon, however I had to use a monopod with it to keep from getting blurry photos from camera shake.

I also used both lenses for twilight/night shots of college level summer baseball. Even though I maxed out at f/5.6 on my 70-300 I was still able to get lots of nice shots. You wont be able to freeze the ball while its moving, but overall it performed well.

While I agree with the others that an f/2.8 lens is the most ideal, they are also the most expensive and generally out of our budget. If most of your shots are going to be during the day I think that the 70-300mm IS lens would serve best. You wont have to worry about using a monopod or tripod, the IS will give you a steady lens at the 300mm end and it also gives nice quality images.

Here are some examples of what a 70-300mm lens with f/5.6 at ISO 1600 can do under the lights:

Here is one with the f/4 70-210mm (very similar to Canon's 70-200mm f/4)

And a few day shots:

A lot of it also has to do with timing. If you can get your timing down then you'll do that much better. I'm very happy with the performance I got with my 70-300mm VR lens, especially for day shots during the baseball and soccer games I photographed.

 

[Frantasmic]

Here is a list from Popular Photography in it's latest issue. They had a Best Buys 2008 feature and the end of the link is called Shoestring Quartet. It is budget zoom lens that won't offer IS, but do offer a decent zoom at a budget price.

http://www.popphoto.com/popularphot...top-buys-2008-top-buys-2008-cont-2-page3.html

I am sure that many experts would have qualms about any of these, but different people have different needs with their photography "bug" and what they can budget toward that.