Review of the Nikon 55-200mm

www.nikon.co.uk If you’ve just bought your first Nikon DSLR then the chances are you got it as part of a kit with a ‘standard’ 18-55mm or 18-70mm zoom lens. For most photographers looking to add to this basic kit the obvious choice is to go for a lens that takes them a little further, which is precisely what Nikon’s 55-200mm lens sets out to achieve. Specification With its DX designation, Nikon’s 55-200mm lens is designed specifically for digital capture and will work on any of the company’s DSLRs, including both the D40 and the D40x. The 3.6x zoom covers focal lengths from 55-200mm, but taking into account the magnification of Nikon’s DX format sensor, this equates to 82.5-300mm in 35mm terms. This range readily covers both the ‘ideal’ focal length for portraits (roughly 85-100mm) and the 200-300mm focal lengths favoured by sports and wildlife photographers. It also has a very useful minimum focus distance of 1.1m throughout the zoom range, and while this isn’t a macro lens by any means, you can still get pretty close to your subject at the long end of the zoom. It isn’t a particularly ‘fast’ lens though, with a maximum aperture of f/4 at the 55mm end of the zoom dropping to f/5.6 at the 200mm end. The minimum aperture also varies – from f/22 to f/32 respectively. The slightly slow maximum aperture isn’t necessarily a problem though, with the VR stabilisation claiming to give a three-stop advantage over non-VR lenses. This means you can handhold the lens at a shutter speed three times slower than is normally recommended, so a speed of 1/40sec at the 200mm end of the zoom can be used instead of 1/320sec. This is especially useful when using long focal lengths. In terms of its construction, the 55-200mm optic uses 15 elements in 11 groups, including one ED (Extra-low Dispersion) element to ensure good image quality. It also comes with a lens hood and pouch, which isn’t always so with other manufacturers who charge for these useful extras. Build and handling The 55-200mm AF-S lens is both compact and light, thanks to its all-plastic build, which extends to the lens mount. A thick, rubberised zoom ring occupies much of the lens barrel, with four useful focal lengths (70, 85, 105 and 135mm) marked between the 55mm and 200mm limits. As you zoom smoothly from the wide end of the zoom to the telephoto, the lens extends slightly, although only by around 40mm, so it doesn’t really affect the balance of the optic. Thanks to the internal focusing, a polarising or graduated filter may be used, while the Silent Wave Motor ensures that focusing is both swift and quiet. The small manual focus ring will disappoint anyone wishing to focus manually. In keeping with many modern lenses it appears almost as an afterthought, with a mere 45o turn taking it from 1.1m to infinity, and at the wide end of the zoom it’s almost impossible to reach with the lens hood attached. A pair of switches at the back left of the lens barrel will allow you to activate either the focus mode or VR. Both lock positively into place, so while they’re easy to operate they’re not likely to get knocked out of position by accident. What Digital Camera Score 86%