Zooming In With The Tamron 70-300mm & Nikon D5000

A few days ago I recieved a Tamron A17 70-300mm lens for my Nikon D5000. The full name is Tamron AF70-300mm F/4-5.6 Di LD Macro. I don’t know enough about DSLR shooting to determine whether or not the lens is any good, but for the price of less than $200, I’m quite satisfied with it. It even comes with built-in motor for Nikon cameras, like the D5000, that doesn’t have a built-in focus motor but relies on the lenses to have one.

Keep in mind that the Nikon D5000 is a DX camera so there’s a crop factor of 1.5, meaning that on a full frame camera the 300mm would actually be 450mm, when talking about 35mm cameras. Or something like that, it still confuses me a bit πŸ™‚

Tamron A17 70-300mm with built-in motor for Nikon can be bought from Amazon for around $150.

The first two pictures (below) are shot with the 18-55mm Nikkor kit lens that came with my D5000.

18mm (Nikkor 18-55mm)

55mm (Nikkor 18-55mm)

70mm (Tamron A17)

200mm (Tamron A17)

300mm (Tamron A17)

As you can see, with 300mm, you get quite close to the subject πŸ™‚

17 thoughts on “Zooming In With The Tamron 70-300mm & Nikon D5000”

  1. OMG That is just amazing. I can’t believe the zoom capability of this thing. In my opinion you can’t get any better. Amazing picture clarity.

    Reply
    • Sure you can get better πŸ™‚ But it’s expensive. For the price of less than $200, I’m very happy with this one.

      Reply
  2. where is this? The pictures look stunning , I know its because of the lense but give the scenery some credit =p

    Reply
  3. Pingback: Martin
  4. Im guessing Malta and were looking at the Mosta Dome.
    Great zoom, I like the sun breaking through at the 55mm one.
    300mm should be good when the bikini season breaks out πŸ˜‰

    Reply
    • Uhm, yeah… except I don’t have a beach nearby – and I’m not prepared to leave the comfort of my laptop @ home, to get out to the beach and take illegal pictures πŸ˜€

      Reply
  5. Wow, that is an excellent zoom at a fairly low price. I thought my 50-200mm had a good zoom but it’s nothing compared to this one. I have a Nikon D40 and I think this lens would be compatible with my camera too, since it has the motor built in. Where did you get it for under $200?
    .-= JasonΒ΄s last blog ..Storage in Allentown =-.

    Reply
    • Hi Jason.

      Should work with your D40 too πŸ™‚
      I got it here, it’s less than $200:
      http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=190361851861
      … but it’s in the UK so I don’t know if you have any additional tax or shipping costs, compared to what I did.

      Reply
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  7. hello, i got this lens when i bought my d5000 but it doesn’t fit, did u have to get an adapter or something?

    Reply
    • No adapter is needed. If it doesn’t fit, then you got the wrong one. Tamron also makes this lens with a Canon mount (and probably others as well), you need the Nikon mount – and the one with a built-in focus motor.

      Reply
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  9. Seems like a decent price. The whole crop thing can be confusing at first. Basically, it helps me to think of the crop factor in terms of cropping in photoshop.

    Reply
    • Yeah the Tamron 70-300 is really cheap. Now that Nikon recently released a 70-300 VR, I’m guessing that might be better glass for most people (bit more expensive as well, I think around $500, but you get VR). I wouldn’t recommend the Tamron 70-300 unless you have plenty of light and image quality is not super important. I sold mine a few weeks ago, as well.

      Reply
  10. Thank you so much! I have been debating this lens for my D5000 and wanted to make sure it would autofocus and have my answer with you. Off to order it and a couple of other lenses. Thanks again!

    Reply
    • I’m glad I was able to help, Becky. Hopefully you purchased the lens at Amazon through any of the links above πŸ˜‰

      Reply

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