Originally posted by hinman I like your photostream on flickr with this lens.
Thank you
Originally posted by hinman I currently have a wonderful Tamron SP 90mm f/2.8 Di Macro and I have a difficult time trying to sell it to fund the DFA 100mm f/2.8 WR purhcase. Is it a worthy upgrade from the Tamron macro? It is difficult to tell and I have used the Tamron for both close up and portrait, it is excellent and rewarding experience.
What is missing on the DFA is the focus limiter and the absence of the aperture ring. I am more concerned on the focus limiter as I find it a good feature to have in dual usage on both macro and a tele-lens for non-macro use. Is the AF good enough on this native lens? And how is manual focusing on this wonderful lens. I need help to justify my upgrade decision. The current price is the lowest that I have not seen for this lens. Though the tempting price and unique opportunity of ownership, I stick to the rule NOT to upgrade until someone help me in purchasing my mint copy of Tamron macro in marketplace.
Thanks for any sanity inputs in my upgrade plan. I am a casual shooter with occasional use on macro shots.
Cheers,
Hin
Mine is the older non-WR version of the DFA100mm, but I think most of this will still apply.
I found the AF was dependent on the body. It was close to useless on my k100d - it would go off hunting and with the long focus throw it's an extended trip. With my k5iis, hunting is pretty rare and the AF is great at normal distances and somewhat useful at closeup distances, though I still prefer manual focus when close-up. It does have quick shift to let you override the AF. The focusing ring is great, large and the action is smooth (the cosmetic design on the WR is a little different from mine though).
Before I purchased my macro I spent hours (ok days, maybe weeks
) looking at samples from the dfa100mm, the Tamron 90mm, and the sigma 105mm.. My conclusion was that optically there's not much to choose from between them and I could be happy with any of them and not look back.
Otherwise, the dfa100mm is a little smaller than the tamron (and takes 49mm filters), WR, and cosmetically quite beautiful (imo). If you can do without the aperture ring and the focus limiter, I'd be tempted to upgrade, but frankly I don't think there's a big rush as you've already got an excellent lens. Even calling it an 'upgrade' feels a little wrong when your tamron is pretty awesome
.
For me personally, I make use of the aperture ring on my non-WR dfa100mm, have found it pretty capable of handling light rain and assorted swamp goo. My main motivation to upgrade to the new version would be the more solid build, but this is minor and I expect to continue being thrilled with what I have for many years.
Hope this is some help and good luck with your sale if that's the way you try to go