I asked last week about which missing Nikkor you'd make if you were the Product Manager at Nikon. As usual, I got a ton of responses. Curiously, though, those broke down to basically just seven lenses that rose above the rest. Let's count those down to #1:
#7 — We'll begin with a "lens" that got a lot of support, though only if I grouped a couple of specific design choices.
- Wide Angle f/4 — The actual focal length differed a bit on some of the responses, but seemingly the idea here was always a wider prime, but keep it compact. Almost all mentioned f/4; the remainder f/1.8. While faster wide angle primes got votes, they didn't get as many as the slower aperture definition. Moreover, the "fast" wide angle prime requests ranged more across the board in focal length and purpose (e.g. 10mm to 18mm, astrophotographer versus some other use). Almost all the wide angle f/4 requests were for 14mm or 16mm, and the purpose was clearly "compact wide."
#3, 4, 5 and 6 (essentially a tie) — This tight grouping surprised me a bit. Each of the following choices got about equal response:
- 16-80mm f/4 DX — It apparently doesn't need to be fast, but it needs to DX sized with optical performance as the goal. If coupled with the few that asked for an f/2.8 or f/2.8-4, this group would have risen out of the tie.
- 24mm f/1.2 S — It wasn't a surprise to me that variations on the current lens lines got nominations, but it was a surprise to me that the top vote getter—by a wide margin—was extending the f/1.2 line to 24mm. I'm not 100% certain what these folk are looking for, as we're also missing a 24mm f/1.4, but it appears that image quality comes first and foremost.
- 8-15mm fisheye — It should be noted that most of the lenses that got frequent requests replicate something that was done in the F-mount by Nikon. This was the lens that was most directly asked for (no modifications). If you add this to #7 (wide angle f/4) the whole "need another truly wide angle lens option" rises to #3 by itself.
- 300mm f/4 — A surprise to me, but there were plenty of people who want something akin to the 300mm f/4 PF, but with closer focusing, to near macro level (e.g. 1:2 or at least 1:4). The surprise to me here wasn't so much the 300mm part, as that's a clear focal length hole in the current Nikkor telephoto lineup, but that almost all of the folk asking for this focal length also mentioned closer focusing as a requirement.
#2 — While the above lenses had what I'd call strong support, there were two that had significantly higher levels of request:
- The 100/120-300mm f/2.8. A few people wanted a bit more focal length at the wide end, but the clear demand here was for a zoom that went to 300mm and retained that f/2.8 aperture. I agree with this being a high need in the Nikkor lineup, despite the fact that we can use the existing F-mount version using the FTP adapter. I'd also point out that on a RED KOMODO-X (why isn't it KOMODO-Z?) with its APS-C crop, this would be the "right" wildlife videography lens, too.
And finally, #1
- Anything that's in the 70-200mm or 70-300mm realm that's not fast aperture. By far the most asked for option was the "carry along telephoto", something like a 70-200mm f/4 or a 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6. Many actually wrote that they'd accept either. The goal here was apparently to keep size and weight minimal (with a more consumer pricing being the second most mentioned attribute). I found this interesting, as the Tamron 70-300mm already exists in the Z-mount, so there's something that people aren't resonating with on the Tamron. Likewise, the 70-180mm f/2.8 is compact. Thus, something about this category isn't being clearly served at the moment.
One message to Nikon: 300mm played a part in #1, #2, and #3+. Seems like a clear message to me.
