Recently with my upgrade to the D700, I've been consumed with replacing all my lenses to full frame format.

Every decision was fraught with cost, as most lenses are sold at a price that would have definitely cause a divorce if I was still married. Ranging from six hundred to several thousands, these lenses are the heart and soul of my photography career.

Originally I was armed with only a few lenses for the D90; DX format is smaller and cheaper. Starting with my sigma 10-20mm that only cost $600 brand new, which was used mainly for real estate as well as some unique scenic wedding photography. Going full frame, this was the first lens that needed to be replaced.

Since the craigs list asking price of a 17-35 was affordable at a $1000 (retail value of $2k with tax), I sold my Sigma for $450 and bought the 17-35mm from a hobbyist that hid the fact that he was selling it from his wife; he would continuously sell and replace his arsenal of lenses . However, after using this lens for numerous real estate, one glaring fact kept cropping up. Although it was a fast lens at 2.8, in order to ensure that the whole room was in focus, I had to shoot at least at a aperture of F11 or more, thus the price for buying a F2.8 lens was lost in this method of usage. You generally pay more for the faster lens.

The second problem was that you could not hand hold this lens at shutter speeds of 1/30 or even 1/4 of a second. The probability of a blurry photo at these speeds without a tripod was basically 100%; VR was desperately needed.

My only other option was the new 16-35 VR lens, but this was retailing at $1500 before Tax. Luck was with me as I sold my 17-35mm for $1300, while purchasing the 16-35 from a suspicious young man for $1300, I was really out of pocket $550 so far; and the changeover from the 17-35 to the 15-35 was free.

Hand holding the 16-35 at shutter speeds of 1/4 of a second was exceptionally clear with no blurriness due to hand shake. This feature alone in real estate photography can mean that someday I might try shooting a whole house without a tripod, once I am confident that the photos will turn out; reducing the time from 2 hours to a mere 20 minutes.

Although the 70-300 lens is a full frame lens and was used for sports, I hated the fact that I basically lost my DX factor of 1.5x. Thus in order to regain that 1.5x zoom, I had to buy a 400mm zoom which is still a bit shorter then the 300mm in DX format of 450mm. However rather then buying the 400mm, I ended up buying a 80-200mm fixed f2.8 Pro lens that was four times the size of my tiny 70-300 for $625. I was thinking of buying a doubler 2x converter that would allow me to use this lens at 160mm to 400mm at F5.6 which is still fast. However with the nikon teleconverter 2x on, the lens could not autofocus. Another brand name teleconverter did allow the lens to work but it was also several hundred for a teleconverter. Thus it would be $625 for the lens plus a $400 for a teleconverter and the fact that you had to insert the teleconverter between the lens to get the additional zoom. I simply wanted a lens that would zoom from 70-450mm when needed.

Even though the 80-200 was a fast lens at f2.8, you will never shoot a soccer at f2.8. Minimum aperture for sport photography is at least 5.6 or even F8 to ensure that a few players would be in focus. The other factor was VR. With a lens of this length, shutter speeds would need to be at least 1/500 of a second to ensure blurry free photos; however soccer in night light would always drop the shutter speed down to 1/200th of a second thus reducing the effectiveness of a non-vr lens.

So I sold my 70-300 for $450, sold my 80-200mm for $800 and bought the 80-400 VR for $1200. The end result was that I was out of pocket of $575.

So in the end, upgrading my wide angle to a full frame lens was $550 and upgrading my 70-300mm to a 80-400mm was $575; the total upgrade costed a grand total of $1,125.

Now the fact that I had bought another D90 for $775 with battery grip several months ago as a backup (we won't include the money spent here as part of the fx lens upgrade), I ended up selling my older D90 with kit lens for $900 and the battery grip for another $125; thus I got back $1025 for my older D90.

Out of pocket for the complete fx lens upgrade? $100 :)

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