NYC Portraits and more thoughts on the Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8.

I love this lens. Have written about it numerous times and enjoy using it every time I bring it out.

If given a choice I will shoot with primes which is the only reason this lens does not get more use. But every single time I use this lens I sincerely wonder why I bother with any other lenses. Why? Well:

• As good a performer at any focal length as any prime I own.
• Though slower than the primes I use f/2.8 is plenty fast for my purposes the majority of the time.
• Covering the focal ranges I use most it eliminates the need to switch lenses.
• Again. I cannot stress enough how happy I am with the image performance of this lens.

I started a recent NYC photo walk…

….with a prime lens that I wrote about in my last post. As usual. But after switching primes a few times I had a thought.

What if I traded the faster aperture of the primes I was using for the flexibility of the Tamron?

So I did so. Sure I would lose a bit of subject isolation but there was plenty of light out and we were starting to shoot more than one person so f/2.8 would do just fine.

It did far better than just fine. The Tamron put in an impressive “bag of primes” performance that one would hope for with a lens like this. So good in fact that I just left it on the A7III the rest of the day. And as a bonus no more lens changes.

Some portraits and random shots from the day were taken with existing light, but the host, Erskine Isaac, provided an AD200 (BYOT: Bring Your Own Trigger for Sony. He provided Canon and Nikon triggers.) with modifier. With some clouds in the sky this proved plenty powerful enough.

Next I will show portraits with AD200, random shots taken over the rest of the day, and then my conclusion.

AD200 Photos Shot Through Umbrella w/ HSS

Random Shots

Conclusion

As much as I appreciate prime lenses I do not feel that I lost anything after switching to this zoom lens that day. I expected this lens to do well in general use, but I was especially impressed with this lens’ performance when used for portraits. Which, based on past experience…

…, I should not find the least bit surprising.

There is a new version 2 Tamron 28-75mm f/2.8 coming out, but I am perfectly happy with the model I have and cannot figure out why I would upgrade.

Final thoughts.

A stellar performance. Left with the same thought I have every time I use this lens:

I really need to use this lens more often.

-ELW