Help me with quality of these lenses

[clark_king1]

In the bag is a quantaray tech-10 24mm 2.8 NF AF, Quataray NF AF 28-

80mm 3.5, Nikkor 50mm AF 1.8, Sigma 70-300mm f4 DL MacroSuper, and

Sunpack flash auto 355AF Thyristor. How good are these lenses they

have been given to me and I really have not used them at all.

 

I was going to use the falsh on an off camera mount with an N50 and

85 1.4 at a rather large gathering of people, just an informal thing.

 

So will that flash work?

 

Clark

[jay_.]

Quantaray is Ritz Camera's house brand name. Most if not all of them are actually Sigmas. They are decent low-end-consumer lenses. The 50/1.8AF Nikkor is a gem, as good as a Leica Summicron optically. The 355AF should work fine with the N50.

[joel_blacher]

Can I make a suggestion? Since you aren't in the position to have to decide whether or not to purchase them, shoot with these lenses first and then make up your own mind. I don't mean that to sound flippant, but asking how they perform first can predudice you toward the result. There are some really fine performers among the "garbage" lenses (this moniker would not apply to your Nikkor 50mm 1.8) and most "photographers" just toss them aside without even using them first.

[dan_brown4]

"The 50/1.8AF Nikkor is a gem, as good as a Leica Summicron optically."

 

I am sorry Jay, but the Nikkor suffers from severe coma distortion when used at wide

apertutres. Take one out and shoot the night sky sometime, you'll be shocked how bad

the lens is. The Summicron easily out-classes it. Yes, at f5.6, f8, f11, the Nikkor is very

fine. However, all fixed 50's are fine in those aperture ranges.