Shawn
Ive got a few lenses and this one is outstanding in a number of respects, but not perfect. First, a few of the things I dont like: Its huge and heavy. About an inch longer than my 28-300mm lens. Its also pretty heavy. I dislike the fact that the zoom ring is in in the back, close to the camera body. The focus ring and zoom ring should be switched. Everyone that picks it up grabs the focus ring and tries to zoom with it. Bad design. Also, for this price Id expect image stabilization built in. It would really help with videos. Now, to the reason I love the lens and Im glad I bought it: The focus is super fast. The pics are very sharp at 2.8. I had 2 Tamrons before this. One was the old version and one was the newer version with image stabilization. Both were very soft at 2.8. I resigned myself to stopping it down to at least 3.5 or 4 to take a sharp pic. Only used 2.8 if I absolutely had to. With the Nikon, it focuses well and takes sharp pics at 2.8. I took this on a cruise recently and took hundreds of amazing pics at 2.8. The lens isnt perfect, and it is expensive, but it took amazing pics and Im glad I bought it.