Solidly built, sharp, price

Not as sharp as some OEM lenes but not as expencive either.

I purchased this lens used from KEH.com. I have read other reviews that said this lens was a good deal so I though I would try it. Here are my first impressions: 1. Solidly built! 2. Sharp at all apertures (I did my normal target test) 3. Fast focusing (on a Nikon F4s) 4. Flair is well controlled. I would recommend this lens to anyone looking for a good constant aperture lens at a good price. Is it as sharp as the Nikon 28-80 AFS… no way but it’s also not $1400 either.

Customer Service

none needed

Good build quality Inexpensive Optically good at wide end

Soft at 80mm

Build quality is excellent. However, it is very soft at 80mm. At 80mm 2.8, not only it's soft, it actually underexpose by at least half stop. At 80mm, I have to stop down to 5.6 to get usable image. Quality at the wider end is good.

Build is Robust. Customer Service Good.

Flare. Underexposes. (Though that might be a camera specific issue.)

I post this as a sort of caveat emptor to potential buyers of this lens and the Atx 28-70 pro II. I've tried both of these lenses, and both have some sort of problem with the optics. The 28-70 is very soft wide open at f2.8, and the 28-80, while resonably sharp wide open, suffers from excessive flare and underexposes by about 1-2 fstops on my D1. I do like the build of the lenses though, they're metal and feel robust, although I don't know how would they fare if I were to drop them. Anyway, to anyone looking to buy either this lens or the 28-70 I would say: Look out for duds. And when you test them, make sure you use a pro developer or a digital camera, because you won't be able to see the softness on prints from the supermarket. From the reviews on this site, it seems that there *are* good versions of this lens out there, so I don't want to slam Tokina too hard. But be aware that there definatley is an issue with Tokina's Quality Control. (I say this after trying 2 28-70s and 1 28-80)

Customer Service

Good. I've sent in the 28-70 lens to Tokina and had it replaced within 2 weeks. (With another dud though. :-( )

Similar Products Used:

Tokina 28-70 ATX Pro II

Built very nicely. looks very professional. Electronic/Manual Focus switch on the lens is handy.

As said, I had problems with the autofocus function of the lens. First of all it focussed slow, secondly it often had to re-focus in order to have a sharp image.

This was an uncomfortable experience. The lens had problems with focussing, even in daylight. In the dark is was just plain awful. I brought the lens back before the refund period expired. Now bought the safe Nikkon 28-105mm lens

Customer Service

B&H has strict policies, but stay within them and you will have no problems.

Similar Products Used:

Nikkon 35-70mm, which was perfect for casual photography

Build quality. 77mm filter size (standart filter size for *real* lens :) Pretty fast AF and god AF/MF switch (EOS version) for non-USM lens. Price - you can buy this lens and 50/1.4 and 85/1.8 (great primes) - or just *one* 28-70L (which still is not *perfect* lens).

f2.8 and f4.0 are almost useless. Buy 28-70L if f5.6 or f8.0 is not enough and you need standart zoom. Flare (I dont' care about flare to much for that zoom). Some front focus on my D30 (body's problem? lens's problem? don't know)

It's fake: lens that looks like pro but this is not pro lens. It's good at f8.0, but is's very soft at f2.8 and f4.0. At 80/2.8 it can be used only for portraits of unperfect models :) Still I just can used my EF24-85 no more after I saw it. Conclusion: good lens to shoot at f8.0 if is is possible to avoid counter light.

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Canon 24-85 (not too bad opticaly compared with Tokina, but build quality is average) Canon EF 50/1.4 (just another league, of course) Canon EF 85/1.8 (the same) Russian Mir-24 (35/2) - even this b

none i just couldn't get rid of it fast enough.

pfff! FFFLLLAAAARRREEE!!!! i really don't know what lens was sent to popphoto for them to say: "it's a true pro lens with very well controlled flare", but it sure wasn't the one i got, AF speed isn't all that either. this lens is a rip off!!! tokina products are not pro quality.period.

a terrible lens !flares like crazy! weighs like a tank!!! but isn't actually built like one...this is truly just an F4 lens because it's terrible at 2.8. i don't understand why would someone pay for the pro lens if he's not getting a pro lens. tokina has some design issues to deal with.

Customer Service

it's one of the worst there is. hopefully you won't need it. thk photo has 3 people running the whole entire operation there. the person for technical questions is dave roberts who seems to work like 4 hours a day because evertime i call he's on break.

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products i own: nikon 28-70 AFS 2.8 nikon 80-200 AFS 2.8 sigma ex 17-35 2.8-4 nikon 24-50 3.3-4.5 nikon 16MM fisheye nikon 135 f2 dc nikon 105 2.8 micro nikon 105 2.5 ais nikon 50mm 1.4 ais

Fast focus (accurate too) on both my F100 and F80 F2.8 throughout Sharp sharp sharp oh yeah it's sharp. Distortion is pretty well controlled at all focal lengths.

Just a bit of softness wide open at the long end A touch of flare if you put the sun right in the frame. Colours slightly cooler than nikons but it's not really a critisism. Thats about it.

This is my second review of this product my first is at the bottom of this pile lambasting the lens for it's lack of focus on my F100! Now i'm going to eat all of my words, carrying a whole shed load of primes since i lost satisfaction with my 24-85mm F2.8-4 Nikkor i was persuaded to try one again by the jessops staff, cause they had a nice one with an F80 (i was trading in my older F100 because it had cost me £500 of repairs in two years!)Both camera and lens for £600 a steal both as new tried it on the F80 (which has had to go away for cleaning a dirty focus screen, non removeable by me at least!) and i am blown away by it so i thought i'd stick it on my F100 (later one with no apparant focus issues) again blown away! Superb lens cooler colour rendition than nikkors and a tad soft wide open at the long end but thats it. Sharp contrasty focuses quick even on the F80 replaces a 28/35/50/(except on really dark days!)/85mm kept the primes but i don't think they'll get out much now! It probably should only get a 4.5 for an overall rating but it's so d*** near perfect that it rates a five and for value in my case anyway a six!

Customer Service

Not required so far on this lens.

Similar Products Used:

Tokina 28-70 F2.6-2.8 Nikon 24-85 F2.8-4 Nikon 35-70 F2.8

F8 on it is 'ouch sharp'. Excellent build quality. Nice contrast too.

F2.8 to F3.5 useless. Left-side blur.

This is two lenses in one. Sort of 'When he was good he was good and when he was bad he was *****!!' It is a very well made lens. Heavy metal! Expensive-looking with a nice feel to the way it works - smooth and easy. Full marks. Alas the bit I actually want - the glass - is not as good. That they advertise this as f2.8 is very misleading. It should read 'f4' but really only gets good at f5.6 onwards. At f2.8 is is very soft and very blurry with lots of ghosting - useless! It improves a little as it get towards f4 where it becomes passable. At f5.6 it gets quite usable. At f8, however, it changes character: I am talking 'ouch sharp'! This is as good as a good prime lens here. I have a D60 and the images come out very very sharp. They look like they've bene through PS USM a few times but no halos. I use a Sigma 105mm f2.8 EX and this Tokina 28-80 is as good at f8. Sadly there is one persistent problem with this one which is that the left side of all images made using this lens are softer than the right. It is as though the centre is off to the right. I also noticed chromatic aberration in quite a few shots on a cloudy day. I have not read this mentioned by others. I have not, however, encountered flare which many have said they find. In view of these anomalies, I might have a worse-than-usual sample and will therefore try another one in the hope of improving its performance in the f2.8 area and the left-side blur. Sorry Tokina but if you got this lens right, you would have one 'serious' lens which would sell beyond your wildest dreams. As it is, it does not fit the reason why people buy this type of lens. A flawed masterpiece!

Customer Service

Intro2002 UK importers of Tokina seem very good.

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Canon 28-70L

- High Build quality - Great optics - f2.8 - price

- Long end at widest aperture it is soft. But at least you get 2.8. - After 6 hours of a wedding, you feel the weight

This is my favourite lens. It's built very well, great way to swicth from AF to MF (very fast and intuitive). Focuses very silent and very fast (definitely much faster then 28-135 IS). Comes with hood. Has a great wide manual focus ring, which makes it great for manual focusing in case you want to. I found that i manual focus a lot more with this lens because I can!

Customer Service

Never needed.

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Canon 28-105 Canon 28-135 IS

Fast, constant f2.8. Solid build. 'Clutch' mechanism to swith from Auto to Manual focus (not as nice as USM but useable).

Flare flare flare. And some may find it a bit heavy. 77mm filter size.

Well, it's a fast lens, I'll give it that,... and heavy. I bought this lens because I wanted the zoom range and speed but couldn't afford an "L" lens from Canon. For the price, you get a pretty good lens. I figure it's somewhere between consumer-grade lenses and the "L" line. It has the constant aperature found in the higher-end lenses but Tokina had to make compromises to price it lower. Thus only one SD (super low dispersion) element. I'm not an optical expert but this probably is what hampers the performance of this lens. It's just not quite sharp wide open and softens a bit as you approach 80mm. The lens also exhibits an alarming amount of flare. I've had flare from recessed lighting, hockey rink flood lights, and just about every point light source that was in the frame. It seems worse when the light source is off-axis. It's also a very ugly hourglass-shaped flare displaying a rainbow effect. I haven't gotten rid of this lens but I feel that I need to be very careful in considering situations appropriate for its use.

Customer Service

Sent a sample image to THK and they said they would review it and try to duplicate in their lab. Haven't heard back from them and somehow doubt that I ever will.

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None