Great lens, if this is what you are looking for! Sharp, DX 52mm equivalent, low light capable
Everything I read lead to this as being the best budget buy for a third lens. I am especially pleased with the low light capability, essentially does away with flash requirement for low interior lighting, assuming you can live with the more incandescent glow of no flash vs the bright look of the flash. Outdoors evenings and nights equally pleasing for me. If my 18-55 had this aperture level, I would not have purchased this one, but for that kind of kit zoom, I would have had to pay so much more than this lens cost. As for sharpness, I don't see any difference from the kit lens, but I am not a pro. Size also is not significantly smaller than the 18-55. I did look at the 50mm 1.8 tho, and on a DX, this is the more accurate representation of the human eye vision, or the 50mm on the full size sensor. It works pretty well in an 20x20 room space for groups, would like an 18-50 or so, but not for the money. I can just back up. Portrait lens evaluation - quite pleased. Bokeh, also quite pleased. Remember, all of this is speaking from an affordability perspective. I would love one of those $1500 70-300 Nikon 2.8 lens, but hey, I have not spent that much on my whole setup which includes a sx600 hs point and shoot and a sx520 hs superzoom, plus filters, bags, batteries, misc., etc.
On a side note, on my budget, what my D3300 is missing and will never get, is the range of the superzoom. Yes you get a lot more noise, but the sx520hs is superb at those distances that would cost me many $1000's of dollars to achieve on the D3300. Got it refurb from Canon for about $100 and use it all the time for wildlife and far off shots, realizing it suffers in quality perhaps, but is superb in those special circumstances of distance. It's only drawback is no viewfinder, but to get that you will spend closer to $350-$500, and for that I bought my D3300 with two lenses. So not really a compromise.
So I am very pleased, but I did my research. You should think thru your particular situation and requirements before purchasing this lens, but know it is a good lens and does what it is supposed to.
Lastly, the seller, (name omitted by me), provided a great deal. This $170 purchase was $225 at your local big electronics chain (name omitted by me). I purchased it at the big chain to test, returned for credit, and bought this one). If you don't know who I am talking about, you need to do some more research about your lens purchase!
Hope this helps some of you looking for a good third lens for your Nikon DX.
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