Tamron SP 300mm f/5.6 Adaptall-2 model 54B

Good product and price At high telephoto magnification (300mm) it is a bit difficult to hand hold the lens even with VR on. One needs to hold steady, hold breath and shoot the picture. It works better leaning of setting you elbows on a rest. One can achieve sharp pictures this this lens easy at lower magnifications and certainly is comparable to my Nikon DX VR lens at the 150 mm at this range. I will need to test on the humming birds on the Silk Floss tree to compare.

Lightweight and convenient but not the sharpest. This is one of the lowest cost 70-300 lenses with fast autofocus and stabilization both of which perform well. The lens has a autofocus problem with my d7200 that does not occur on a d300 and that is when it does not have enough contrast to autofocus it will go to past the infinity mark and run the motor against the infinity stop making a squeaking sounds, though I find it easy to avoid this problem now that I understand it. The lens is softer wide open than I like at 300mm but it does improve to acceptable levels when stopping down even to f/6.3 although f/8 is best. I chose this lens because the autofocus is very fast, enough for birds in flight and it is light weight and small and because it is more compatible with older cameras than the af-p lenses which are faster focusing, sharper, and more expensive. The bird photo is at f/6.3, the first flower is at f/5.6 and the second flower is at f/8 for some idea of real world usage and they are all at 300mm. Read full review

at this price it is a steal I find the Tamron 100-300 VC USD to be the best long lens of any brand that I have used. The stability of the image in the viewfinder is breathtaking, and the focus performance is excellent. I find the imagery to be very good wide open and stunning at f/8. I do not hesitate to use this on the finest of details (e.g. chickadees) and I am never disappointed.