With most wide to standard full-frame zoom lenses offering focal lengths from 24mm or 28mm this new 17-35mm from Tamron is an exciting proposition, offering wide, sweeping vistas and all in a very compact package. Considering also that Tamron are pitching it against some of the best lenses available in this group, clearly this warrants a closer look. Let's see how it all works out using the Nikon D810 36MP body for this review.

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Tamron 17-35mm f/2.8-4 Di OSD Handling and Features

This full frame zoom lens is chunky but fairly light at a modest 460g and relatively compact. It appears to be well made and all the controls operate smoothly. A petal lens hood is provided, which bayonets cleanly onto the front of the lens. Within the bayonet fit lies a standard 77mm filter thread. The front element is not overly large, so use of thin filters should not be a problem.

Immediately behind is the manual focus ring, followed by the clearly marked zoom ring. Closer still to the camera body is the AF/MF switch. There is nothing else to adorn the lens barrel, so no distance scale and no depth of field scale. Focusing is down to 0.28m or 11 inches, offering a maximum magnification of 1:4.9. This is reasonably close for a wide angle zoom, but does not approach macro distances. There is no continuous manual focusing in AF mode, so the choice is simply AF or MF.

The front element has a Fluorine coating to repel dust, grease and moisture. There are seals throughout the lens to resist moisture and thus make shooting possible in poor weather conditions. Flare and ghosting are minimised using Tamron's BBAR (Broad Band Anti Reflection) coating technology.

Optical construction is 15 elements in 10 groups. There are two glass moulded aspherical and four LD (Low Dispersion) elements. The diaphragm consists of 7 rounded blades, with a view to improving bokeh.

There is compatibility with Tamron's TAP-in console, allowing the lens firmware to be updated via a computer. There is also additional control of fine adjustments to AF via the console.

The AF DC motor is described as OSD (Optimised Silent Drive) and is intended to be quiet and fast. There is no Vibration Reduction, although arguably this is less necessary in wider lenses.

With the Nikon D810 there are no handling issues, everything is well balanced and the lens is an efficient tool. Having the slightly wider 17mm focal length is useful and the 35mm long end, although maybe a little short for some, is in itself a classic “short standard” highly regarding by many street photographers. The lens lends itself well to street, architectural and landscape subjects. The lens is also available for Canon and of course can also be used on both Nikon and Canon APS-C format DSLRs. In that case the “35mm format equivalent” focal lengths will be 25.5-52.5mm for Nikon and 27.2-56mm for Canon.