Lens for taking pictures of aircraft?

[drnuke14]

Hi - i'm new to this, and am planning on purchasing my first DSLR (probably a Nikon D50 or D70s to start). I'm an aviation fanatic and want to be able to get great pics of aircraft both on the tarmac stationary and action shots of them flying by. I want to know what would be the best lens (for speed,zoom etc) to get in order to get great pictures. Any suggestions?

[britkev]

The best? How much money do you have? How much more can you borrow? ;)

But seriously, you could do much worse than start off with the dual zoom lens kit D50, with the 18-55 & 55-200. Stick to sunny days and you'll get some good shots of airplanes.

Depending on your airport and where you spot you may find 200 not quite long enough... the Nikon 70-300 G is cheap, but not really sharp enough and a little to slow to focus for consistent top notch aircraft shots.

Unfortunately all the really good long lenses run well into four figures. If you're aiming at airliners.net this hobby can easily get outrageously expensive: I suggest you need to learn to walk before you try to run.

[coldrain]

Without knowing the budget you have in mind it is a bit hard to advice you (also hard when I do not really know just how much tele "plane spotters" need to use).

On two sidenotes, the mentioned 70-300 G is not the best idea for cheap tele, the Sigma 70-300 APO DG version is quite a bit better and very cheap too.
The second side note: Canon has much more options where tele lenses and tele zoom lenses are concerned.

[Ant]

I'd get a Canon for aviation shooting. As Coldrain says you'll get a better lens choice for this kind of stuff.

[Jason25]

Another option is Nikon's 80-400 VR or the Sigma 80-400 OS. Better for handholding with more reach as well.