Guess what I just got myself this morning?

Yes, it's none other than the 85mm f/1.8D Nikkor, the smaller, cheaper and only slightly slower brother to the famous 85mm f/1.4D beloved by wannabe portraitists and bokeh fetishists everywhere.
I thought long and hard before getting this lens, making sure to carefully read the most trustworthy reviews and to look at as many sample pictures as I could spare the time for, and though I agonized between getting one of this lens, Tamron's famously sharp 90mm f/2.8 Di SP Macro and Sigma's 105mm f/2.8 EX macro DG, in the end I was swayed to go with the 85mm f/1.8D by its comparatively inconspicuous size, the extra 4/3 stops of light it takes in and its quicker autofocus speed (macro lenses are notorious for slow AF, and my in-store test of the Tamron 90mm convinced me that perpetually hunting autofocus would likely be a big problem in the real world). The bottom line is that I'm just not very interested in macro photography, not at this point in time anyway, and I had this gut feeling that the additional reach offered by the Sigma 105mm wouldn't suffice to quell my doubts about getting it over what Photozone called "a very boring lens" by sheer account of its "exceptional performance in all tested categories"; having seen with my own eyes just how rich and sharp pictures taken with the exceedingly "boring" 50mm f/1.8 Nikkor can be if one knows what one's doing, I've come to feel a much keener appreciation for certain kinds of boringness.
All of the preceding discussion shouldn't suggest that I won't get the Sigma at some point in the course of the year, however - I'm always looking for good quality glass that will give me more reach at a reasonable price, and with the combined cost of the 85mm f/1.8D Nikkor and the Sigma 105mm f/2.8 being less than that of a single copy of Nikon's new AF-S 105mm f/2.8 ED VR Micro-Nikkor, I can rationalize this to myself as getting two lenses for the price of one (oh, the lies we tell ourselves!) At any rate, having already purchased the Tamron AF 28-75mm f/2.8 SP XR Di LD only just two weeks ago, I figure I'll have enough on my hands for a while learning how to get the best of my new acquisitions. Now, if only the British weather would cooperate and it would stop raining!
PS: I finally got a chance to play around a little with my new buy, and as you can see here, this thing is sharp! Note that these photos have been converted directly from the RAW files, and have not been sharpened in the slightest - I don't need to, as you can pretty much see every last pore in the subjects' faces as it is ... I can already tell that the 85mm f/1.8D belongs alongside the 50mm f/1.8 as the best lens in my entire collection.
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