I would only buy the 24-120.

    Not IMO - it would make more sense to buy the 18-70 and a 70-300 so you
can get better shots of wildlife, or buy the 24-120 and a 100-500 or
something similar.  For wildlife shots you can't have enough zoom it seems.

    Dave

I would buy the 18-70mm (I did!)

The wide end of the zoom is excellent for lanscapes/travel, and the 70mm end
very good for potraits/travel etc.
The lens is small and light and handles well on the D70.
It makes an excellent 'walkabout/travel' lens...

I later got a s/h AF 80-200 f2.8 ED and a s/h AF 50mm f1.4 D for candids/low
light people pics.
The 80-200 lens is not small + light   ;- )
It is fast and great for lowish light work...   see
http://www.guytittley.co.uk/Gallery/album%202/index.html
These were taken in low light at ISO1600 and f2.8 - f4 , hand-held or
leaning against the wall at around 1/15 - 1/60 sec.

Guy

Hi Alan,

My opinion is don't buy lenses with allmost the same range.

On my D-70 I have the kit lens 18-70mm and a Sigma 28-300mm (and for
wildlife the Sigma 50-500mm). Most of the

time I use the 28-300mm and only occasionally the 18-70mm. For indoor
shooting the 18-70mm is perfect. For outdoor

shooting (wildlife, etc.) you need a longer lens (at least 200-300mm or
more).

The Sigma 28-300mm is not the best quality you can buy, but a very
acceptable lens with an average quality and a very

nice range. During my last holiday in Crete I only took this lens with me.

I would advice the 18-70mm + e.g. the Sigma 70-300mm (or 28-300mm). Of
course Nikon has good lenses too but also very expensive.

Sigma/Tamron makes good lenses for an acceptable price.

Succes and regards,

Harry

The Netherlands

120mm (i.e. 180mm equivalent in 24x36 format) is quite a bit short for
wildlife. Unless you shoot a lot in low light conditions without
flash, VR will not be very useful to you at small focal lengths (at
these FLs, camera shake is less of a problem than subjects moving
during long exposures). I would recommend you a longer FL zoom for
wildlife, unless you are satisfied with pictures of wild birds the
size of a speck of dust. On the other hand, obviously you cannot do
with a 70-300 or 200-500 as the only lens, and an extreme zoom like
the 50-500 is an insane choice for extensive hand-held use at 50mm. So
my answer is, if you can have only one lens, buy the kit 18-70 now for
general photography and natural scenery (and maybe some wildlife if
particularly friendly and approachable) and a second lens later, when
you have a better idea of your needs. Also, VR is really useful only
for hand-held shots (e.g., action, sports, car and horse races), so if
you can use a tripod it is not worth the extra cost.

My answer would tend to be no, you need at least two lenses with a
more extended FL range and less overlap. There may be special
situations in which either of your proposed lenses would be ideal, but
not frequent enough, in leisure photography, to choose these
particular two as your only lenses.

Buy the 18-70mm DX lens. It is a really good lens, whereas the 24-120mm
has been given some rough reviews by users since it came out.

Neither lens is going to be long enough for wildlife photography. However,
Nikon were at one point bundling a 70-300mm zoom lens with the D70 and
18-70mm. I am not too sure of the quality of the 70-300mm zoom, but if you
are a beginner this would be all the kit you need for now.

Hi Alan,

My opinion is don't buy lenses with allmost the same range.

On my D-70 I have the kit lens 18-70mm and a Sigma 28-300mm (and for
wildlife the Sigma 50-500mm). Most of the

time I use the 28-300mm and only occasionally the 18-70mm. For indoor
shooting the 18-70mm is perfect. For outdoor

shooting (wildlife, etc.) you need a longer lens (at least 200-300mm or
more).

The Sigma 28-300mm is not the best quality you can buy, but a very
acceptable lens with an average quality and a very

nice range. During my last holiday in Crete I only took this lens with me.

I would advice the 18-70mm + e.g. the Sigma 70-300mm (or 28-300mm). Of
course Nikon has good lenses too but also very expensive.

Sigma/Tamron makes good lenses for an acceptable price.

Succes and regards,

Harry

The Netherlands

The kit lens is definitely best for vacation shots where you need a bit
of wide angle to take in big buildings up close or indoors and wide
landscapes. If you have used film SLRs, you will need 1.5 more wide
angle to match that so the 17 is similar to a 24 on a film camera. Also
for travel the smallness of the kit is nice.

The 24-120 VR is a pretty big heavy thing if you haven't held one and
24mm is like 36mm on digital. The VR is most useful for shooting at dusk
or indoors (though without wide angle it won't be very useful indoors)
with stationary subjects when you don't want to bother with a tripod. As
mentioned, for wildlife you will want at least 300mm and you will want
that to go down to as small an aperture as possible to freeze motion in
low light f/2.8-f/4 not f/5.6.

So the 24-120 would be useful if you were walking around the woods at
dusk near home where you don't mind the weight and expected to get very
close to turtles and other slow moving wildlife <g>. Or if you don't
mind travelling with the weight and planned to get a second wide angle
lens (and those tend to be heavy also).