Lens decision!

I appear to have made a decision with regards to upgrading to a full-frame camera. Well, sort of- I've bought a Nikon 28-300mm full-frame lens to replace my very cheap Tamron 18-250mm zoom.

I guess this means I'm sticking with the Nikon system rather than switching to Canon for the EOS 6D, which is something I'd been flirting with. There are a couple of advantages of this; firstly, I can upgrade and replace my lenses and other kit piecemeal without leaving holes in my lineup since my existing lenses will work on a Nikon full-frame (even if they won't be making the most of its capabilities) whereas with Canon I'd have to replace everything in one go- camera body, lenses, flash, remote & triggers. The other reason for sticking with Nikon is Canon's lens line up, specifically on the telephoto side of things. Here's what I mean- this is the Nikon lens I bought and this is the Canon equivalent. Both are 28-300, f/3.5 - 5.6, image stabilising, full-frame etc. etc. The Nikon one (at time of writing) is around £650 on Amazon, the Canon £2050. Their product lineup would seem to suggest that Canon will let you have 50mm into the hundreds fine, but if you want to start lower, they deem that to be a 'pro lens' and you're into more serious money. That's not an option for me and I can't see an alternative in their lineup, nor from the likes of Sigma, so that sort of decided it for me.

I know I could get a 75-300 or some such but I'm not willing to take on an extra lens. The idea is to build a lineup of:
+ Super wide-angle
+ Prime portrait (35mm or 50mm)
+ General versatile & telephoto

The 28-300 will certainly offer benefits over my current lens- not only is it longer (on crop sensor, anyway), but it's got vibration reduction, advertised as making up the equivalent of four shutter stops of speed, allowing you to shoot slower. Not only that but it's f5.6 at the long end, compared with 6.5 on what I have now. All told, it should make for a considerably quicker lens (and hopefully sharper, too).

All of this, combined with me finding a cheap Nikon refurb was too much to resist. I'll update more once the lens arrives. Hopefully in the next couple of days.