A while ago someone asked our opinion about getting 55-210 lens and of course there were various answers. It triggered me to do a test between the lenses that I have.
I don't recall if that thread was on dpreview, but as I don't find here I'm creating this new thread.
I'm going to call the lenses here by their max zoom like 135, 210, 350, 800.
The 800 lens is a cheap one from Amazon 420-800 range, manual focus, no stabilization.
All pictures were taken of a painting on the wall, from 2.25 m away, on a tripod.
I took pictures at:
55 focal distance with 135 and 210 lenses,
70 focal distance with 135, 210, 350 lenses,
135 focal with 135, 210, 350 lenses,
210 focal with 210 and 350 lenses,
800 focal with 800 lens.
I used the same method to name the cropped pictures. I had to crop to 2400 x 1600 pixels to keep the size under 4 MB. So, a picture with 135 lens at 70 focal is named "135 at 70".
I will post my comments later after a better look at the crops. The initial impression is that 135 is better than 210 in 55-135 range, 350 is better than 135 and 210 in 70-210 range. Optical zoom is good to get close detail, but 210 at 210 doesn't beat the 135 at 135 cropped to get the same viewing size (pixel peeping) on the screen. 350 at 210 is better at pixel level that the 800 at 800.
It's time consuming to crop, or resize pictures to get under 4 MB file size to upload here. Is it a better way to have the pictures available for the other dprevived members, like uploading them full size to youtube and insert a link here to that location? Or a different way?
I have to remember to insert the pictures in reverse order, begin the attachments with the last picture I want to be shown.
June 23, 2023
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Hi Piticoto!
There is a way to put your flickr images here in full size. Upload to flickr, then copy a link to the largest size download, which you use as the link value in the image tag. ... Other forum members have talked about using the tag to show an uploaded reduced size pic when you read an article, with a clickable download link underneath it. I'm afraid I don't know how you do that - it's way beyond the basic HTML I learned 30 years ago.
HTH
Mike M -
These are on a far away wall, 45 m by google maps scale.
I cropped the pictures to get about 2400 x 1600 pixels. Zoom in at the same viewing size of the bricks to compare details, not quite pixel peeping.
The 135 lens at 135 is limited by the optical reach, but not bad compared to the 800. The 350 lens at 350 with digital zoom is way much better than the cheap 800 lens.
I'll get stuck with 70-350 as 350 being my maximum focal length. I'm not going to get any of the lenses up to 500, or 600 focal lengths made for FF and weighting 1.8 kg, or over 2 kg, depending on the range and maker.
This is with 18-135 lens at 135
Next one is 420-800 cheap lens at 800
Next one is 70-350 at 350
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I agree ab out not buying ever longer lenses. As you say, we don't need the extra weight. Leave alone the difficulty of finding the subject! I never use digital zoom, but my swallow and passing aircraft pics almost always need cropping, which amounts to the same thing (but not both, obv ;-)), and they are sharp enough for 60x40cm (24x18) prints.
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I improperly called digital zoom as it's zoomed in the computer. I just realized that the camera's 2x digital zoom will output 6000x4000. But it changes how it focuses, using the large rectangle. I prefer the small spot for more precise focus where I want it to be. But, when extra zoom is needed, I'm OK with the large focus rectangle as I can always manual adjust focus.
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I have two more pictures with 350 optical zoom only and 350 optical plus 2x digital in the camera. To my surprise it seems that the 2x digital in camera has just a little more detail compared to 350 optical only but zoomed 2x in the computer to have the same viewing size. I'll have to repeat just to make sure I didn't do something wrong. Both pictures were on tripod with 5 seconds timer, auto focus on 350 optical only, manual adjustment on 350 x 2 digital as it gives me a large rectangle for auto focus. It's possible that auto focus on small spot is not that good. I'll repeat with manual focus for both times, just not today. If it's not a visible difference without pixel peeping between just optical and 2x digital in camera, I prefer only optical as it's larger field of view in the picture. Definitely large filed of view is needed for moving subjects.
The first one is 350 optical only, the second one 350 optical x 2 digital in camera, both cropped to 2400 1600 pixels for reduced file size, under 4 MB.
