A question about the Nikon Premier 8x32 Roofs (2 Viewers)

henry link · Oct 29, 2011

Brock,

Seems like we're both happy enough with the color bias of Nikon binoculars, just for opposite reasons. I like how close they come to neutraity and you like how far they depart from it.

BTW, Golden-crowned Sparrows in Kentucky? Perhaps you meant White-crowned Sparrows, or, as owners of EII's know them - Pink-crowned Sparrows. ;-)

Henry

Kammerdiner · Oct 29, 2011

brocknroller said:
Henry,
...
In my backyard birds, reds and yellows seem to be the most dominant colors – finches (Yellow and House), woodpeckers, warblers, Red-winged Blackbirds, Golden-crowned Sparrows and Cedar Waxwings immediately come to mind.

I do catch the occasional Bluebird, but they’re rare. Blue Jays are quite abundant. They are smart birds and interesting to watch but “if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all”.

So binoculars with “happy tints” that emphasize reds and yellows like the Nikon SE, EII, and HG are not only pleasing to my eyes, but are actually useful for birding.

That such a "warm" biased light curve is a ‘distortion’ of pure white light doesn’t bother me for birding. If anything, it enhances my birding experience.

I don’t care about the green leaves or purple mountains majesty. For birding, I want the emphasis on the “warm” side of the spectrum. While Jay may not agree, others do.
...
Brock

A note of caution: I think birders want color neutrality as much as anyone. It's necessary for ID'ing gulls and shorebirds, for instance, where subtle variations in bill color and leg color need to be considered. Often, the colors involved are yellow, pink, orange, etc. All on the warm side, all affected by color bias. I don't think any of the bins involved in this discussion would rise to the level of confusing things, but maybe the EII is getting close??

Oh, and Brock the nearest Golden-crowned Sparrow is probably 2700 miles west of here. If you really have one in your back yard, please let me know!

Mark

PS: Maybe those are White-throats, tan-striped morph? Very common this time of year.

jaymoynihan · Oct 29, 2011

henry link said:
... the color bias of Nikon binoculars....I like how close they come to neutrality ....

Thank you Henry. I think my SE 8x to be neutral also. I was gettin confused there for awhile

I am the original poster on this thread. I try to follow a tread i start until the mumbles stop.|8||
Besides, i am a bit of an optics junkie i guess. Binos, microscopes, hand loupes, telescopes all feature prominently in my avocational activities. So, carry on... :eat:

jaymoynihan · Oct 29, 2011

Kammerdiner said:
... I think birders want color neutrality as much as anyone. It's necessary for ID'ing gulls and shorebirds, for instance, where subtle variations in bill color and leg color need to be considered. Often, the colors involved are yellow, pink, orange, etc. All on the warm side, all affected by color bias. I don't think any of the bins involved in this discussion would rise to the level of confusing things...

:t:
As a bird/animal behavior watcher and storm spotter, neutrality is very important.

denco@comcast.n · Oct 29, 2011

brocknroller said:
Thanks, I think, though Henry's hardly in any danger of losing his Optics Wizard cap. Just offering an alternative view from the other side of the corpus callosum. Henry's actually more of a "two cultures" person than he lets on and has more of an "artistic eye" than I do.

I'll make you the same offer as I did with the SV EL. You hold onto your "ugly woman" for a year, and I will consider buying one. Btw, your wife doesn't read your posts, does she?

Allbinos' review of the 10x35 EII seemed enthusiastic to me. The first sentence in the commentary where they seemingly dissed the EII as "a relict of the previous era" (or "old technology" as you would put it) was actually a set up for the second sentence, which reads:

"Does buying this pair of binoculars make sense? The answer could be only positive and the excellent result this device got in our test is a very good argument supporting it. If you add a fantastic field of view, a light but solid casing and a very affordable price for such a performance it would be difficult not to recommend these binoculars to anybody who doesn’t plan using it in extreme humidity."

I would add that in extreme humidity the rubber armor of the black body EII they reviewed doesn't bubble or peel like the original gray body version's.

Even the one major criticism they had about the "shallow hole" in the spectrum was countered by this comment:

"The colouring still remains good because the secondary maximum for the blue range makes up for it."

But the best part of the review for me was this resounding recommendation:

"I guess even after 20 or 30 years from the purchase the owner of this instrument will be able to enjoy its solid build quality and classic looks whereas cheaper but allegedly waterproof binoculars, produced in China, by that time will have been recycled and forgotten."

I'll get back to you in 19 years about that.

Brock

I agree about the durability and quality of the EII's. I also will say what I have always said that for the money the EII's are the best binoculars available. If you don't need waterproof or can get by without it these are your binoculars. I personally still like them better than the SE's too. The WIDE FOV is great! But in the Albino's review the Zeiss 8x32 FL pretty much CRUSHED them! 90% of the tests were superior on the little Zeiss. The transmission on the EII's was really poor especially for a porro. The EII had 86.1 % versus 94.6% for the Zeiss. Wow, that is a big difference. The CA score on the EII's were 5.9 versus 9.2 on the Zeiss. Those little EII's have alot of CA! Also what surprised me is people complain about blurring at the edge of the field in the Zeiss yet the EII's were way worse at 3.0 versus 6.0 for the Zeiss. Also, distortion was superior in the Zeiss at 6.0 versus 5.0 for the EII's. Even the focus was better in the Zeiss. Albino's result show's a clear cut big win for the Zeiss FL's. The little EII's are great for a $450.00 binocular but they don't compare with the top $2k alpha's anymore. Nobody will tease you if you trade all your EII's in for an FL. There is no shame in that.

brocknroller · Oct 29, 2011

henry link said:
Brock,

Seems like we're both happy enough with the color bias of Nikon binoculars, just for opposite reasons. I like how close they come to neutraity and you like how far they depart from it.

BTW, Golden-crowned Sparrows in Kentucky? Perhaps you meant White-crowned Sparrows, or, as owners of EII's know them - Pink-crowned Sparrows. ;-)

Henry

Henry,

Yes, the Nikon EIIs have characteristics we both like, and they aren't so color biased as to have a noticeable color cast during daylight like some binoculars, otherwise, neither of us would probably use them for birding.

Allbinos refers to the 10x EII's light curve "dip" as a "shallow hole" and added that "the colouring still remains good because the secondary maximum for the blue range makes up for it."

So the overall picture presents itself as "neutral". Holger has also described the EII's color as "neutral" in his review, but the slight "bump" in the low frequency end makes those reds and yellows "pop," a characteristic I really enjoy.

The only time I see a color cast with the SE, EII, and HG is at dusk when anything whitish shows a slight reddish tinge. It's even more dramatic in the winter when in low light the snow covered landscape looks blood red.

Oil sunflower seeds have gone up to $37 per 50lb. bag! That's a $20 increase in two years. How many birders are crazy enough to pay that much to feed backyard birds and varmints? And I run through it fast since I put out 14 cups per day in the winter.

So, of course, the Golden-crowned Sparrows followed me to Kentucky. You don't think they want to eat leftover cowboy beans and beef jerky, do you?

The (sometimes) Honorable Judge Roy Bean

brocknroller · Oct 29, 2011

Kammerdiner said:
...Oh, and Brock the nearest Golden-crowned Sparrow is probably 2700 miles west of here. If you really have one in your back yard, please let me know!

PS: Maybe those are White-throats, tan-striped morph? Very common this time of year.

Mark,

Apparently, only about 800 miles west in Middleton, WI. Perhaps Ben from EO saw this one.

Note this sentence: "A birder from Pennsylvania was visiting Madison and came by to add the bird to his list." I wonder who that was?

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/environment/article_c31e5e5e-1209-11e0-bbe5-001cc4c03286.html

Brock

Kammerdiner · Oct 29, 2011

brocknroller said:
Mark,

Apparently, only about 800 miles west in Middleton, WI. Perhaps Ben from EO saw this one.

Note this sentence: "A birder from Pennsylvania was visiting Madison and came by to add the bird to his list." I wonder who that was?

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/environment/article_c31e5e5e-1209-11e0-bbe5-001cc4c03286.html

Brock

Well, was it you, Brock? Wasn't me. Haven't been to Madison since my grad school days. Yes they do turn up way out of range but as the link suggests, it's quite rare. You suggested they were in your backyard; I'd come to see that!

I usually see them when I'm out in CA for the holidays. A lovely bird, but not to be confused with anything around here.

Mark

jaymoynihan · Nov 13, 2011

Being i was the OP on this long thread, I thought I should add this.
Well, i did get a modern 8x32 roof ie, one that is waterproof. A new for $400 pair of the Leupold 8x32 Golden Ring HD (out of production). They came in at just 0.7 (2nd place, just in front of the SE) behind the Zeiss FL in the in/famous Allbinos ranking.

I have compared them at length now with the 8x SE. Optically, the SE in better (res/contrast) but by a small margin. I think the Leupold got penalized for its weight (27 oz i think), just as the SE got penalized for not being WP.
The depth of field on the Leopold is very shallow. Once i "learned" how to focus them, I got to see how close to the SE they actually are.

mooreorless · Nov 13, 2011

Sounds like a very nice binocular. Bryce has one of these for sale on here. I would help him if I could.
http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=216046

brocknroller · Nov 13, 2011

jaymoynihan said:
Being i was the OP on this long thread, I thought I should add this.
Well, i did get a modern 8x32 roof ie, one that is waterproof. A new for $400 pair of the Leupold 8x32 Golden Ring HD (out of production). They came in at just 0.7 (2nd place, just in front of the SE) behind the Zeiss FL in the in/famous Allbinos ranking.

I have compared them at length now with the 8x SE. Optically, the SE in better (res/contrast) but by a small margin. I think the Leupold got penalized for its weight (27 oz i think), just as the SE got penalized for not being WP.
The depth of field on the Leopold is very shallow. Once i "learned" how to focus them, I got to see how close to the SE they actually are.

Sounds like my learning curve with the Nikon 8x32 HG vs SE. The fast focuser enhances the perception of shallow depth since just a nudge and your out of focus.

With some practice, I got better at not overshooting targets, but to achieve the best fine focus I still needed to slightly overshoot the target and refocus. I did that when there was time such as a bird perched on a branch, but for a bird in flight I just did the best I could, sometimes getting them in focus, sometimes not.

Porros are just so much easier to focus for me than midsized roofs. The 8x32 EL was the least fussy in this regard and the HG the most.

Besides the focusing issues, the other thing I don't like about most midsized roofs is the 2-D views compared to porros. This was particularly noticeable when comparing the 6x30 FMTR-SX to the 8x32 HG.

In the porro, the views looked very 3-D, you could clearly see the separation between church and skate, but with the HG, judging exactly how far behind that church was behind the flying fish was more difficult and bore less resemblance to what I would see with my own eyes at 8x closer.

Lower power helps with depth and 3-D effect, and there are apparently adjustments that can be done with the optics convergence that can enhance the 3-D effect.

The 7x36 ED2 had a very good 3-D effect for a roof, almost porro-like, which is amazing considering the ED2 focused down to 4 ft with no overlapping barrel shadows. You get the best of both worlds with that bin.

Depth perception and 3-D effect were greatly reduced vs. porros in most of the 8x30-36 roofs I've tried. The best in this regard was again the 8x32 EL, which had a more natural view than the midsized 8x HG, Monarch, SLC, Noble, and Echo.

Brock

jaymoynihan · Nov 13, 2011

brocknroller said:
Porros are just so much easier to focus for me than midsized roofs.

I am lucky i guess in that i do not experience a difference categorically in focusing ease between porros and roofs. Perhaps that is because i focus a range of different types of optical instruments on a daily/weekly basis, binoculars amongst them.
The Leopold does have shallow DOF though, separate from its focus speed. I actually read the little pamphlet that came with them. In the section on focusing it actually says that (I forget the exact distance on the wheel it said)it has a short travel from infinity to about 20 yards, then a slower turning to closest focus point. and the focuser travel does actually get longer the closer you focus. Interesting design.
Close focus for me is about 27".:eek!:
On my 8x SE the focus turning and DOF is great. But, in cold weather the focus wheel get rather stiff, which i understand is a "feature" of that glass.
If i had to pick one pair for kudos for focusing (how smooth, speed, and DOF) it would have to be the Zeiss 7x42 BGATP. :t:, and the 8x30 of the same line is pretty sweet in the hand too.

Alexis Powell · Nov 15, 2011

jaymoynihan said:
In the section on focusing it actually says that (I forget the exact distance on the wheel it said)it has a short travel from infinity to about 20 yards, then a slower turning to closest focus point. and the focuser travel does actually get longer the closer you focus. Interesting design.

Are you saying that they have a variable-ratio focus, or is that just a description of the usual relationship between lens (or focus knob movement) and change in focus that they are trying to pass off as a virtue? All bins of conventional design focus "slower" at close distances, but it is irritating to those of us who use bins for both very near and far work (butterflies and birds). The best focus systems, found only in the Brunton Epoch and Pentax Papilio models as far as I know, have a variable ratio focus to (relative to a conventional bin) speed up focus at close distances and slow it down near infinity.

--AP

jaymoynihan · Nov 15, 2011

Alexis Powell said:
Are you saying that they have a variable-ratio focus, or is that just a description of the usual relationship between lens (or focus knob movement) and change in focus that they are trying to pass off as a virtue? All bins of conventional design focus "slower" at close distances, but it is irritating to those of us who use bins for both very near and far work (butterflies and birds). The best focus systems, found only in the Brunton Epoch and Pentax Papilio models as far as I know, have a variable ratio focus to (relative to a conventional bin) speed up focus at close distances and slow it down near infinity.
--AP

Interesting. From what you write, I assume re the Leupold it may be "... they are trying to pass off as a virtue?". I do not know.

A question about the Nikon Premier 8x32 Roofs (2 Viewers)

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henry link

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