...says one of the world's best scope testers :h?:
Last weekend I was lucky to visit an optics exhibition with a nice selection of birding scopes (see below). I could have been more specific with my claim but after intensive side-by-side comparisons I still think that for an average birder and in the wild it is not easy to compare the optical quality of the 77/80+mm vs 60+mm scopes. Eg:
1) How to evaluate brightness in bright light (iris stopped down)?
2) What is the effect of the stopped down iris on aberrations?
3) What zoom setting to use in comparison if the magnification is different (same power or same focal length)?
4) How to control the influence of differential vibration on the perceived image
etc. etc.
I like larger scopes, but I am not sure that I could distinguish them from the corresponding smaller versions just by looking through them. If I could use my digital camera - that's another story.
Sorry about thread deviation
Ilkka