Wow those Nikon 8x32 SE's are Impressive! (1 Viewer)

I received the Nikon 8x32 SE's I ordered from Adorama and man are those things impressive! I can't believe how sharp and bright they are. No wonder they have such a following in the birding world. Once I got the IPD adjusted correctly I get no blackouts and what a view. The view is absolutely beautiful. I had some 10x42 SE's awhile back and I got alot of blackouts with them. Not so with the 8x32's. They are definitely sharper and brighter than my Nikon LX L 8x32's. The 3D view is awesome. They are quite light and they actually fit my hands quite well. The rubber eyecups don't bother me at all because they seem to be perfect with perfect eye relief. Too bad they are not waterproof but if you want the best optics you can't go wrong these. It's obvious porro prisms have many inherent advantages when you look through these.

Dennis

Welcome to the club!:t::king:

Bob

I've had a "porro epiphany" lately myself. Mine came in the form of Fujinon 6x30 Nautilus. They are flat amazing, and have me thinking about 8x32 SEs also. A friend has a pair of SEs and I want to A-B the Fujis and Nikons. Not a perfect comparo with one being 6x and the other 8x, let alone CF v IF, but allowing different distances (for the mag difference) we can compare the view.

The birding world will be a better place if Nikon would re-introduce the SEs in a waterproof version with proper twist out eyecups -and- Fujinon produces lightweight, center focus versions of some of their stars.

Yup. They are terrific. :t:

I don't find the eyecups a problem. They feel comfortable and I ordered a couple extra pair from Nikon. I will just get a good case and keep them out of the water. I can't believe the things are better than any binocular I have EVER tried! Even roof's costing over $2K! Wow!

Dennis

[email protected] said:

I received the Nikon 8x32 SE's I ordered from Adorama and man are those things impressive! I can't believe how sharp and bright they are. No wonder they have such a following in the birding world. Once I got the IPD adjusted correctly I get no blackouts and what a view. The view is absolutely beautiful. I had some 10x42 SE's awhile back and I got alot of blackouts with them. Not so with the 8x32's.
Dennis

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Interestingly, I sold my 8 x 32 SE's a while back as a result of persistent blackouts (although I agree completely with Dennis's optical assessment), but I have never had a blackout problem with the 10 x 42 SE which I regard as equally impressive and actually ergonomically easier to handle. The moral (and an obvious one) is that you have to try before you buy as individual physical characteristics can be make a huge difference in whether a highly regarded binocular actually works for you.

Though Dennis and others aren't having a problem with blackouts, clearly enough do that it is an issue that would need to be addressed if an SEII were issued. I mention twist out eyecups for several practical reasons not the least of which would be to help eliminate blackouts. The primary reason for BOs is that the position of the eye isn't matched to the fully executed image circle exiting the eyepiece. This tends to be more of an issue with long eye relief and short non-adjustable eye cups. Though there are work-arounds for this, a multi position twist out eyecup can help provide an accurate reference point.

I think the best solution for any bino is to have enough eye relief for almost anyone wearing glasses, even Shecky (ba dum, bum...here 'till Friday!), while also providing a twist out eye cup that has positions to accommodate everyone else.

I can't help but feel that this business of blackouts with the SE binoculars is just a bit overblown. Blackouts happen with any binocular if your eyes are not lined up and the IPD is not correct, and especially with bins that have eye relief adequate for eyeglass wearers. The SEs are hardly unique in that regard, and if you wear glasses this is a feature, not a problem. Many people, including myself, have never had blackout problems with them whether wearing glasses or not (my glasses are fairly recent additions to my face, so I was using SEs long before I started using glasses).

Yet for years now it seems as that whenever the SE is mentioned there are couple of members who feel they must chime in and tell us how user unfriendly they supposedly are. This probably puts a lot of people off from trying a superb binocular that might work beautifully for them. I've owned and used any number of highly-regarded bins that didn't work for me for one reason or another, yet I don't think I've made it my crusade to warn everyone off of those particular bins.

I got blackouts with the Vortex Viper. I think due to long eye relief there. If they were too close the black outs appeared. Not a problem really. Fine 8x bins.

Tero said:

I got blackouts with the Vortex Viper. I think due to long eye relief there. If they were too close the black outs appeared. Not a problem really. Fine 8x bins.

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Blackouts seem to vary from person to pwerson and binocular to binocular. You must try before you buy. I had blackouts with both the Nikon 8x42 LX L and the Nikon 10x42 SE(Something awful!) but no blackouts with the Nikon 8x32 SE or Nikon 8x32 LX L. Go figure! ER must be a little bit longer in the 42's causing the blackouts whereas the 32's ER is perfect.

Dennis

In some cases it may be intolerable. With the Vipers I could easily work around it and I welcomed the eye relief with glasses on.

[email protected] said:

Blackouts seem to vary from person to pwerson and binocular to binocular. You must try before you buy. I had blackouts with both the Nikon 8x42 LX L and the Nikon 10x42 SE(Something awful!) but no blackouts with the Nikon 8x32 SE or Nikon 8x32 LX L. Go figure! ER must be a little bit longer in the 42's causing the blackouts whereas the 32's ER is perfect.

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Edz commented on cloudnights about getting more blackouts with the 10x42 SE and fewer with the 8x32 SE.

The odd thing is the prism housing and eyepieces on these two bins are identical. So the bits that determine ER are the same.

Still not seen a good explanation for this effect (though I believe it's real ... it seems to affect quite a few people) though I suspect the focal planes are not quite in the same place so the exit pupil moves by some (larger) amount. It would only take a mm or two when the setup is already "borderline".

The blackouts are worse for anyone who's entrance pupil gets in front of the exit pupil of the bin. So tight-fitting glasses (when they designed for the loose fitting audience), flatter faces and myopes (short signed people) with larger negative prescriptions can have more problems.

I know we've been through this, and I imagine there is no simple formula for predicting blackouts, but I have absolutely no problem with my 10x42 SEs, yet I have minor blackout issues with my 8x42 Ultravids. 8x32 Ultravids are worse for me, yet the 8x32 Trinovid BNs no problem, same with the 8x32 EL. I don't wear glasses and am slightly far sighted, corrected to 20-10. I think I have deep set eyes but how do you measure that. I know I have a very narrow IPD. Since I can't test before buying, what do you figure my odds are for having black out problems with the 8x32SE?

The birding world will be a better place if Nikon would re-introduce the SEs in a waterproof version with proper twist out eyecups ...

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Isn't that the truth?

I, too, have fallen into the porro epiphany lately. The SE 8x32s are definitely a wonderful optical achievement. Based on your comments then Dennis I then take it that these are your new favorites?

FrankD said:

Isn't that the truth?

I, too, have fallen into the porro epiphany lately. The SE 8x32s are definitely a wonderful optical achievement. Based on your comments then Dennis I then take it that these are your new favorites?

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Since you're using my words Frank, I'll assume you are asking me.

I don't own 8x32 SEs and have used them but a few times, briefly. I am quite intrigued by them however and may be persuaded to buy them, though what I really want doesn't exist. My porro epiphany is based on my recent acquisition of Fujinon 6x30s which I can hardly put down. They are far from the ideal birding bins but the view is intoxicating. I'm sure a big part of the appeal has to do with them being 6x30s.

The mythical bins I want would look much like Nikon SEs, be available in 6x32 and 7x32, be waterproof, center focus, have 18mm or so of eye relief, and a multi-position twist-out eyecup.

I have a date on January 19 with a friend to A-B compare his SEs to my Fujinon 6x32s. We'll allow for differences in magnification and will set up viewing targets under varying conditions. We've done this before with 4 spotting scopes, so we have a certain method. I just want to know if the Nikons are as good optically as the Fuji Juniors, though I suspect they are. I'll take several Leicas to throw in the mix to help lend context.

They have to be my favorite view for fair weather although I am not getting rid of my roof prisms. I still need something for wet weather and I will probably keep my Canon 12x36 II's for that long range detailed view.

Dennis

Here's a nice explanation of the advantages of porro-prism binoculars:

Replacing the hypotenuse face of a right-angle prism by a total internal reflection roof, consisting of two surfaces positioned at 90-degree angles with respect to one another, yields an Amici prism. Addition of the roof serves to maintain the 90-degree inversion to the image observed with a right-angle prism, but also rotates the image by 180 degrees around the optical axis. At the roof surface, light rays incident at angles that would normally enable them to be transmitted through the hypotenuse face undergo crossover by total internal reflection through the prism. The result is to divide images in the center and transpose the left and right portions. Amici prisms are expensive and difficult to fabricate because the roof angle must be held to a tolerance of 2-4 seconds of arc to avoid producing a double image artifact. In addition, introduction of the roof element degrades diffraction-limited resolution by almost a factor of two in the direction perpendicular to the roof edge, regardless of the accuracy of construction. This artifact can be partially offset by multi-layer coatings applied to the surface."

Second, the eyepieces in SE binoculars are extremely well corrected for the various kinds of optical aberrations and distortions. SE eyepieces are of astronomical quality and I find that the view they produce is remarkably similar to the view produced by my Televue Radian eyepieces. My subjective sense of the view through SE eyepieces is "It's like there is no glass in there". The caveat here is that you must have your eye at the design eyepoint of the eyepieces, this is also true of the Televue Radians.

The third part of the system, the objective lenses is an area where I believe all of the major houses are capable of producing lenses of extremely high quality. Someone else might elaborate on the advantages of apochromatic versus achromatic objectives at low power magnification (8 or 10 power).

Lastly, in my opinion Nikon optics have outstanding multicoatings which produce superior contrast. And this superior contrast enhances our perception of brightness and resolution.

Hmm. Explains why these Nikon 8x32SE's are so darn good!

Dennis

[email protected] said:

All of the major optics houses know this. As you are probably aware, all of the best quality spotting scopes on the market today (from Swarovski, Leica, Zeiss, Nikon, Kowa, etc.) are porro prism designs.
Dennis

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Dennis,

Here you are simply misinformed. The current top scopes by all the brands you name (except for the Leica Apo-Televid 77, which cannot really be called "current" anymore, although the 82mm range replacing it is still not available) use a Schmidt roof prism for their angled models, and Zeiss does even for its straight-through model. With precision manufacturing and dielectric phase correction coatings, these prisms do not prevent the scopes from achieving diffraction-limited performance. Rather, the limiting factor for these scopes is loose manufacturing tolerances. The best samples of any of them are either of diffraction-limited quality or at least very, very near to it, even with a roof prism in the optical train.

Kimmo

Found this googling porro prism spotting scopes:

http://www.hit.ac.il/staff/kahanej/article/WhichBinoculars.pdf

excerpt:
Spotting scopes also use Porro and roof prisms, but the overwhelming majority are Porro
prisms, because size is not such an issue with these instruments. There are some exceptions,
notably small, compact roof prism scopes designed for maximum portability, but these do not
offer interchangeable eyepiece capability. With the exception of large European drawtube
scopes, all the premium, full-feature, large-objective scopes on the market today use Porro
prisms.


and another....

http://www.betterviewdesired.com/Swarovski-Habicht-CT-75-and-85.php

excerpt:
Most spotting scopes sold in the US are prismatic scopes that use porroprisms just like those in porro binoculars to erect the image (turn it right side up and right way round). That gives them the characteristic dog leg look, generally with the eyepiece offset above the objective lens. They focus internally, either with a knob on the prism housing, or with a helical collar on the barrel of the scope. A draw tube scope is a modern adaptation of the old fashioned seaman's collapsing (telescoping ) telescope, in which the sections of the barrel slide inside each other when collapsed. The only difference is that the traditional collapsing telescope used a Galilean erecting system (lenses) while most modern draw tube scopes use roof prisms.

Then there's this:
Diascope system
Common features


LotuTec Coating
Outstanding Optics
Fluoride containing optical glasses for maximum reduction of color fringes.
T*-Multicoating for high transmission and color fidelity.
Phase corrected roof prisms for excellent detail recognition.
Impressive close focus range for insect watching.
Long eyerelief for eyeglass wearers.
Wide angle eyepieces.

Is there any wonder why there is some confusion?

Kevin Conville said:

....
Is there any wonder why there is some confusion?

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Kimmo is right, of course.

There is so much confusion because all sorts of incompetent people distribute all sorts of nonsense via the internet which gets perpetuated by (a) taking internet nonsense seriously in the first place, and (b) by quoting and reiterating it.

Tom