scampo said:As a keen photographer sinced a lad, I have always loved those names - I used to aspire to a Sonnar 1.8, the next one up from Tessar 2.8!
scampo said:Just think what it would be worth now, Adey. And what beautiful photos it would still take.
There's a super camera shop in Loughborough (Paul Moffat's Cameras on Baxter Gate, from where I bought my first 'real' camera when I was 14), they seem to specialise in old Leitz-Wetzlar kit - what beautiful cameras and lenses they are.
Leif said:Dielectric coatings were around for decades before they were applied to binoculars. I think the Swarovski EL range were the first binoculars to have dielectric coatings - Swarobright - applied to prisms to increase contrast and brightness. (Or at least the first company to mention such things. Nikon might have been doing the same.) It took Leica many years to introduce binoculars with dielectric coatings i.e. the Ultravid range. Such coatings add cost, which is presumably why they were not used earlier. Manufacturers correctly predicted that the market would support even sillier prices.
Back to flourite optics. Flourite (or flourite glass) is expensive and increases manufacturing costs as it is harder to work than standard glass (it is softer). So increased costs is the obvious reason why manufacturers have not used it before. What it does is give improved correction of chromatic and spherical aberrations. Bear in mind that a binocular has objectives with an F number of ~4 according to some sources. In some top name instruments CA is so severe that to my eyes it interferes with observation, rendering a bird as a smear of purple. If the Zeiss Victory FL range do have greatly reduced CA (and maybe improved sharpness?) and are otherwise top grade, then IMO they will be a big advance. Whether or not the market as a whole agrees is another matter.
Incidentally most people claim not to see CA through top end binoculars such as the Swaro EL and Leica Ultravid. Goodness knows why!
Incidentally the current Zeiss Victory range are reckoned by most people to have excellent optics.
scampo said:I see why you bought a Leica scope, now, Adey! Pretensions of grandeur, eh? Oh to be rich!
Leif said:Incidentally the current Zeiss Victory range are reckoned by most people to have excellent optics.
Swissboy said:I seem to remember that when the original Zeiss Victories came out, Zeiss claimed that its optics were as good as fluorite glass.Or else, the original claim must have been full of bull?
scampo said:I'd agree with Gorank regarding the lack of 'character' in the design of both Swaro and Leica - too smooth looking, maybe?
laika said:Leif!
What do you mean by dielectric? Is the same as laser? English is not my native language!
My Fujinon binocular has something called EBC or electron beam coating,i wonder if that is a sort of dielectric coating?
mak said:Swissboy, do you have the claim from Zeiss about the Victory optics being as good as fluorite?
Swissboy said:As I said I SEEM to remember. When I was in for an additional pair of binoculars I searched around in the internet so much that it is impossible for me to say whether the claim really came from Zeiss. And that one printed (in German) Zeiss publication I still have does not make such a claim.
iporali said:As has been said earlier, even the present Victories are claimed by Zeiss to be "four element superachromats". I don't know how this could be made without some kind of low dispersion glass - which someone may well call "as good as fluorite". At least this is something that eg. Swaro and Nikon (who use HD, ED-glass) would like us to think with their scopes (Zeiss, Leica and Kowa use "real" fluorite crystals).
Ilkka
Leif said:Ilkka: A very good point and that struck me too. Quite how they can be super-achromats is beyond me. All reports suggest that they are no worse and no better than competing products in terms of CA. (Or maybe they do use low-dispersion glass? Sounds unlikely since Zeiss make no song or dance.)
(The definitions of apo-chromat and super-achromat are somewhat elastic, and some manufacturers simply take them to mean an objective with 3 or 4 elements one of which is low dispersion glass. Others use a more strict definition in terms of the image quality.)