Do you think an excellent 8x42 can be better than an alpha 8x32 optically? (1 Viewer)

[Patudo]

Ok, if you did a lot of birding in low light which binocular would you prefer a Nikon Monarch HG 8x42 or a Zeiss 8x32 FL? Which one would perform better? remember the Nikon is pulling in 72% more light.

One thing that, interestingly, no one thought to ask was - when referring to birding in low light, just how dark (or otherwise) are the conditions? I'll bet that what each of us considers "low light" is going to vary from person to person. For some it might be almost darkness, for some it could be the grey light of pre-dawn, for some it could be what's called "civil twilight", for others "nautical twilight". Maybe you could give us some examples, from your experience in the field, of what birding in low light means?

Of course, it could also be asked - how much low light birding (in any kind of low light) do you actually do as a proportion of your birding in total? Or indeed, how much birding do you actually do, full stop?

 

[Maljunulo]

I can't quantify it, but if I can't tell when my binoculars are in focus, I decide it's time to put on the lens covers and go home.

 

[Ivydwg]

One thing that, interestingly, no one thought to ask was - when referring to birding in low light, just how dark (or otherwise) are the conditions? I'll bet that what each of us considers "low light" is going to vary from person to person. For some it might be almost darkness, for some it could be the grey light of pre-dawn, for some it could be what's called "civil twilight", for others "nautical twilight". Maybe you could give us some examples, from your experience in the field, of what birding in low light means?

Of course, it could also be asked - how much low light birding (in any kind of low light) do you actually do as a proportion of your birding in total? Or indeed, how much birding do you actually do, full stop?

Good question! This is my experience ...

Living in the UK, I am hardly blessed with sunny conditions. Overcast winter days typically create low, poor light conditions, even in the middle of the day (it's often not much better in the summer!). I have been induated with wintering bird surveys early this year and late last year. I can't pick and choose the best and brightest days to survey, otherwise I simply wouldn't fulfil my survey schedule.

Therefore, in my experience, based on my geographical location in the world, I would choose an excellent 8x42 over an alpha 8x32. That additional light gathering makes a significant difference in my experience for more accurate and confident bird ID, particularly under the cold and grey blanket cloud that so often frequents the British Isles.

 

[WJC]

I must have missed the reply to Bill's question about why it is difficult to make a good 10X32.

Maljunulo said:
“I must have missed the reply to Bill's question about why it is difficult to make a good 10X32.”

Dennis said:
“I think John kind of answered that above. Smaller apertures with higher magnifications especially roofs seem to have to be built to very exacting specifications because any imperfection seems to be more highly magnified by the smaller aperture and higher magnification.

Actually, Richard, he sidestepped this one, too. The fact is that the difficulty in making a “good 10x32” is no more difficult than making a good binocular of any other aperture and magnification. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with a roof or Porro design, arm strength, IPD, size of exit pupil, eye relief, or anything else he may have read in an Allbinos memo. I realize their “enthusiasts” are so much smarter than me because he “agrees with them ... most of the time.”

Perhaps I have aided his thinking in that he seems to have difficulty with things not related to black and white thinking. And while he gives me no more credit than for being a screw-turner, perhaps the attached will get his attention a micron more. I AM primarily a screw turner. But my fingers have been in many more flavors of the optical pie. We were talking about MANUFACTURING. Well, the image in the upper left of the attached may cover that for him.

Lee says everyone is entitled to their opinion. Well, mine is the cloud of optical misinformation from which Dennis seems to get his stream of talking points is so thick, I don’t think Superman could fly through it.

 

[albie...]

Bill post #84,

I've been following (not stalking) your informative writing style for years . Mostly over on Cloudy Nights until you left (a shame and still don't know what happened) . Any one that can read and has the ability to filter out the nonsense knows who to take serious and who to use as a source of entertainment/comedy or for just filling up the trash bin . You sir are amongst the few whose info I take seriously. You don't need to prove anything and I find it sad that you seem to feel the need to do so because of certain individuals that will never "get it" .

 

[[email protected]]

Yes.

The rubber has a whitish, rather unattractive discoloration, which doesn't wipe off with a damp cloth.

Mechanically and optically, still like new.

I have promised them to my #2 granddaughter, after giving my non-field-pro 10X42 EL SV to #1 granddaughter. (in transit with UPS as I type this)

Optically did you like the 10x42 LX or 10x42 EL SV better? Those LX had good optics outside of maybe a little CA.

 

[Maljunulo]

Optically did you like the 10x42 LX or 10x42 EL SV better? Those LX had good optics outside of maybe a little CA.

I bought the EL SV because it showed more detail in deep shadows.

"More" means some instead of none in really dark spaces.

 

[[email protected]]

I bought the EL SV because it showed more detail in deep shadows.

"More" means some instead of none in really dark spaces.

Interesting that the EL showed more detail in shadows. The EL is very good in low light.

 

[Maljunulo]

Interesting that the EL showed more detail in shadows. The EL is very good in low light.

That isn't what I said, and I don't think they are the same thing.

 

[[email protected]]

Good question! This is my experience ...

Living in the UK, I am hardly blessed with sunny conditions. Overcast winter days typically create low, poor light conditions, even in the middle of the day (it's often not much better in the summer!). I have been induated with wintering bird surveys early this year and late last year. I can't pick and choose the best and brightest days to survey, otherwise I simply wouldn't fulfil my survey schedule.

Therefore, in my experience, based on my geographical location in the world, I would choose an excellent 8x42 over an alpha 8x32. That additional light gathering makes a significant difference in my experience for more accurate and confident bird ID, particularly under the cold and grey blanket cloud that so often frequents the British Isles.

Your binocular choice does depend on your geographical location, doesn't it? The further north you are the more glare you have and some areas are just less sunny and more overcast all the time where a 8x42 is beneficial.

 

[willisoften]

Good question! This is my experience ...

Living in the UK, I am hardly blessed with sunny conditions. Overcast winter days typically create low, poor light conditions, even in the middle of the day (it's often not much better in the summer!). I have been induated with wintering bird surveys early this year and late last year. I can't pick and choose the best and brightest days to survey, otherwise I simply wouldn't fulfil my survey schedule.

Therefore, in my experience, based on my geographical location in the world, I would choose an excellent 8x42 over an alpha 8x32. That additional light gathering makes a significant difference in my experience for more accurate and confident bird ID, particularly under the cold and grey blanket cloud that so often frequents the British Isles.

Same here, there are times here in Belfast when late November through January ,the bad weather makes it seem dark all day. Yet I've always made do with 8x30 I suppose when I started to look at binoculars, when I first made a pay-packet 40 years ago the difference between 30s and 40s was substantial. I do have 10x42 and perhaps because of the magnification they don't seem any better under our grey skies.
A friend of mine was a landscape surveyor for OS he always has 8x56 at hand (Nikons M5 possibly) those definitely make a difference but I would never carry them.

Despite the difference in the area of objectives 30 vs 40 give a few mm either way being massive 700ish vs 1250ish can anybody really say its 40% brighter? 56mm almost doubles the area of a 40mm objective. But they don't seem doubly bright. Anybody know the actual formula?

I don't dispute that all else being equal 56 is brighter than 40 which is brighter than 30 which is brighter than 25 ... Just than given the added weight & bulk etc it doesn't seem proportionate.

 

[DrewskiMT]

I'm just gonna post in here on this old dead thread, one that was beat to death..., because I have been trying to answer some of the original questions myself with real world field observations.

Conquest HD 8x32 (420ft) vs Nikon MHG 8x42 (435ft) FOVs

I spent a couple evenings this week birding the last two hours before legal sunset and up to 30 minutes past sunset. I was looking at western bluebirds and eastern king birds, meadowlarks, nighthawks, and crows and flickers and the like both near and far. I enjoyed the image quality in the Conquest better. I just did. It seemed... sharper, and perhaps a little bit more contrast, blacker blacks and whiter whites. The 8x42 MHG image did not appear brighter, looking at open grassy hillsides surrounded by timber and indirectly lit, nor did it seem brighter looking into deep shadows, until AFTER legal sunset (sun below horizon completely). Call me crazy, and I really could not believe it myself, but this is what I saw, 35 years old eyes, 20/40 vision uncorrected in both eyes, no astigmatism or other eye disorders or concerns, full good color vision verified by FAA pilot flight physical vision testing. The brightness differences were NOT significant until after the sun had set below horizon. They just were not significantly different in overall edge to edge "scene" brightness or when finely focused on tree bark in shadows with my attention on the contents and brightness of the sweet spot.

I would prefer to bird with the Conquest 8x32 generally. The only time I can think I would prefer the 8x42 MHG would be for looking at and across water, looking into the sun/oncoming bright light, and hunting 30 minutes before and after sunset. Outside of those specific conditions, I personally would prefer the view (and ergonomics and lighter weight and lighter hand feel) from the 8x32 Conquest. It IS that good, to my eyes, in my conditions: mixed grasslands and forest about 50/50.

Now before people start talking about color differences (transmission curve graph across the entire visible light spectrum of frequencies) between the two binos, let me also add that I could not tell a significant or notable difference in color between the two binos, hand held, back to back on lots of different subjects, bushes, ponderosa pine trees, yellow grass fields, brown dirt hillsides, or the color of the birds. The images looked more similar with respect to colors, than different. Both appeared very accurate (naked eye). I did not see any warm or cool / green or yellow biases, at all.

FOV: 420 vs 435ft in the real world. To detect a meaningful viewable difference in FOV while birding, I had to be focusing on a subject at least 200 yards away. Closer than that, and I there was not a "noticeable" or funtional birding/hunting difference.

I am looking forward to putting all three head to head against my mom's new Swaro EL 8x32. I will post my observations in the coming weeks. Stay tuned. I will be looking at colorful posters and flowers and other colorful scenes not found outside to get a better understanding of the color differences. I will also test color in dim low lighting and bright daylight/natural light.

 

[DrewskiMT]

Same here, there are times here in Belfast when late November through January ,the bad weather makes it seem dark all day. Yet I've always made do with 8x30 I suppose when I started to look at binoculars, when I first made a pay-packet 40 years ago the difference between 30s and 40s was substantial. I do have 10x42 and perhaps because of the magnification they don't seem any better under our grey skies.
A friend of mine was a landscape surveyor for OS he always has 8x56 at hand (Nikons M5 possibly) those definitely make a difference but I would never carry them.

Despite the difference in the area of objectives 30 vs 40 give a few mm either way being massive 700ish vs 1250ish can anybody really say its 40% brighter? 56mm almost doubles the area of a 40mm objective. But they don't seem doubly bright. Anybody know the actual formula?

I don't dispute that all else being equal 56 is brighter than 40 which is brighter than 30 which is brighter than 25 ... Just than given the added weight & bulk etc it doesn't seem proportionate.

This has been explained extensively in other threads/postings but the short and crude and incomplete answer is:

"The second formula is Brightness; this is the exit pupil squared. So in an 8x42, this number is 5.252² = 27.56. Greater than 25 is considered ideal.
The last formula is Twilight Factor, this is another formula for brightness/resolution in low light for a binocular – because it is a more complex measurement, some feel it’s a better representation. This is calculated as the square root of (objective diameter x magnification). So in an 8x42 bino, 8x42=336 – √ 336 = 18.33. Again, the higher the twilight factor, the better the resolution in low light." - Optics 101

As you note, it is not a 1 to 1 correlation between perceived brightness and amount of light gathered... and for me, comparing twilight numbers and looking through the binoculars doesn't really correlate to a simple 1 to 10 (pain scale) brightness score either.

 

[DrewskiMT]

Good question! This is my experience ...

Living in the UK, I am hardly blessed with sunny conditions. Overcast winter days typically create low, poor light conditions, even in the middle of the day (it's often not much better in the summer!). I have been induated with wintering bird surveys early this year and late last year. I can't pick and choose the best and brightest days to survey, otherwise I simply wouldn't fulfil my survey schedule.

Therefore, in my experience, based on my geographical location in the world, I would choose an excellent 8x42 over an alpha 8x32. That additional light gathering makes a significant difference in my experience for more accurate and confident bird ID, particularly under the cold and grey blanket cloud that so often frequents the British Isles.

I would think your conditions would also call for something even a little bigger with a tad more magnification, I was thinking 10x50 for your winter. Not many 10x50s choices on the market, but a few decent ones exist in addition to the Swaro.

 

[DrewskiMT]

The other issue here is transmission. Allbinos rankings used to average 4 wavelengths I believe to come up with their number. Nikon MHG 10x42 and Conquest 8x32 tested at 88% but the Zeiss Alphas and Conquest HD 10x42 generally test at 93% or slightly better. The new 8x32 SF being the exception with a lower, 90.6%.

 

[Upland]

Still liking your MeoPro Airs Dennis?Haven’t been active lately so curious to see if you still feel as strongly about them as you did initially.

 

[dorubird]

"Do you think an excellent 8x42 can be better than an alpha 8x32 optically?"
An excellent 8x42 it is already alpha binoculars

 

[ZDHart]

"Do you think an excellent 8x42 can be better than an alpha 8x32 optically?"

What anyone thinks about it doesn't really matter - does it? All depends on the specific qualities of whatever two binoculars you can directly compare.

The only way you can answer that question is to pick the two binoculars that you want to compare... and compare them first hand.

The results of that comparison will be unique - not applicable to a different pair of binoculars.

 

[Maljunulo]

Dennis is gone, but his threads live on.

 

[_Prism_]

I'm just gonna post in here on this old dead thread, one that was beat to death..., because I have been trying to answer some of the original questions myself with real world field observations.

Conquest HD 8x32 (420ft) vs Nikon MHG 8x42 (435ft) FOVs

I spent a couple evenings this week birding the last two hours before legal sunset and up to 30 minutes past sunset. I was looking at western bluebirds and eastern king birds, meadowlarks, nighthawks, and crows and flickers and the like both near and far. I enjoyed the image quality in the Conquest better. I just did. It seemed... sharper, and perhaps a little bit more contrast, blacker blacks and whiter whites. The 8x42 MHG image did not appear brighter, looking at open grassy hillsides surrounded by timber and indirectly lit, nor did it seem brighter looking into deep shadows, until AFTER legal sunset (sun below horizon completely). Call me crazy, and I really could not believe it myself, but this is what I saw, 35 years old eyes, 20/40 vision uncorrected in both eyes, no astigmatism or other eye disorders or concerns, full good color vision verified by FAA pilot flight physical vision testing. The brightness differences were NOT significant until after the sun had set below horizon. They just were not significantly different in overall edge to edge "scene" brightness or when finely focused on tree bark in shadows with my attention on the contents and brightness of the sweet spot.

I would prefer to bird with the Conquest 8x32 generally. The only time I can think I would prefer the 8x42 MHG would be for looking at and across water, looking into the sun/oncoming bright light, and hunting 30 minutes before and after sunset. Outside of those specific conditions, I personally would prefer the view (and ergonomics and lighter weight and lighter hand feel) from the 8x32 Conquest. It IS that good, to my eyes, in my conditions: mixed grasslands and forest about 50/50.

Now before people start talking about color differences (transmission curve graph across the entire visible light spectrum of frequencies) between the two binos, let me also add that I could not tell a significant or notable difference in color between the two binos, hand held, back to back on lots of different subjects, bushes, ponderosa pine trees, yellow grass fields, brown dirt hillsides, or the color of the birds. The images looked more similar with respect to colors, than different. Both appeared very accurate (naked eye). I did not see any warm or cool / green or yellow biases, at all.

FOV: 420 vs 435ft in the real world. To detect a meaningful viewable difference in FOV while birding, I had to be focusing on a subject at least 200 yards away. Closer than that, and I there was not a "noticeable" or funtional birding/hunting difference.

I am looking forward to putting all three head to head against my mom's new Swaro EL 8x32. I will post my observations in the coming weeks. Stay tuned. I will be looking at colorful posters and flowers and other colorful scenes not found outside to get a better understanding of the color differences. I will also test color in dim low lighting and bright daylight/natural light.

My wife and I compared my Conquest HD 8x32 to a friend's Victory SF 8x42 in Kent and our experience was very different to yours. For one, the difference in brightness was quite noticeable, even in bright light. Around 30-40 minutes before sunset, the image on the larger 42's seemed substantially brighter and more pleasurable to view - and it stayed that way until at least 20 minutes after sunset when we wrapped up. This viewing made such an impact that I abandoned my initial plan of buying a 10x32 and bought a Victory SF in 10x42 instead.

As for Dennis's original question - I'm not sure it makes much sense as you're comparing two different sizes entirely, with two entirely different sets of performance characteristics. But here is a real example I can share: I currently own an 'alpha' Zeiss Victory 8x25 and during the brightest parts of the day, it is genuinely even brighter and more pleasurable to use than my larger 'excellent' Conquest HD 8x32. The playing field is only really evened in the 15 minutes before and after sunset, but even then the difference is not significant enough for me to ever carry around the much larger 8x32. In the real world, for the vast majority of the day, the better (and smaller!) Victory 8x25 wins it all the way - for its superior optics and handling characteristics (smaller size, lighter weight, & overall superior feel).

The takeaway here is that a true top-tier alpha from a holy trinity brand (Zeiss, Swarovski, Leica) can punch above it's size/ weight class in addition to squeezing out every last drop of performance in it's category. This ability to outclass a larger but inferior optic is one of the biggest benefits you get for the added expense of an alpha, as it means that oftentimes many of us can get away using a much smaller, more portable binocular.