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Pro bird photography with m4/3 (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter njlarsen
- Start date
Vespobuteo
Well-known member
Seems like a pretty rare breed, bird/action photographers moving from FF to MFT?
Another pro-photographer moving from Canon to Olympus (saving weight).
But he does mostly landscape stuff.
http://claesgrundsten.se/blogg/
Another pro-photographer moving from Canon to Olympus (saving weight).
But he does mostly landscape stuff.
http://claesgrundsten.se/blogg/
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Chosun Juan
Given to Fly
Niels,
With the Panasonic Lumix DC-GH5, and the Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II, the MFT technology is getting tantalizingly close to the best of DSLR performance. Perhaps only 1 or 2 generations and they will be there in their own right ..... bring on the Olympus OM-G! :king:
The bodies can be upgraded with better sensors, AF, EVF, and ergonomics, but where O where are the seriously long, fast lenses?? A 300 f4 is just about it ..... where are the lightweight FL 300 f2.8, the 400 f4, 500 f4, 600 f4, the 150-600f5.6, a range of diffractive optics supertelephoto's even? I know some will say these would upset the balance of the outfit, but with such a small sensor you need all the aperture you can get, and even with 2x crop factor native 5 and 600mm lenses would be useful. Battery grips would give better balance, and shot capacity for BIF shooting.
Are such lightweight purpose designed high performance lenses on the cards for MFT? .... I just can't get excited by a 100-400 f6.3 :cat:
Chosun :gh:
With the Panasonic Lumix DC-GH5, and the Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II, the MFT technology is getting tantalizingly close to the best of DSLR performance. Perhaps only 1 or 2 generations and they will be there in their own right ..... bring on the Olympus OM-G! :king:
The bodies can be upgraded with better sensors, AF, EVF, and ergonomics, but where O where are the seriously long, fast lenses?? A 300 f4 is just about it ..... where are the lightweight FL 300 f2.8, the 400 f4, 500 f4, 600 f4, the 150-600f5.6, a range of diffractive optics supertelephoto's even? I know some will say these would upset the balance of the outfit, but with such a small sensor you need all the aperture you can get, and even with 2x crop factor native 5 and 600mm lenses would be useful. Battery grips would give better balance, and shot capacity for BIF shooting.
Are such lightweight purpose designed high performance lenses on the cards for MFT? .... I just can't get excited by a 100-400 f6.3 :cat:
Chosun :gh:
Personally, I think the Olympus E-M1 mk 2 has already arrived in terms of matching the performance of apsc DSLRs. It has comparable DXOmark sensor scores, and even exceeds the best such DSLRs in some respects such as fps burst shooting.
For me, the promise of micro 4/3rds has been to develop a birding camera/lens combo that is light enough to comfortably carry around all day, while getting image quality comparable to apsc DSLRs, but with superior “reach” than the typical hand carried dslr setup due to the 2x crop factor. I think with the new bodies and lenses, that promise has now been fulfilled.
The lenses you are suggesting would eliminate one of the benefits of MFT: being light enough to carry around comfortably all day. I find with the new bodies, which are incrementally heavier than the old, carrying around the Oly 300 f4 (w/ teleconverter) is as much weight as I want to carry. For the first time (and I've been using mft for 5 years), I get muscle fatigue and have to shift carrying shoulders frequently when using that lens. (The lighter 100-400 is less of a burden).
I haven't seen any references to longer or faster lenses being in the works. And for the reasons I mention, I probably wouldn't be interested in them myself. There already exist long, heavy, fast lenses for dslrs, if that is what you are looking for.
As for not getting excited about the PL100-400 f4.5-f6.3, maybe it will help if you think of it as being a 200-800 equivalent? Also, the IS in these cameras/lenses is very good; so they encourage you to develop your skills at shooting at lower shutter speeds, which can help offset the restraints of the narrow aperture.
My 2 cents.
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I personally am too old to be excited about lenses that weigh many lbs. I would not want a lens heavier than the pana-Leica lens I have now. If you need reach corresponding to 1200mm then you are at a distance where air movement likely has deteriorated the result anyway. This might be different if you take photos in the Arctic-- but I live in the tropics.
Niels
Niels
Dave Williams
Well-known member
Although you are right about distortion due to haze much depends on how big your subject is in the first place. If you want a small bird fairly full in the frame 1200mm isn't really that much reach.
Dave, I would like to ask you what size sensor you are used to. The attached images is uncropped at 728 mm equivalent. At 1200 you would not have been able to keep the whole thing inside the frame.
The attached image is completely unedited, and I have not evaluated whether this or one of the others will be edited. So do not criticize the camera due to flaws in this image. I expect I can do better.
Niels
The attached image is completely unedited, and I have not evaluated whether this or one of the others will be edited. So do not criticize the camera due to flaws in this image. I expect I can do better.
Niels
Attachments
Dave Williams
Well-known member
I use a full frame Canon camera for nearly all my shots. I know lots of people wouldn't dream of using a 2x extender/converter but personally I am quite happy to do so on both a 500mm and 600mm lens f4 lens.
Chosun Juan
Given to Fly
The Oly is close - but not quite. Not quite D500 levels of AF tracking, or sensor range, and the EVF lag and blackouts is probably the biggest issue. Definitely headed in the right direction though, and mirrorless is no doubt the future.
I shoot a Nikon D7100 + Tamron 150-600 hand held. It weighs in at about 2.7kg (6lbs) which I carry around easily on a Black Rapid sling. With the APS-C crop this brings me to ~900mm, and with the extra 1.3x in-camera crop it maxes out at about 1150mm equivalent. I am just about always above 800mm.
For me ergonomic bliss is at least D500/ 7D sized bodies, but the upper limit of glass that I'd like to be hand holding is 3kg (inclusive of TC's), with 2kg even more preferable.
I would think that a good 300mm f2.8, or 400mm f4 designed for MFT that can take a 1.4x TC (or 600 f5.6) , would be a good minimum lens that I'd be looking for. If it was a purpose designed Diffractive Optics lens with Fluorite elements too, it would come in well under 2kg.
There is the opportunity to make even 600mm long, fast f4 purpose designed lenses for MFT that are much lighter than their FF counterparts. I think it seriously hamstrings the system not to. The system can accommodate both users - those looking for maximum compactness and portability (say a 100-400 f5.6 max), as well as those professional lenses that I mentioned, to provide a true lighter weight alternative to FF and APS-C DSLR'S. Don't forget. .... larger format mirrorless cameras are coming - it's just a matter of time too ....
Chosun :gh:
Chosun Juan
Given to Fly
Yep, I would agree with this. Both 1200mm+ and fast apertures are needed to capture the little geewhizzits!
Chosun :gh:
I think we are both agreeing that it is close to the best now; which means it matches or is competitive with the performance of the average DSLR.
Phil Bishop
Well-known member
Unfortunately a 600mm F4 is still going to have the same amount of heavy glass in it-the objective lenses are still going to be 150mm in diameter and 20-40mm thick. The length will not change significantly either, the best you could hope for is a slight reduction due to the shorter flange depth.
Diffractive optics will help, and will save a bit of weight, though there are drawbacks with them-presumably why Canon and Nikon arent using them in the big lenses.
Chosun Juan
Given to Fly
Yes, with a standard refractive design, the changes would be incremental in nature, but still very worthwhile.
The current measurements for the big FF 600f4's are:
Canon: 3.92kg, 449mm L
Nikon: 3.81kg, 432mm L
Canon has already flagged further reductions in weight are coming for its L series super telephotos .... down to what weight, and how - there are no details of.
With the reduced image circle required, shorter flange focal distance as you mentioned, as well as the smaller flange diameter, as well as throwing all the tricks in the book at it, such as thin lens technology, aspherical, and fluorite lenses, a purpose designed MFT super telephoto should be able to come in at under 3.5kg and <400mm. The use of carbon fibre in the body should reduce that further - to somewhere down to approaching 3kg. Those are pretty useful reductions and improvements to handling.
The use of diffractive optics designs could bring even further reductions - say <2kg for a 400f4 DO and ~2.7kg or less for the 600f4 DO. That would be awesome - fairly expensive - but awesome!
Nikon always seems to lag behind on lenses, but Canon is due to debut a new FF 600mm f4 DO lens in the near future - see this thread on it here: http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=317888
I think with these larger 'pro' lenses though, that a larger, more suitably ergonomic hand/battery grip is required for the bodies to balance the handling out.
Surely a market exists - not everyone wants to lug ~5.5kg of FF gear around + tripod. A MFT system weight of under 3.6kg would be most welcome. :t:
Chosun :gh:
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