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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

The Binocular Journal (1 Viewer)

Troubador said:
Well, even I, who heartily dislikes the shape of porros in the hand, have to say that the leatherette-covered Habicht 7x42 is one handsome bino.

Lee
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Well, just as roofs, not all porro's are made equal. A porro with rounded shoulders melts perfectly in the palms of your hands, like the round shoulders of a slender lady... :smoke:

The Habichts I find a bit akward (they don't have round shoulders and are too skinny for me), the E2 is good, the SE very good and the Opticron HR WP is perfect for my hands.

George
 
14Goudvink said:
Well, just as roofs, not all porro's are made equal. A porro with rounded shoulders melts perfectly in the palms of your hands, like the round shoulders of a slender lady... :smoke:

The Habichts I find a bit akward (they don't have round shoulders and are too skinny for me), the E2 is good, the SE very good and the Opticron HR WP is perfect for my hands.

George
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An excellent point George and I will look out for slender ladies at the next Bird Fair!

And if Nikon ever bring EII or SE I will certainly try them too.

Lee
 
black crow said:
I think I've talked binos in most all of my posts in this thread outside of long promised pics. The idea is to have a combination of both and I'm planning on sticking to that. So I'm about to head out with EII porro as the sun has returned and no more rain for days ahead. I've got all four dogs with me today. I'm still torn between staying satisfied with the EII for now or buying myself a Swaro Habicht for my birthday in a few days. I'm more satisfied with the EII than any binocular I've owned yet I crave something better. This cannot be psychologically healthy.:eek!:
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Consider yourself blessed that you've founds bins that fit your needs and preferences so well, so early in your binocular carreer.

If you're looking for bins with all the good qualities of the E2 and then some more, I can assure you you won't find them, because they don't exist. Other bins will always be different, with their own strong points and weaknesses.


George

Who spent a lot of time, energy and money before settling on E2s
 
I'm rapidly becoming convinced you are correct. It's sad in a way. I so loved the hunt. I'd have to start spending two or three grand now to make serious improvements. At least I think that's true from comparing the EII with $2000 to $2600 binoculars. I'm just not willing to spend that kind of money at this time. Plus once you fall in love with these beautiful porros you form a nice attachment to the style. I think they are beautiful and unique and yet can fill the same areas that the compact roofs have carved out for themselves. They are small,lightweight and ergonomically great handling. This is what I looked for in a roof. The lack of waterproofing is their one drawback and the Swarovski Habicht series has that waterproofing along with amazing optics. We must start a porro revolution8-P if we are to convince the top optics makers to take them seriously and improve on them.
 
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black crow said:
I'm rapidly becoming convinced you are correct. It's sad in a way. I so loved the hunt. I'd have to start spending two or three grand now to make serious improvements. At least I think that's true from comparing the EII with $2000 to $2600 binoculars. I'm just not willing to spend that kind of money at this time. Plus once you fall in love with these beautiful porros you form a nice attachment to the style. I think they are beautiful and unique and yet can fill the same areas that the compact roofs have carved out for themselves. They are small,lightweight and ergonomically great handling. This is what I looked for in a roof. The lack of waterproofing is their one drawback and the Swarovski Habicht series has that waterproofing along with amazing optics. We must start a porro revolution8-P if we are to convince the top optics makers to take them seriously and improve on them.
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You needn't give up on the hunt BC. Different binos carry different flavours, different balances of capabilities as well as feeling different in the hands and delivering differing images to the eyes. I am less confident in the idea of the ideal bino today than 10 years ago any more than the concept of the perfect dinner. Much better to try out a range of flavours and enjoy more than one.

Lee
 
Well I have other interests that I want to pursue with my finances. My goal in returning to Birdforum in part was to find some better optics. I've actually done much better than I had hoped or expected. I have 4 new binoculars of which 2 are just what I wanted (Nikon EII) , one is very close (Kowa Genesis) and one (the Meopro) is going to be sold off. I don't plan on stopping posting and bugging everyone but I do really think I have what I want to be using day to day for a long time into the future with one possible exception and that is the Swarovski Habicht.

I'm sure there is still a world of wonderful optics out there but I'm going to leave it to others for now. I felt the pull of that buying addiction and I don't want to get drawn too far into that. I just want some great optics for looking at this weird reality. My next optic purchase is likely to be a good microscope. I'm still a kid at heart and I want to look at pond water again. It's been about 55 years since I looked at some pond creatures under glass.
 
I concur, I got a reasonable stereo microscope for looking at small stuff, made an adapter to connect my phone to get pictures from it.
I would add one final bin before you close the list... Pentax papilio... the binocular “microscope”.... can focus to 50cm! I spent some time this evening looking close up at a large bee in the garden digging for pollen, unaware that I was looking at him. Not pondwater, but interesting never the less and didn’t need a long journey to get to either. There’s lots of cool stuff that optics opens the doors to!

Peter




black crow said:
Well I have other interests that I want to pursue with my finances. My goal in returning to Birdforum in part was to find some better optics. I've actually done much better than I had hoped or expected. I have 4 new binoculars of which 2 are just what I wanted (Nikon EII) , one is very close (Kowa Genesis) and one (the Meopro) is going to be sold off. I don't plan on stopping posting and bugging everyone but I do really think I have what I want to be using day to day for a long time into the future with one possible exception and that is the Swarovski Habicht.

I'm sure there is still a world of wonderful optics out there but I'm going to leave it to others for now. I felt the pull of that buying addiction and I don't want to get drawn too far into that. I just want some great optics for looking at this weird reality. My next optic purchase is likely to be a good microscope. I'm still a kid at heart and I want to look at pond water again. It's been about 55 years since I looked at some pond creatures under glass.
Click to expand...
 
Troubador said:
No I have never seen EII or SE as Nikon doesn't bring these to Bird Fair.

Lee
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The Nikon stand did have a 100th Anniversary edition of the 8x30 EII locked away with the WX, and it was this they kindly brought out for me - for which I remain very grateful. I just wish I had been as impressed by the binocular itself, but for reasons I've already mentioned, wasn't. I would very much like to look through another pair though - just in case the one I tried might have been some kind of lemon. Generally speaking I do like those classic 8x30 porros. I'd like to look through the EII's predecessors - the A and original E series - it would be very interesting to see how they compare with the equivalent Zeiss West and Jenoptem I'm familiar with.
 
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wllmspd said:
I concur, I got a reasonable stereo microscope for looking at small stuff, made an adapter to connect my phone to get pictures from it.
I would add one final bin before you close the list... Pentax papilio... the binocular “microscope”.... can focus to 50cm! I spent some time this evening looking close up at a large bee in the garden digging for pollen, unaware that I was looking at him. Not pondwater, but interesting never the less and didn’t need a long journey to get to either. There’s lots of cool stuff that optics opens the doors to!

Peter
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YES I have the 6x5 Papilio. It's one binocular I will never sell or be without.
 
I just had these new EII 10x35 out for a look on a beautiful bright late afternoon. I've never seen more beautiful or sharper images anywhere. I think they outperform my Swarovski 8x50s at 1/4 the price. Maybe it's the day and maybe I got the perfect sample but I've just never seen anything better anywhere even after looking at the Zeiss Victory. I could not be happier about this find. Total WOW!
 
black crow said:
I just had these new EII 10x35 out for a look on a beautiful bright late afternoon. I've never seen more beautiful or sharper images anywhere. I think they outperform my Swarovski 8x50s at 1/4 the price. Maybe it's the day and maybe I got the perfect sample but I've just never seen anything better anywhere even after looking at the Zeiss Victory. I could not be happier about this find. Total WOW!
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Another great find, BC! After all the questions, answers, study and learning, believe you have the 1-2 punch you always wanted in your optical arsenal. It appears all the glassing goals you've stated these past few weeks you've achieved in the EII 8X30 and 10X35...Congratulations!! :t:

Ted
 
Thanks Ted, I do feel kind of like a big winner. I've stumbled my way through a lot of searching and best guessing and I think I hit the jackpot. I came very close to never considering the EII because it was a porro. If not for encouragement from BSW and Bill I would have never likely taken the plunge. I could have easily walked right on by thinking I'd looked in every corner. Makes one wonder about how many things in our lives just slip through our fingers without our ever knowing it due to our biases.
 
Stellar binocular and birding day. Spent the afternoon at the creek at my friends house and birds were abundant. I got to test my EII 10x30 against her brand new Zeiss Victory FL 10x42. It was a perfect test day with mixed sun and white clouds with lots of sun and and shaded areas to test a binocular. We saw American Goldfinch, White crowned sparrows, Yellow rumped warblers, Black throated gray warblers, Orange crowned warblers, and several crows bathing in the creek. Lots of nice little rapids in the sun to look at and just a totally beautiful day to just be outside looking at the action. Nice to just sit on a bench and soak in the sun with the four dogs hanging about.

The Zeiss Victory SF 10x is one amazing binocular. I can't say enough good things about it. I can say the same for the EII. In fact we agreed that center sharpness is a tie or very close. Actually we both slightly preferred the EIIs 3D effect. Hard to believe that in a binocular costing about 1/5 th of the Zeiss. And in full light there really was not a lot of difference in brightness. The Zeiss were much better out at the edge and with that beautifully smooth focuser it's a true pleasure to use. As the day wore on towards early evening and clouds rolled in the Zeiss performed better than the EII which is to be expected. She has decided to keep both the 8x and the 10x and I will have my porro 8x and 10x . We are both totally pleased with what we have. That's a nice feeling. No one feels like they have a lot less than the other.
 
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Yes the SF. Briefly, what are the main differences in the SF, FL, and HT? I've heard the HT are their brightest but don't know much beyond that.
 
BC
HT is a tuned-up FL with high transmission glass giving what it says on the tin plus a bit more red and a bit more blue in the colour balance as well as handling that is almost like a open bridge. For me its handling was a step forward from FL and others have praised it for its 'transparancy of view'. It was designed with low-light situations in mind. HT has two bridges with the focus wheel between them.

SF was designed to have a much wider fov (148m vs 136m for 8x and 120m vs 110m for 10x), have a mild-ish field flattener and a radically changed point of balance by deleting one of the objective lenses and getting the focusing lens to help out. This put the balance point back to nearer the eyes and if you grasp the optical tubes by your three fingers your first finger falls on the focus wheel and the weight feels much less. SF has two bridges with the focus wheel between them plus a third bridge down by the objectives.

It was discovered later that a combination of certain within-tolerance focus components created a pattern of stiff points in the focus travel in some units so this was remedied later in the life of the grey SFs and this improved focus was carried forward to the black SFs.

Lee
 
Thanks. I think the SF is ideal for her because she has the Swaro 8x50 for low light situations which are going to be mostly in her yard and so close range where an 8x will work fine. The rest of the time she'll appreciate the larger FOV.
 
I had a treat today on my hike. Full sun and upper 70s so just a tee shirt and bino harness and light pants. I was up on this trail called "Fell on Knee" at about 5500 ft and the dogs and I had stopped for a bite. We heard a noise loud enough to make the dogs bark. I thought it was either a deer or bear or lion or a fallen branch. When the dogs got quiet I figured it was likely a branch but I kept my ears open. Soon I heard a loud hammering. I then suspected a Pileated Woodpecker. I searched on all the snags in vain and I could not quite pinpoint the hammering but it was close. Just when I was about to give it up and move on I scanned at about ground level and there he was about 8 or 10 ft up a young pine about 75 feet away from us. I had the new 10x35 EII and got a stunning view of him boring a sap hole in a live tree. I held the binos on him until my arms got tired. It looked like he was picking off some insects attracted to that sap flowing. I rarely if ever see one that close up and in a 10x it was especially great.

Now I'm off to an ice cream and pizza feast. Ya'll have a great day.
 
It's that homemaking season. Yesterday I heard then saw a flicker at work about 20 ft above the path I was on, far enough along to be leaning well into the hole to finish the interior. Now that's a lot of work. Wouldn't want to do it more than once a year, if that. (Pro forma bino credit: my usual 10x32 UV. I'm so used to that format it's second nature.)
 
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