Kowa 820M Scope & Dimage 5 Camera (1 Viewer)

I need some help.

I have a Kowa 82mm 20-60 x Spotting Scope, a Minolta Dimage 5 Digital camera and the appropriate adapters for attaching the camera to the scope. The problem is that all I get is a large vignette around a small image (10 mm). The image I do see is fuzzy and very milky in the center as though there was condensation on one of the lenses. However, this is not the case. The edges of the image are almost in focus. What am I doing wrong? Any suggestions will be most appreciated.


John T.

Stuart, Oklahoma

Hi John,

On behalf of Admin and the Moderators, welcome to Bird Forum :t:

You've certainly come to the right place to pose your question. I'm no expert in such matters but I suspect you may struggle on two counts. Firstly whilst the Kowa 820 is a superb scope for viewing with, it has standard glass elements rather than the higher grade Fluorite of the 823/824. For stright forward viewing with the scope - for which it was designed of course it's not always easy to tell the difference compared to a fluoride one. However when it comes down to digiscoping the higher quality glass definitely gives higher class results.

The second issue is the camera. Again a very good camera, but I suspect it's one with a lens diameter a bit too wide for the scope eyepiece hence the vignetting. I have an Olympus C2100UZ which has a 49mm lens thread. I can fit it on my scope via my adapter, but I have to zoom to around 8x to get rid of the vignetting, but that's way too much for the scope optics and even on a fluorite scope the images are very soft and muddy just as you describe. If that was the only issue then I'd suggest checking out the new EagleEye UK digiscoping adapter, designed for video cameras and still cameras of wider lens diameters. I think it's around 12x zoom and is claimed to redress this vignetting problem, though I haven't tried it myself - but I may one day as I like the idea of it.

Of course another issue in all case of digiscoping is how you had the camera up to the scope. Using an adapter and a very firm tripod is a must as even breathing I find introduces movement.

I'm sure some other members will have thoughts on this.