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5x25 Visionking and Foton compared (1 Viewer)

B

Binastro

Well-known member
Visionking took 16 days to customs plus 6 days, so 22 days total.
Unfortunately a small customs charge plus handling fee was levied.

Pleasantly surprised.
Visionking seems aligned on first look.
Mostly multicoated surfaces but some very bright white uncoated surfaces.

Has optical window and objectives move to focus behind optical window.

Approximately 5.0x, which surprised me.
FOV possibly 13.5 to 14 degrees compared to Foton 12.2 degrees.

White pillars much whiter in Visionking.
Some pincushion distortion near edge.
Near edge there is prism squaring off.

The Foton seems sharper but will try further. The Foton is a very sharp binocular.

Although package marked 800g it was in fact 1002g as delivered.

Visionking is heavier than Foton.

Exit pupils of both look similar.

The Visionking is a serious wide angle binocular, but further testing after initial trial may reveal more.
 
Definitely would like to hear more about the Visionking Binastro. It has been on my radar for some time and I have a bit of a soft spot for low mag/wide angle binoculars....especially at that price.
 
Hi Frank.
When I opened the parcel the binocular did not mist up like binoculars do in winter.

Packing was quite good, but I feared it would be knocked out of alignment but seems O.K.

There are some reflections from prisms at big angles, but must try at night.

Marked Multicoated 5x25 Field 15.8 degrees Super Wide Angle.
They don't seem to have gone for the Bushnell tactic of overstating magnification by 15% on their Xtrawide binoculars.
However, I doubt that the 15.8 degrees is genuine.

The Dowling and Rowe 4x22 is also a genuine 4x and not 3.5x as in the Bushnell 4x21/4x30 Xtrawide.

More to follow, as a bit tired now.
 
The Visionking is clean inside

The Visionking prisms seem to be too small for the whole field, and at some angles, some direct light might get to the eye?

With tethered front caps the Visionking weighs 543g.
With strap the Foton weighs 459g.
I couldn't be bothered taking caps and strap off, so not the same, but the Visionking is about 18% heavier than the Foton.
The Visionking is also bulkier.
The Visionking is rubber armoured, the Foton leather covered.

The Visionking does not snap into sharp focus, maybe because of some stiction or backlash. I must try to see if this is so.
I am very sensitive to focus. Someone, maybe most, who are less sensitive and have more accommodation might not notice this.
Also the edge performance is poor.

Pincushion distortion is mild considering the field size.
 
The eye relief of the Visionking is more than with the Foton.
The Visionking has twist up eyecups.
Dioptre adjustment on the right eyepiece, not accurately set for zero.
The Foton has short rubber eyecups.

I didn't notice any false colour with the Visionking, but will check.

The close focus seems quite long, but a lot of depth of field.
It may be that the focus is slow, not being internal, which may be why it doesn't snap into focus.

Looking at street light.
Both the Visionking and Foton are very similar.
With the street light in the field there are a few faint ghosts with either binocular, but rather good.
With the street light outside the field there are several bright ghost images produced by the light at odd positions when moving either binocular around.

I would say both are 6/10.
I have seen a lot worse.

The Visionking may be slightly brighter than the Foton with slightly better transmission.
 
Near the field edge the Visionking has a lot of angular magnification distortion, probably due to the wide angle eyepieces.
The sky is not clear, so can't do star tests.

We had spectacular lightning storms two days ago and a lot of heavy rain yesterday. Today quieter but mainly clouds.
 
The sky cleared around midnight last night and I was able to view the Moon one day past full.
The angular magnification distortion is not as severe as I thought near the field edge.

The field is quite heavily curved plus some other aberrations, but one can refocus and get fairly clear images nearing the field edge.

The Foton is very sharp and shows excellent detail on the Moon.
The Visionking image is soft and much less detail is shown.
Basically this is why it doesn't snap into focus. The optics are rather poor, maybe because of sample variation.
Clearly it would be better if this binocular was sold in a store and one could try six or at least three and buy the best one.
This for me is typical of Chinese products. There is usually something missing regarding quality.
The Visionking has good coatings, quite good transmission and a clean white image of white objects, but the resolution is poor.
Probably the glass blanks are not ground. Although this may work in perhaps a Nikon Aculon, it doesn't work here.
The Foton is, I think, traditionally made and has superb resolution.
 
Looking centrally through the Visionking I can see with my side vision at least two and possibly four edges of undersized prisms with vignetting past the edges.
I am not sure if I have seen this before in a binocular. I must try an EWA old Porroprism binocular.

The Foton has little angular magnification distortion, but surprisingly the Foton has considerably more pincushion distortion than the Visionking, despite the larger field of the Visionking.

Both binoculars have no CA centrally that I have seen, although some false colour near the field edge.

The curved field of the Visionking can be used to see close objects without having to refocus, by just moving the object in the field.
 
The left optic of this example of the Visionking 5x25 is better than the right.
Possibly of acceptable quality.

At least this indicates that one may get a reasonably good binocular if one can test several.
 
The Visionking 5x25 can be used with glasses, at least my ones, if the eyecups are fully turned down and if the binocular eyecups are pushed against the surface of the glasses.
The whole field can be seen.

With the latest glasses, only one month old and current prescription, the view is interesting. They are computed for 70cm distance and are quite strong.
What results is, I think, a 6x25 binocular with a 14 degree field. With the extra magnification and good correction, more detail is seen. The left eye seems to do most of the work, with the poor right binocular optic taking a secondary role.
However, I am not used to wearing glasses with a binocular and there is some eye strain. Also I can only just take in the whole wide field without moving my eyes around. In addition, I am not sure how good the glasses are with dealing with off axis rays.
I suppose I could get used to the view with these glasses, but I don't like pushing the binocular against the glasses to see the whole wide field.

It is a pity that the right optic is poor and the left optic only just acceptable.
Initially, I thought it might be my eyes that were causing the soft images with poor detail. But using the Foton 5x25 with superb detail showed that it is the Visionking at fault.

I cannot be bothered with perhaps buying three Visionkings and hoping one will be good.
 
I was able to test the Visionking and Foton 5x25 on the planet Venus in a good clear sky. Also the Russian 6x24 Porroprism binocular. Unfortunately I only had about two minuted before Venus went below a roofline.
There was no obvious reason for the poor resolution in the Visionking.
It may be just that the optics, particularly in the right barrel are poorly made and give soft images, or even that the optical windows are very poor.

In daylight the Foton is dim compared to the Visionking and the Foton probably has a yellowish cast. But the Foton has excellent resolution. It is a very sharp binocular.

The Russian 6x24 is almost as bright as the Visionking 5x25. White pillars are not as white in the 6x24 as in the Visionking.
The resolution of the 6x24 is very good. A very nice binocular, although at night it has lots of ghost images from a streetlight. Field about 11.5 degrees.

I also tested a Celestron 6x30 monocular, which is quite bright but difficult to hold steady. It probably has a field of 9.5 degrees rather than the 10.5 degrees claimed.
 
Summary.

I was able to star test the Visionking 5x25 on a bright star.
Although there were slight irregularities in the out of focus star, there was no serious astigmatism or anything to account for the poor resolution in the right optic.
I think that the surface curves of the elements are poor, or the glass material is somehow faulty, maybe striations or imperfect mix.
I am no stranger to poor optics, but thankfully some optics are good or excellent.

The poor resolution shown in this sample is not acceptable in any binocular regardless of cost.

Hopefully, there are some examples of this binocular with good or at least acceptable quality.

If it had good optics then this binocular would be most useful.

It has a bright image, quite good transmission, very wide field, no colour cast and would be generally useful.

But a low power binocular such as a 5x needs very good optics as the eyes are trying to make out detail with little help from magnification.

This can be done.
The 4x21 and 5x25 Bushnell Xtrawide samples have good optics.
The 5x25 Foton and 6x24 Russian Porroprism binocular have excellent optics.

It would be better if a good importer distributed the Visionking 5x25s. This would probably result in better quality control and the possibility of trying several and buying the best one.
As it is, it is pot luck as to whether the Visionking 5x25 delivered will be of acceptable quality or not.
 
This morning at 3 a.m. the sky was clear and I looked for noctilucent clouds but didn't see any. No luck this season so far.

This was the first opportunity to measure the field of the Visionking 5x25.
My first estimate using star separation is 14.15 degrees.
However, the angle was difficult, but screwing the eyecups fully down helped.
Severe light pollution.
I hope to refine the measure.

Sweeping the sky for stars means that the poor resolution of the right optic is not a problem, as my night vision resolution is not good for this task.
The large field is useful for seeking bright comets or tracking down Mercury.
So the binocular is genuinely useful for astronomy if resolution, say, of the moon is not needed.
 
On two recent nights I was able to make field size measurements of the 5x25 Visionking.

First night.
Fixed eye, one barrel 14.8 degrees.

Moving eye around the field, each barrel 15.25 degrees.

Both barrels moving eyes around 15.53 degrees. It may be the IPD was slightly incorrect, which also increases the field size.

So the binocular does have a large field.
I had the eyecups collapsed, which isn't my normal position without glasses. But this allowed me to move my eyes away from the axes to increase the field visible, but not at one time.

Second night.
15.2 degrees right barrel, fixed eye.

I am still not satisfied with the results as I haven't found the correct bright stars at the correct elevation and the correct separation.

But the field size is around 15 degrees.
With stars the poor resolution of the right barrel does not seem to matter.
 
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Try found another models, simply compact 4x-5x bino with 5mm (or more) exit pupil and high quality image, and found only this 5x25 Visionking ( extra wide, not very image quality), Bushnell xtra wide 4x30 ( extra wide and fixed focus, not good image quality).
And Pentax VD 4x20 - nice , but price is much higher.
May be, other brands make compact 4x-5x models ?
 
Dowling and Rowe 4x22 both independent focus or fixed focus models.
I use this and like it.

Also maybe called Lyra from memory in The Netherlands.
Also 6x30 same basic model with longer tubes.

Bushnell 5x25 Xtrawide actually about 4.4x24.
This is quite good.

The Foton 5x25 I have has exceptional optics.
The objectives are actually 30mm aperture but exit pupil is 5mm.

There are old ex. gov. binoculars maybe 5x40? Huge, uncoated.
Maybe Ross.

Regards,
B.

P.S.

Faulty memory.
Libra 4x22
Kasai 4x22
Super View 4x22.
All the same roof prism binoculars.
 
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