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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kevin Purcell" data-source="post: 1483529" data-attributes="member: 68323">It's a consequence of the design and I suspect they way optics designers at a "camera company" designs a bnocular (as camera lenses need flat fields much more than bins though in this case I think it's the IS that needs it otherwise the field will do the hula as a IS moves around).So that field flattener gives a smaller DoF and leads to a more photograph-like "bokeh".It can be an advantage (as you point out you  loose forground and background branches at the cost of contrast) but very close in (where the absolute DOF gets rather small) it can be more of a problem. But then again I can see the argument being made that these are high magnification bins (10x and up)whose primary use it not for close birding. It would seem that only the 10x42 with an 8 feet close focus might actually show this sort of problem with a bird down the line of sight with it's beak in focus but tail out of focus. Another reminder that all bins are compromises.That said I've been using my 10x30 more and more for birding. And I'm impressed. I even find the small exit pupil to be less of an issue than I'd suspected (though it's certainly smaller than I'd like). Eye placement is a bit more critical than I like but the view is very nice. And the grip on the bins is so good so I find I can hold 10x much more steady and my couple of 10x porros and even more steady than my token 10x roof.In fact this has made me reexamine compact 10x32 bins in general whereas previously I'd seen them as "too shakey with a tiny exit pupil" and so not very useful now I'm not so sure.But of course chasing a passerine (a warbler or vireo) in the canopy, pressing the IS button and actually concentrating on the tiny field marks (light lores or spectacles?) is quite a revelation. It really does take the bins out of consideration: more like looking at a slowly drifting picture of the bird.I think I've joined the cult <img src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7" class="smilie smilie--sprite smilie--sprite2" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)" loading="lazy" data-shortname=";)" /></blockquote>

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