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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Kevin Purcell" data-source="post: 1269642" data-attributes="member: 68323">Day 2 part 2Leupold Yosemite 6x30Easy bins to get out of the case. Even the objective covers stay on this time. Outside it's clear these are brighter than the other bins. Views of ornamental flowers are bright and colorful with nice detail on the petals. Full field of view is easily visible. No KB blackouts when I rotate my eyes. Doesn't feel tunnel-like to me (perhaps because of the biggish FOV) even though the AFOV is clearly narrower than the other bins. Nice weight too at 17oz. Not too heavy. But no shake noticeable - the x6 and 17oz gives a steady image for me. I found the close focus (with my eyeglasses) was around three meters (10 feet) or so. Grip is very pleasant with thumbs kept apart, unlike the roofs. Viewing crows in the trees opposite (25m) against a blue sky with some hight cloud I didn't see any obvious CA around the birds. They seem both brighter than the Hurricanes and have more contrast. A little bit of "rolling globe" effect on panning but not a great deal. The  image seems quite flat.Celstron Ultima DX 8x32Easiest to get out of the roomy case. Very, very stiff center hinge. Views of ornamental flowers are bright (but not quite as bright as the Yosemite), colorful and sharpest of the bins with very nice detail on the petals. Much bigger AFOV than the other bins but I can't quite see the edges. The DX feels more like "I'm in the picture" with a bit of "This seems bigger". I was doubting this was x8 when comparing the other bins. So I suspect both bigger AFOV and better sharpness play a role in this. Some field curvature noticeable as you rack the focus in and out. Plus distortion in the outer part of the FOV. This is particularly noticeable with a "rolling ball" effect when panning. It is the worst of the four bins for this.The focus rate is rather very slow and so feels rather without "snap". And is made to seem slower (though I only realized this the next day) because the focus "direction" is reversed from the three other bins: turn focus clockwise to get to infinity.Viewing crows in the tree tops against a blue sky I didn't see any blatant CA around the birds.Grip is comfortable even though the bin is rather heavy. But the balance is good. And the finger and thumb placement works well. I suspect I like grip on porros better than I do on roofs.Vortex Diamondback 8x42Fancy case is a bit fiddley to open and extract the bins. Design looks nice but it seems less practical than a top-loading Cordura case. Objectve covers stay tether through the process though.The bins come across as big, solid but not too heavy.Views of ornamental flowers are bright and sharp but not as bright as the porros and not as sharp either but still very good. Center is FOV is sharp but with some softening to the edges but edge of FOV is sharper than he edge of FOV in the DX.  Focus action is fluid and the rate is fast enough (slower than the Hurricane but faster than the DX). Images come quickly and clearly into focus (more of a snap than the DX).I can see not quite the full FOV with glasses on but AFOV is big (though not quite as big as the DX). AFOV is bigger in the Diamondback's than the Hurricanes.When panning I don't see any hint of a rolling ball effect. Even less so than the Yosemite's.Viewing crows in the trees against a blue sky here is some small amount of CA but less than the Hurricanes. They seem both brighter than the Hurricanes and have more contrast too. Rather less of the "looking at a picture feel" but not quite a "real" as the DX. Curiously the smaller Hurricane seemed "more colorful" in a artificial way I can't put my finger on. Grips is a big roof prism grip with my thumbs colliding again. Not used to the roof grip but eventually I learn to move the thumbs so they don't collide with an asymmetric grip.Ranking for a variety of tests coming up ...</blockquote>

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