Dear European Curmudgeon:
I think (nay, hope) you will agree we are all products of our experiences and environment. If so, then my time in optics allows me a different perspective than those who have had different careers. Elkcub has rattled my cage for being too preachy or braggadocio. But, that too, has had—based on experience—a valid and useful reason.
Everyone coming to a binoculars forum has an equal right to share their opinions. However, that does not mean all those opinions are equally accurate. My whole schtick is to provide—from experience—data that might help someone. Do I make mistakes? Yep. Do I mind being corrected when wrong? Absolutely not! It gives me better information to proffer my neighbor the next time the subject arises. I didn’t worship binoculars. I just used them to feed my family and put the kids through school.
The over the top behavior is used in an effort to get through to the one or two percent who MAY be listening and care. Sadly, most people believe ALL these forums are just chat sessions. And, if that’s what they believe ... that’s what they get. (see attachment)
Example: Over on Cloudy Nights a fellow stated that nobody had ever addressed a certain point about binocular collimation. I referenced 3 sources that would have answered his question. Not only that, I gave him my email address and invited him to contact me. Did he check any of the sources I offered? He did not. Did he call me as requested? He did not. Did he miss a beat in continuing to spread inaccurate information? What do you think?
In my previous post on BF, I was just trying to point out that so many revered “experts” ... aren’t—no more than a large number of members of this forum, some of whom you have already mentioned. As Lee points out, opinions from all quarters matter. But I’ve known some of these experts, been in their shops, and if I revealed all I know, I would be in court the rest of my life. In general, let me say that some still know nothing about binocular alignment and some of those who do, learned it through Cory or myself.
“No Brag; just fact.”— Walter Brennan, The Guns of Will Sonnett, 1967-1969
I will mention one example. Based on the success I was having at Captain’s in Seattle, the manager of Captain’s sister store in Portland hired a Navy Opticalman for his store. This “Opticalman” was a Corpsman who walked behind an F-14 Tomcat that was testing its engines and was blown— unceremoniously—off a flight deck, getting pretty banged up in the process.
Rather than lose a warm body, the Navy put a sword on his shoulder and said: “Thou art now an Opticalman.” So, what did this fellow know about optics? Does the term “ZERO” mean anything to you? Of course, the manager, not knowing anything about optics himself, hired him based on the rating he had when he left the Navy. A valid choice? He was a nice enough fellow; I liked him and spent hours teaching him what the Navy didn’t.
One day, while visiting the Portland store, I saw this fellow out in the pouring rain trying to collimate a sextant by looking at a flag atop a nearby bridge. When he came in, wet from head to toe, and leaned against his Mk 5 collimator to discuss his ordeal (At least it was warm. Portland can’t always get rain like that), I asked him why on earth he chose standing in the rain as opposed to using the collimator.
He replied:
“You mean you can use this thing for that?” ‘Nuff said.
Most of the things in binocular repair require little more than a few hand tools, manual dexterity, and a modicum of common sense. Other things require a knowledge of the operation of the particular instrument and the whys and wherefores of 3-axis collimation, none of which are currently revealed on the Internet. Good intentions never equal technical accuracy. The same is true of sales, as well. If the bar of understanding is going to be raised, the salesperson must know more than what’s on the side of the box.
Accurate or not, all opinions are useful to someone. But as long as I see articles, ostensibly written by people some see as experts, stating waterproof “just means rubber armored,” people confusing distortion with curvature of field, think aberrations can be corrected independently, collimation (Columnation, Colluation, Kolimation, Kolimation, Kullmination, etc.) error seen as the inability to “focus,” why the left side of their binocular CAN’T be focused, or calling Bk7 “BAK7” (which is not made by any leading glass company), please forgive me, but I am going to be leery of experts. I have seen way too much bad information put out by them. The main reason being too many people take the first piece of research they see and run with it.
“So, you have enemies? Good, that means you have stood up for something sometime in your life.” — Winston Churchill
I’ll end by asking for your forgiveness if not your indulgence. :cat:
Bill
Being a curmudgeon myself, I have to say that this was not my point.
If you look at the first post of this thread, I wasn‘t after „sharpness“ (pun not intended
) but instead after „reliable reviews and tests“ - of course, a big word!
These get usually written by people who
- know a thing or two about optics and the machine-human interface
- have quite a bit of experience
- know how to work and write systematically (or even scientifically).
Of course, there are many members here who fit that description. Nevertheless, most reviews I am reading on BF or CN (including those I have written myself!!!) are rather something like „user reports“, giving a more or less personal account of what was experienced with this or that binocular.
An then there are the more systematic reviews such as e.g. the current one on the Canon 10x32 here on BF by Henry Link, or others outside BF by people like Kimmo Absetz, or Holger Merlitz, or Gjis, or others who have unfortunately stopped writing reviews such as Ed Zarenski (to just name those that come spontaneously to my mind, but there are of course many others to which I apologize for not naming them here).
Please don‘t misunderstand me. I am not disqualifying the many nice and interesting user reports here on BF; I spend myself A LOT of time reading and enjoying those. It‘s just that from time to time, I like either a slightly more systematic analysis of what‘s going on, or an in-depth description of one or comparison of several binoculars.
And such write-ups are usually too big for a forum post, and therefore I was looking for websites where they are easily accessible (I will have to print out the many posts here from Henry on the Canon in order to have them as easily accessible as I like).
And I admit that I had to look up in the Collins what curmudgeon means ....:-O
Canip