What are you looking at?

[Alex Vasile]

Picked up an old (and beaten up) 500mm f8 reflex lens but the weather (and the birds) have not been cooperating for a while; it's been a lot of really high iso noisy images that were just a tad out of focus. Finally managed to edit a batch and get them to somewhere that I'm happy with the technical aspects.

I like the funkiness of the bokeh, butI foresee it being a challenge to not have it be very distracting.

Colors and such adjusted to taste.

Let me know what you think.

 

[AlanLichty]

Nice portrait of the robin. That is an unusual bokeh - almost a double image. Do you have to do manual focusing?

 

[Alex Vasile]

Nice portrait of the robin. That is an unusual bokeh - almost a double image. Do you have to do manual focusing?

Yes it is. Because of the mirror in the middle of the lens, the bokeh balls are actually bokeh donuts.

And yes, it’s all manual focus, which is a little tricky on moving subjects at 500mm… but it was also $50, so I can’t expect that much from it. At least the focus is smooth and the focus throw is very very long.

 

[JimFox]

Hey Alex,

What a cool looking Robin. I will say you are a better man then me to manual focus on a bird! That's some good work. I think I have gotten too spoiled with Autofocus. But I do think there is something cool about old lenses.

Good job with this.

 

[AlanLichty]

Manual focus out in that range is almost hit and miss. I have a Canon EF100-400 lens I love dearly and bought a 2x tele extender thinking this game me a great long reach combo for wildlife. Turns out that tele extender kills autofocus so I have 400-800mm with manual focus. Most birds are gone by the time I am ready to shoot

 

[KevinA]

Picked up an old (and beaten up) 500mm f8 reflex lens but the weather (and the birds) have not been cooperating for a while; it's been a lot of really high iso noisy images that were just a tad out of focus. Finally managed to edit a batch and get them to somewhere that I'm happy with the technical aspects.

I like the funkiness of the bokeh, butI foresee it being a challenge to not have it be very distracting.

Colors and such adjusted to taste.

Let me know what you think.

For $50 you can't go wrong. Is this uncropped? Subject looks sharp and I'd put up with the bokeh, it's not too bad. Personally I don't like subjects slap bang in the centre of the image but prefer them on a thirds line, but cropping can solve that.

Manual focus out in that range is almost hit and miss. I have a Canon EF100-400 lens I love dearly and bought a 2x tele extender thinking this game me a great long reach combo for wildlife. Turns out that tele extender kills autofocus so I have 400-800mm with manual focus. Most birds are gone by the time I am ready to shoot

Alan, did you try taping some of the pins on the extender to stop the lens reporting? It's sometimes possible to get autofocus this way in good light. Google it.

 

[AlanLichty]

Alan, did you try taping some of the pins on the extender to stop the lens reporting? It's sometimes possible to get autofocus this way in good light. Google it.

Interesting - first time I have heard of that. I will play around. Thnx.

 

[Alex Vasile]

Manual focus out in that range is almost hit and miss. I have a Canon EF100-400 lens I love dearly and bought a 2x tele extender thinking this game me a great long reach combo for wildlife. Turns out that tele extender kills autofocus so I have 400-800mm with manual focus. Most birds are gone by the time I am ready to shoot

I don’t have experience with that lens, but I have a 70-300 which has an ultrasonic motor and I dispise the manual focusing experience with that. There’s a bit of give in the focus ring, so I need to turn it 1-2 degrees before it engages and actually moves focus. This one at least is only manual and immediately responds. But yes, very difficult, I usually have to make a guess and zone focus as I raise the viewfinder up to my eye.

 

[Alex Vasile]

For $50 you can't go wrong. Is this uncropped? Subject looks sharp and I'd put up with the bokeh, it's not too bad. Personally I don't like subjects slap bang in the centre of the image but prefer them on a thirds line, but cropping can solve that.

Alan, did you try taping some of the pins on the extender to stop the lens reporting? It's sometimes possible to get autofocus this way in good light. Google it.

I had to sharpen it up a bit, since I’m pretty sure the image is slightly front focused.

Yes it’s uncropped. I’ll give the crop a try and see how it looks.