For those who could care less about super zooms, consider looking at the
pretty pictures anyway. A few are among my favorites, comments welcome
<http://www.moosemystic.net/Gallery/MPhotos/TamSharp/>.
Andrew Fildes wrote:
>Convenience, right? Trouble is that they do not perform that well (as
>yet), they're slow, they're expensive (relatively) and they're large.
>As for using them quickly (no time for changes) - that's also fraught
>with problems as camera settings for long tele are often quite
>different so jumping from say 30mm to full stretch should usually
>necessitate some adjustments anyway. A mode to S mode and upping the
>ISO for instance.
>
>
You got me to thinking and checking more closely my 10.7x zoom.
I've already addressed the secondary point about speed in another reply.
I guess "expensive" is a rubbery thing. I thought under $400 was a
pretty decent price, and still do, for what I got.
Large? Well, 28-300/3.5-6.3 is 73mm in dia. and takes 62mm filters. At
the wide end, it's 84mm long. I'll admit 300mm requires some length,
165mm, but it can make one feel very manly. :-) It is lighter and
smaller than their older 28-200 IF that I have for the OMs. It's a
little fatter, the same length and weighs less than the Zuiko
35-105/3.5-4.5. Not much bigger and about the same weight as the
35-70/3.6. Oh, and it close focuses to 1:2.9.
I haven't had the problems you have had with going from one end of the
zoom range to the other. Different strokes. Also, of course, I own mine
and use it all the time, so I'm used to it. Sort of like your reaction
to some of the carps in the dpreview preview of the E-330 that you found
not to be issues.
Now to the nitty gritty. I went through and selected shots covering the
whole zoom range and with detail in all four corners. Not as easy a task
as I might have thought, lots of shots with sky in the top. Not a
perfect group of samples, as there is often detail in the corners that
is at a far different distance, and so fuzzy from DOF - some decent
bokeh, though, nothing ugly.
- Bridge has some OOF close stuff in the lower left corner, but you can
see through it.
- Leaves-28 has a tree in the upper left, so the sample is in a bit.
Even then, DOF rules that corner.
- River has the same problem, but in the lower right.
- Trees has it worse, because it's less obvious. There is a tree branch
in the upper left that's so close that it can't really be distinguished,
but makes the far corner look very fuzzy. My sample is in and down some,
but its upper left corner is still affected. The dark line bisecting the
lower right sample is probably a shadow from a flagpole.
Taxi is a ringer. It's in there to illustrate a problem I see all the
time in samples posted to forums alleging to show lens performance. The
corners are all rather fuzzy - because they are 20' closer to the camera
than the center. Of course, I used selective selective focus and proper
f-stop to get everything pretty much in focus, but at full pixel, the
corners are fuzzy. OK, it's also there 'cause I like it. :-)
Anyway, I think these are good samples, taken in the ordinary course of
travel by a technically half-decent photog, without any special
treatment, hand held with a selection of focal lengths, light, subject
distance, etc.
My reading is that this lens is sharp edge to edge over most of its
range, and gives away very little at 300mm. It might even be a little
weaker at 180mm, but with one hand held sample, I just don't know yet.
Of course, it is designed to cover 35mm, so I'm using the heart of the
coverage, but I don't think I should hold that against it, performance
for the use in hand is still performance.... And there's no reason that
somone designing for a smaller sensor can't do the same thing
At long last, my point brought forward from previous posts... The E-330
with 18-180, looks like a great travel combo, if the lens is good enough
- and I know it's possible to make a lens like that good enough. The
28-300 is eq. to 45-480 on the 300D and nowadays I carry a 19-35 to get
me down to 28mm eq. So the ZD would be a little less on both ends in one
lens.
Moose
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