Mass produced lens, longer than 500mm and faster than 2.8?

[CuriousOne]

Hello.

Considering the lens prices, I doubt I can afford any, but it is quite interesting, whenever such lens were/are manufactured? So far, by research I found only one - Soviet Uran-12 lens, 500mm/F2.5, which is relatively easy to obtain ($800-$1200), since was used in soviet movie theater equipment. It weights around 30kg and is quite huge, but specs aren't that impressive, center resolution is 17lpm or something that low. What about such non-soviet lens?

I know about Sigma 200-500/2.8 and 600/4 minolta, but I'm interested if there was something even longer and faster.

[ForenSeil]

Hmm there's an Leica 400 mm f/2.8 APO-Telyt-R, a Nikon and a Canon 400/2.8,... supposed to be all very good but also very pricey for sure.

A few telescopes have dedicated focal reducers to reach speeds around F3 for usage with Astro-CCD sensors, for example you an for Celestron C8, C9, C11, C14 etc. series, giving for example an 600mm F3.3 from C8, 850mm F3.3 from C11 etc., they are very "cheap" (you can get a used one for less than 500€ incl. reducer) and very light compared to their refractor-counterparts.
Though coverage will be small and only useful for µFT if used with the F3.3 focal reducer.

I also had an Celestron "Comet Catcher", 500mm F3.6 - not exactly F2.8 but very light and does cost only ~200 bucks and has APS-C coverage (very sharp center but coma in the corners on APS-C, perfect on µFT and unusable vignetting on FF)

There's also an Sigma 200-500mm F2.8 APO zoom lens, costs around 10k new I think.
http://www.foto-biz.com/sites/default/files/misc/sigma-200-500.jpg

I think the reason why such fast 500mm+ lenses are rare is that they are hard to use due weight, on these tele focal lengths on refractor lenses the weight increases exponentially with every stop of light. For me it wouldn't make sense to use more these focal length with such a speed anyway, for potrait's it's long, for birding and wildlife much too heavy, for astro-work there are better and cheaper solutions.

[CuriousOne]

Night time video/photo wildlife observation is the answer. An 1000mm/F1.2 would be VERY nice

[Tedat]

Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 4/1700mm

http://www.dpreview.com/news/2006/10/1/zeiss1700f4


ok.. not a mass produced lens and no F2.8.. but same speed as the Minolta and longer

[Gerald]

Try a Panasonic FZ200, 25-600mm F2.8 zoom, 1920x1080 60p vídeo.

[ForenSeil]

[CuriousOne]

I can't forgive myself for giving away 60cm mirror from telescope(!) for free I thought "I would never use this, it just takes up space, let's get rid of it". I donated it to a guy, who used it as water heater focuser. Stone hit it later and it break apart.

[iangreenhalgh1]

Wray 48 inch f4 aerial recon lens. A giant triplet, about 10 lbs in weight and a foot long, would need tobe mounted on 3 feet of extension tubes to gain infinity.

[ZoneV]

[Lloydy]

[iangreenhalgh1]

[duckrider]

Would be fun to get the lens into focus: depth of field will be some mm in 100 m distance.....

[buerokratiehasser]

Aint no such thing because you would need a tank as a mount
as earlier posters have pointed out

There is one Sigma lens that already requires carrying mule, 600/4 or something; impressive photo. of the lens, I mean. Zoom/focus electrical...

Maybe with cat telescopes but still the opening too big (the sweet spot for these is astro so they tend to be real estate)

Yes the beloved FZ super bridge models. HOWEVER, they have equivalent xxx mm only (some even xxxx). If you equivalent their aperture too it stops being so impressive. Equivalent aperture is sort of important for things like sharp motif in background blur. Also for sharp motif, with all the diffraction, you see

[sammo]

If you call a telescope a lens there is: Celestron C14 Hyperstar, 350mm diameter f/2 (700mm focal length)

[Pancolart]

Check Leitz Epis series. There are monsters like 4.5/800mm.

[ForenSeil]

Or Hyperstar Schmidt-Camera conversion kit for Celestron C8 or C9... with C8 ist would be ~F410mm F2, C9 would be....
Excellent IQ but hard to handle and 27mm image cicle only (for C8, don't know about others) ^^

300-500€ for used C8 and then 1,5k (new) for a conversion kit.