First outing for Tamron AD2 46A lens

[MarkS]

Just take the 46A out for its first outing on a very dull and misty January afternoon


Mandarin Duck at Etherown Country Park




Canada Goose




Mute Swan

[marcusBMG]

Very nice Mark, nice colourful duck, dreamy background. 46A probably the best of the tamron adaptall "consumer" 70-210/80-210mm zooms IMO.

[tb_a]

Not bad at all, but a little bit too much sharpening applied for my taste.

BTW, I would appreciate very much if you would state also the camera used and a more generic lens name; e.g. Nikon D7100 and Tamron 70-210 mm f/3.8-4 (46A). Maybe next time. Thank you!

[MarkS]

Hi Thomas

All these were shot on a Nikon D3 and the lens is 70-210mm f3.8-4



The Nikon D3 pulls an incredible amount of detail on its full frame sensor

[Lloydy]

This Tamron gets a good rating -

http://www.adaptall-2.com/lenses/46A.html

I've got a scruffy, slightly fungused copy that I used a lot on my Pentax K10, and I got some good images from it. I tend to use the 19AH constant f3.8 Tamron now, which is superb, or one of the Vivitar S1 70-210's - but I agree with adaptall-2.com that this 46A is above average.

[Piotr Krochmal]

especially for first photo

[Paul]

[Gardener]

I like this Tamron very much - sharp, compact, cheap, well designed and very good-loking lens.

[cooltouch]

I've never used nor owned a 46A, but I do own what would appear to be a close clone, the 103A. It's not a bad lens, but not in the same league, really, as the 46A.

Looking at the Modern Photography resolution tests for the 46A over at adaptall-2.com, I regard these numbers as excellent, for the most part. Yes, a bit soft at wider apertures, but by f/8 it should be plenty sharp enough, even in the corners. This lens's resolution numbers are quite a bit better than Tamron's famous 19AH SP 70-210mm f/3.5 and rival those of the SP 60-300mm, an excellent and very useful optic with its zoom range. If any non-SP lens is deserving of the SP moniker, it's this 70-210mm 46A.

[bghomofaber]

I prefer it over the mythical 30A (80 200 2.8 o the entire range, fluorite elemens) because there is not that big difference in sharpness from a practical pov, and the 30A is so heavy that it discourages any walk now.

I want to eventually compare it with a 103A and a 60-300 that I'm cleaning.

From an artistic pov it has a fantastic rendition of reds and brownish colours, my favourite wall colours (I like ancient walls hues against strong light), I could compare it with the renditions of the contax zeiss T lenses and on such occasions it wins hand down.

I usually carry zeiss and tamron all in the same bag, choosing the one more appropriate to the subject palette.

Sometimes the zeiss conveys the same atmosphere as in my vision, sometimes it is the tamron.

On the reddish and orange part of the spectrum I really love the tamrons, as I said, despite their poor flare performance in extreme backlight.

[marcusBMG]

The bigger distinction is with the 103A's predecessor the 03A. These test pics from in order 03A, 103A and 46A illustrate the point. WB was equalised in LR3. jpg's resized in faststone, f3.8 NX20.





103A has a pretty warm tone, 03A is really blue, 46A has the most neutral rendering.
According to adaptall-2.com the redesign of the 03A was most specifically to improve off axis performance. On apsc I have to say I don't notice the imrovement really. These lenses have very similar resolution mostly.
Between the lenses I can say IME that 46A is the best best corrected and most consistent performer, 103A is particularly oriented to portraiture due to warm rendering and good performance at those focus distances, it is however not as good at infinity. 03A has the weakest contrast and resolution wide open, and is the most afflicted by fringing/CA.

[guardian]

[bghomofaber]