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Mamiya C 210mm f/4 vs Mamiya C 300mm f/5.6
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 04, 2023 10:17 am    Post subject: Mamiya C 210mm f/4 vs Mamiya C 300mm f/5.6 Reply with quote
Objective: see whether my 210mm Mamiya can actually replace my 300mm. It does appear to be the sharper lens to me. Does it render enough detail to match the 300mm after cropping?
210mm image is increased in size (to 143%) and interpolated to match the size of the 300mm image, then 100% crops are compared. Camera used is Sony A7RII.

comparison by devoscasper, on Flickr

First thing that is evident is that the 210mm suffers from purple fringing in high contrast areas. It looks worse than it really is, because the image size is increased and the fringing only appears in areas of extreme contrast. The 300mm doesn't have this issue and seems to feature ULD glass even though this is the earlier version without the ULD designation. This was already established by Stephan. The ULD designation seems to be merely a way to remarket the lens. Purple fringing is easily removed in PP, so not a big deal.

Another observation is that the 210mm has significantly more contrast than the 300mm @ f/5.6; when stopped down this difference becomes small. The 300mm shows more detail than the 210mm's interpolated image, especially stopped down to f/8 or f/11. There's no reason to sell my 300mm.


PostPosted: Sun Jun 04, 2023 2:57 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I agree, keep both


PostPosted: Sun Jun 04, 2023 4:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I'm kind of curious about how these test images were shot, especially for those long focal lengths.

I'm not much of a fan of any 300mm, simply because of the tripod prerequisite.

-D.S.


PostPosted: Sun Jun 04, 2023 10:39 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Rather than interpolating the 210, wouldn't reducing the 300 be fairer to the 210, or at least show samples of the orignal images?


PostPosted: Mon Jun 05, 2023 2:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
The only fair test involves the same subject photographed at distances which frame the same area to compare -- photo using 300 made farther away than same-framed photo made from closer.


PostPosted: Mon Jun 05, 2023 4:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Slalom wrote:
Rather than interpolating the 210, wouldn't reducing the 300 be fairer to the 210, or at least show samples of the orignal images?


It’s not a fair comparison, but I wanted to test if the 210 holds as much detail as the 300, despite cropping. I didn’t want to potentially lose detail by reducing the size of the 300mm image.


PostPosted: Mon Jun 05, 2023 6:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
the only useful info of this test is your 300 is ULD (even if not marked as such) and the 210 isn't


PostPosted: Mon Jun 05, 2023 7:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
D1N0 wrote:
the only useful info of this test is your 300 is ULD (even if not marked as such) and the 210 isn't


Of course I can not decide that for you but for me it was a useful test. Many vintage 300mm lenses don’t have particularly high resolution, or at least not high enough to outresolve a 42mp sensor. Using a sharper 200mm (or 210mm) instead, and then cropping the image can be a more rational approach, especially because 300mm lenses are longer and a bit of a nuisance to use (hard to focus accurately because of movement in viewfinder); on top of that, this 300mm is slower.

The test tells me however, that the 300mm resolves more detail than the 210mm image when cropped. Resolution of the 210mm could still be higher, I’m not sure, but part of that may be an illusion because of the higher contrast.


PostPosted: Mon Jun 05, 2023 7:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
? Increasing 210mm image size has to add details not in original image.


PostPosted: Wed Jun 07, 2023 8:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
@ Casper:

thanks for the test - it quite exactly reflects what I earlier have been writing about the Sekor C 5.6/300 mm (and the 5.6/300mm ULD, which has iodentical properties). The Sekor C 4/210mm is a very capable lens as well, better than most vintage 4/200mm from CaKoMiNikon and others.

S
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