Soligor 95-310mm f/5.6

[cooltouch]

I picked this lens up from eBay the other day. Just for grins I entered a very low bid price a few days before the auction close -- something I never do -- and whaddya know? I won it.

Click here to see on Ebay

The seller didn't say so, but this lens was obviously New Old Stock (NOS). It was still packed in the original plastic wrap, had the little gel pack inside the styrofoam, blank cards, etc. Plus the lens mount was mint. No sign that it had ever been mounted on a camera. Well, I took care of that real fast! Heh.

This particular lens was made by Sun in 1983 -- S/N 283xxxx.



I first heard about the Soligor 95-310mm f/5.6 from a colleague of mine back in about 1984. He owned one, and I was looking for a zoom that included 300mm as part of its focal range. I decided to buy a Soligor, but not the 95-310. I bought the 85-300mm f/5 instead. I went with the 85-300 for two reasons -- it was a two-ring zoom and back in those days two-ring zooms still had a reputation as being better quality optics than one-ring push-pull zooms. Plus it was a third-stop faster than the 95-310. I looked up the mail-order prices for both zooms in an old photo magazine from the 1980s and I see that the 85-300 sold for about $150, whereas the 95-310 sold for about $100.

In actual use, however, I was rather disappointed with my 85-300's performance. Mostly because it was soft wide open. Scarcely a year passed when I sold it and bought a Tamron SP 60-300mm f/3.8-5.4, a much better zoom, and hey, it was even a one-touch. Go figure. That Tamron set me back about $300, too, so I guess you get what you pay for.

But you know, I'd always been kind of curious about the 95-310. I'd never even seen one in person. So when I stumbled across the eBay auction, curiosity got the better of me, and I went for it. Especially since it was Nikon mount, which meant I could easily adapt it for use with my EOS DSLR.

My first impression of the lens after opening the box was, wow, this lens is tiny for a 300mm focal length! I still own a Tamron SP 60-300 and also a Tokina AT-X 100-300 f/4 and both are quite a bit larger than the Soligor. Just to give you an idea of size differences --



The Tokina is a big lens. At a constant f/4 aperture, it has to be. Front element is 77mm. The Tamron is shorter, but not by a whole lot. Its front element is 62mm. And the pipsqueak Soligor, which actually has more focal length than the other two lenses, has a relatively narrow 58mm front element.

With regards to the Soligor's macro setting, really it's just an indication of the lens's close-focusing range. Nothing like the special twist-and-push-then-click engagement of the Tamron. The Tokina? Fuggedaboudit. It doesn't have one at all.

So yesterday, I took the Soligor out and took some test shots with it. My conclusions are mixed. Wish I had a Soligor 85-300 to compare it to, but I'd have to say that the 95-310 exhibits a rather surprising degree of consistency regarding sharpness across the range of f/stops. It's just a tad less sharp wide open at f/5.6 than at f/8 and there is very little difference in sharpness from f/8 all the way to f/22, with it being sharpest at f/22. I found this to be surprising. Most lenses I own, including some excellent macro lenses, exhibit a noticeable fall-off in sharpness at the smallest apertures. So that was encouraging. But this lens exhibits rather pronounced color fringing -- green and purple -- all the way to and including f/22. So at least it's consistent.

Here's a picture of a neighbor's dead maple tree. It was brutalized by Hurricane Ike and then this past scorching hot summer proved to be too much for it. This shot was taken at f/11, an aperture where, with all my other lenses that might show some color fringing at wider apertures, it's gone by that point.



And here's a 100% crop of the top left corner. Nasty.


So, while I would describe the 95-310's sharpness as adequate, its level of CA is severe. But all is not lost in that regard. A few clicks in Paint Shop Pro, and we have this:



Center of field, sharpness is better than I expected. If you've read any of my other telephoto lens reviews, then you know about the water kiosk about 400 meters down the street from where I live. I want to be able to resolve the sentence "We care about the water you drink." Well, guess what? The lettering may be somewhat soft, but it is clearly legible.

Here's the scene I'm talking about, Soligor 95-310 @ f/11:


And a 100% crop:


Some purple fringing is evident in this center-of-field shot (check out the windmill's blade's and the white framing around "Watermill Express"), but it isn't nearly as bad as on the corners. I suppose it's also worth mentioning that these are APS-C corners as well.

Here's another shot of the dead maple, this time at f/22. 100% crop from the original. Because of the lighting, I did adjust contrast somewhat which didn't help much with the burn-through on the tree's left side, but no sharpening was done. If you look closely, you can also see that there is still some purple fringing going on, although much reduced. This is no macro lens, but it does a reasonably good job with detail, I feel.



Conclusion: this is an interesting little zoom that should perform well in certain situations, as long as the photographer is aware of its shortcomings. It's very light for its focal range, and easy to handle. If the price I paid for mine is any indication, it can also be picked up for cheap. But it is also possible to find the Tamron SP 60-300 for good prices if one is patient. It's bigger and heavier, but it is a much better lens in my view.

[RioRico]

[stratboy99]

I'm a fan of Soligor.

I have one of these and also the 85-300mm. I took the 95-310mm to Southern Thailand for holiday recently and tested it out. I liked it very much for being compact for the zoom range to 310mm and while I am using the K200D with the 1.5 crop factor I am getting about 465mm in total. I can't complain

I have to take out the 85-300mm for a run soon, and compare them.

[David]

I had that same lens in K mount. To be kind, it was not my favorite.

[cooltouch]

[cooltouch]

[David]

I think your best bet for that lens is to make a super macro tube.

1- Get an old Nikon parts camera with a complete mount
2- Gut the lens and put the mount on the far side.
3- Connect the two nostrils via a long rod
4- Have a super macro tube
5- Use scavanged lens elements to make a modern art sculpture.

[cooltouch]

Certainly creative, but way too much work. If I felt like doing that sort of thing, I have another old Soligor -- one of the ubiquitous 90-230mm f/4.5 two ring zooms (s/n 17113371) that I've seen under a bunch of different brand names -- that I can use if I feel like getting artsy-fartsy. That old thing is a doorstop for sure. At least the 95-310 might be worth a Jackson.