Canon FD 2.8/300mm L + 4.5/500mm L on 5DII + NEX 7

[hinnerker]

Some of the best telephoto lenses you can buy are the 2.8/300mm and the 4.5/500mm Canon Supertele lenses.



Both lenses are excellent, because of the fluorite glas elements, they use.

And this is my newest aquisition.. the 4.5/500mm L



Elements/Groups: 7 Elements in 6 Groups
9 Elements aperture
4.5-5.6-8-11-16-22-32, in half stops
close distance: 5 m
Dimension:
Length ~ 43 cm
Diameter of frontglas: 128mm
Weight: 2610 g

Comes with Ed Mika 0.75mm FD to EOS Adaptor (was the wrong one, 0.5 type is necessary. I corrected this by myself)


For testing the lens performance, i did use my NEX 7 and my Canon 5D MKII to combine the cams with the lenses.

First shoot only to see, how the 500mm lens performs on infinty and whats about CA's for this combination with the Canon 2 x Extender.

Therefore i did use my NEX 7 via FD Adaptor and attached a Canon 2x Extender (Version 2) to the FD 500mm L lens.

Let us count a bit for the focal lenght.. (2x 500mm=1000mm) x cropfactor 1.5 = 1.500mm for shooting the moon as the ultimate infinity point... this is a crop!



Not bad at all..


After adjusting the infinity to get this results in the moon shot, i want to see, how the lens performance is on EOS 5D MKII

So i did a walk in the nearest Zoo..

Lets see some pictures of a flamingo first..



and now lets go in details for that shot..



BOAH... thats really great..

Want some more..?






and the details again..



I own a second telephoto lens from this FD L-Series, the Canon FD 2.8/300mm L... also a very, very great piece of glas...

Before i did the decision to buy the 500mm L lens, i was interested in compairing the

Canon 5D MKII + Canon FD 4.5/500mm L, which gives real 500mm

against

SONY NEX 7 + Canon FD 2.8/300mm L which give virtual 2.8/450mm focal length

So the difference in focal lenght is small.. but whats about image qualitiy?

Let us see.. how the NEX + 300mm combination works against what we have seen from the 500mm lens on the 5D MKII..

NEX 7 + 2.8/300mm L


Details...






All shots are open aperture shots without tri- or monopod, only leaning myself or the lens on walls, edges or something which helps reducing the shake. (no sharpen applied !)
The lens is not to heavy for that kind of use and the easy to use inner focus mechanic (only one floating group inside construction) makes it easy work with those lenses at about 500mm

IMHO both lenses are the best you can buy for telephoto shooting..

Cheers
Henry

[ForenSeil]

I love these Canon L "telecsopes"
IQ is always impressive for such problematic focal length/speed combos.
I whish I had one

[ZoneV]

The FD 500/4.5L is really a greta quality lens!
I was amazed when I got some years ago (pre Ed Mika adapter time) on to convert and repair.
The image quality - even with extension tubes - was absolute great.
And the weight and size make hand holding still possible. With my FD 400/2.8 or 800/5.6 (more than 5kg) it is possible too for me, but quite exhausting and one need much light.

[Olivier]

Wow

These pictures are really impressive !

[stingOM]

Indeed they are stunning!

[poilu]

+1 impressive quality !

[danikatia]

[LucisPictor]

Yes, that's some real pro-gear!!