which 400 / 500 mm to get?

luisalegria · Expire: 2018-01-18

Any of the old Tamron 400/6.9's

The Nestar is harder to find, but the non-nesting variety I find is as good.

woodrim · Joined: 14 Jan 2010 Posts: 4060 Location: Charleston

hmallat · Joined: 11 Jul 2009 Posts: 23

There are two models of the Nikkor 400/5.6, ED and ED IF. The IF (internal focus) model should be easier to handle as the front of the lens stays put while the elements inside the lens move. IF lenses are comparatively speaking easier to focus, something that can make a difference with birds.

I agree with the other posters that it's a very sharp lens. I haven't used mine much after getting a 400/3.5 but I will hold on to it because I'm sure I would regret selling it at some point!

martyn_bannister · Joined: 23 May 2010 Posts: 1151

NOT one of these! The Meyer Optik Telemegor 400mm f5.5

The IQ on my one wasn't the best....... Love the look of it though Smile

Toeteraar · Posted: Sun Dec 09, 2012 1:37 pm Post subject:

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Does anyone know this Tokina 400/6.3?

http://www.ebay.de/itm/Vivitar-TelePhoto-400mm-1-6-3-T4-Ausfuhrung-mit-M42-Anschuss-Neuwertig-/190768211994?pt=DE_Foto_Camcorder_Objektive&hash=item2c6aabe81a

ManualFocus-G · Expire: 2014-11-24

The Tokina 400/6.3 is poor in my experience. Difficult to focus as it's soft wide open.

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Okay, so my shortlist has changed again Smile

I missed a Tokina AT-X today, but anyway, these are the current options:

best quality, most expensive:
1. Nikkor 400/5.6 ED-IF or ED
2. Tokina 400/5.6 AT-X SD

cheapskate:
1. Vivitar (or similar) 400/6.9
2. Soligor 400/6.3 (it should look exactly as the one shown above, right? I recall that these old Soligors also were sold as Miranda lenses?

mirror:
1. Rubinar 500/5.6
2. Tamron 350/5.6

AVOID
1. Sigma 400/5.6 non-APO, APO
2. Meyer Optic and similar GDR 400/5.5
3. Tokina 400/5.6 SD non AT-X
4. Tokina 400/6.3

Regarding the Sigma 400/5.6, another one appeared recently on ebay, and even in the description the fogged-up lens element is almready mentioned. It seems that these do fail at a 100% rate ....

I've read through the forum and actually found a thread where the Rubinar seems to give excellent results on the E-M5, even better than Tamron. On the downside, it's very heavy, but I have a soft spot for these Russian optics.

I'm not sure whether 1000mm eq. focal length are even harder to handle than 800mm, regarding atmospheric conditions, blur (even on a tripod), etc.

Olivier · Expire: 2015-08-06

Soligor 6.3/400 different versions :

http://forum.mflenses.com/searching-for-a-long-telephoto-lens-300-400mm-t14308,highlight,+soligor++400++6++3,start,15.html

http://forum.mflenses.com/searching-for-a-long-telephoto-lens-300-400mm-t14308,highlight,+soligor++400++6++3,start,30.html

http://forum.mflenses.com/searching-for-a-long-telephoto-lens-300-400mm-t14308,highlight,+soligor++400++6++3,start,45.html

http://forum.mflenses.com/fs-soligor-400-6-3-minolta-sr-mount-t26713,highlight,%2Bsoligor+%2B400.html

http://forum.mflenses.com/soligor-tokina-400-6-3-the-biggest-of-the-t4s-t7857,highlight,%2Bsoligor+%2B400.html

luisalegria · Expire: 2018-01-18

There are Soligors and there are Soligors, and there are Tokinas and there are Tokinas.
IMHO,
The best Tokina 400/6.3 is the earliest preset version, the design of which is distinctive, also made for other brands, including camera makers brands.
I have one of these as a Mamiya -

http://forum.mflenses.com/mamiya-tokina-400-6-3-preset-t19582,highlight,%2Bmamiya.html

David · Expire: 2013-01-25

I have this 400mm lens:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vivitar-Auto-400mm-1-6-3-Telephoto-Lens-with-Canon-Mount-CLEAN-SLR-DSLR-camera-/261136000903?pt=Camera_Lenses&hash=item3ccceb2787

It's a TX mount lens, so you have a LOT of flexibility.

Here's an album of photos I took exclusively with this lens:

https://picasaweb.google.com/102333270936007447976/10612K7

And three additional wildlife photos I took with it:

Typically, it runs in the $50-75 range for a good copy and about a half dozen are typically available on eBay at any time. I can't recommend it strongly enough. Very easy to use, well balanced, and not as heavy as might be expected.

Mine was made by Tokina (theoretically -- 37 SN) but the couple I looked at on eBay just now are 28 SNs -- Komine. They look exactly the same as mine, though.

David

hifisapi · Joined: 25 Sep 2012 Posts: 941 Location: USA

Olivier · Expire: 2015-08-06

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Is it the fate of lens collectors that they never do what they initially planned? Smile

I missed a rather cheap Tokina AT-X 400/5.6. In the meantime, a Nikkor IF-ED 300/4.5 was at auction but the tripod mount was missing and the cosmetics unsure. And a Nikkor IF-ED 400/5.6 with as-new cosmetics but it had some marks on the optics, and the seller still wanted 400 Euros, so I passed on that one as well. There was/is also a really mint Nikkor 400/5.6 on ebay but for 800 Euros .... it's just not worth it for me. Then I bid on a Rubinar 500/5.6 but it, as well, got too expensive. During all this, I was monitoring "cheap" 400s just as well but those that came up on ebay were, at about 70-140 Euros, again too much to raise my interest, giving that I also saw an Olympus 300/4.5 OM Zuiko change hands for only 93 Euros (and missed that one... ouch).

However, I got interested in mirror lenses again because of this Rubinar, and I read good things about the Tamron 500 mirrors, so I just purchased one at auction today. There's a recent thread here...

http://forum.mflenses.com/rubinar-500mm-f5-6-mirror-lens-tested-with-oly-om-d-e-m5-t54803,highlight,%2Brubinar.html

...including a comparison of the Tamron 500/8 vs. the Rubinar 500/5.6, where the Tamron came out second, but it was the 55B model, while the one I have got now is a 55BB with somewhat changed mirror design. Also I found this tremendous blog with really superb bird shots, a lot of which were taken with the Tamron 500 on the E-M5:

http://collinorthner.wordpress.com/category/birds/

Also it was mentioned somewhere that the Tamron generally might be actually better for close-up shots than the Rubinar. Anyway, my 55BB is half the price of the Rubinar 500/5.6, also it's 1/3 the weight, and giving my experience with Russian optics I assume that the Tamron will be much easier to handle and to focus, so why not give it a try.

Now, I wonder when is a good time to visit that local birding paradise. Probably even during winter time? Last week I realised that there are actually a lot of birds out there right now. Probably not the most exotic ones, but I need to practice a lot anyway with that super long MF lens.....

ForenSeil · Joined: 15 Apr 2011 Posts: 2726 Location: Kiel, Germany.

Unlike the Sigma 400/5.6 and the 400/5.6 APO the 400 F5.6 APO telemacro is ok bye the way
Sample pics: http://www.dyxum.com/dforum/topic12565.html
Same with the Sigma 300mm Macro APO - much better than the non-APO or the only-APO
http://www.dyxum.com/dforum/topic17076.html

Very good and very long teles are generally expensive Sad

Minolta MD/Minolta AF/Leica/Sony (all optically identical) 500/8 Mirror is maybe the best 500 mirror-lens on the market.
http://www.dyxum.com/dforum/topic11513.html
The Sony is usually the cheapest (400€ the last time I saw it so still not very cheap Wink

)

Olivier · Expire: 2015-08-06

Congrats for ypur new Tamron SP 500 F8.

Focusing is very smooth and it has to be to make precise in focus images.

About doughnut bokeh, beware the background and you'll have very contrasty and beautiful birds photos.
The Tamron SP 500 F8 is good for proxi photos (some call it macro).

Here is the 55B instruction manuel
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B_ct4eH-yznrMjBxZGZLTTlFejQ/edit

and here the 55BB's :
https://docs.google.com/folder/d/0B8qlSpaYmK3nTUlLTC10SzZzZjQ/edit

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Thanks for the links.

First, I now have to wait for the lens to arrive. I also am not sure what Adaptall mount it will come with, as the vendor could not specify it and while I have seen a lot of pictures of the lens, there was none that showed the mount clearly enough. Probably I am lucky and it has an Olympus OM mount for which I already have an MFT adapter. But as you can even buy Adaptall rings that directly mount to MFT today, it's not a big deal.

By coincidence, I found reference to a Samyang 500 mm f/8 lens (the "Wundertüte") but with ED glass element, I've never seen that one before. Even though I assume it's a much newer design than the non-ED ones, it's already listed at the Samyang website as discontinued:

http://www.lenstip.com/844-Samyang_500_mm_ED_MC_f_8.0-lens_specifications.html

http://samyang.pl/index.php/en/samyang-500mm-f8-preset-ed-if-mc

Does anyone in the forum know this lens? Is it a real improvement to the cheaper non-ED Wundertüte? It's very long which means it's no direct competition to the mirror lenses anyway, but also very light (only 576 grams).

coon · Joined: 26 Mar 2011 Posts: 6

I can also say that the Beroflex (=Soligor) 400mm f6.3 is quite sharp. The problem is handling it, hand-holding makes it very difficult to focus correctly, and the dark viewfinder doesn't help there as well.

Not very artistic, but here a small 100% crops from the bottom right corner:

f6.3

f8

f11

f16

f22

f32

I cannot say how well that compares to the Tokina 400mm SD, but considering that the latter is an automatic lens (for Pentax at least) and has a slightly brighter max. aperture, I would say that the advantage in usability somewhat outweighs a slightly better resolution. To be honest, my Beroflex is collecting dust, because I always need to bring a tripod. Usually I use my Meyer 300 f4 if I need a long lens, hand-held shots are much easier with it than with the Beroflex.

coon

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

I have a question regarding the Tamron 500/8 55BB Adaptall-2 lens. I still haven't got my copy that I purchased at ebay, but regarding the photos I now have confirmed that it will come with a Nikon Adaptall-2 mount. I do need an OM mount, though, because I already have the OM-MFT adapter.

Will this older Tamron mount work for it or do I absolutely need an Adaptall-2 even though mirror lenses don't have any aperture-related stuff anyway?

http://www.ebay.de/itm/321043016521?_trksid=p5197.c0.m619

The alternative is to get an Adaptall–MFT mount which is available new but a bit more pricey.

Olivier · Expire: 2015-08-06

Hi Memento.

What is your camera ?

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Hi Olivier,

Olympus E-M5 and OM-1, but I don't really "need" the lens on the OM-1, the E-M5 is much more important for me.

So either I need an OM mount or a MFT mount for the Adaptall lens.

Thomas

Olivier · Expire: 2015-08-06

For the E-M5, you can buy a Tamron Adaptall 2 Lens to Micro 4/3 Adapter.

Here is one from Big-IS. His adapters are very good. I have a lot of them and never had any issues.
Click here to see on Ebay

glasslover · Expire: 2013-10-19

Hi!

memento · Joined: 05 Nov 2012 Posts: 79

Is there any difference between Adaptall and Adaptall-2 when you use a mirror lens (without aperture mechanism etc.)? Thomas