Which Telephoto?

[shrimperblue]

Can anyone please tell me what lens is best recomended here for birdies etc on a budget. Also does anyone use/know if the Sigma 2x Tele is any good?

Sigma 28-300mm f/3.5-6.3 DG Macro (Canon AF)
Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 APO Macro DG (Canon AF)

Thanks,

SB

[silverJON]

From what I gather, the 70-300 is your best bet as a budget telephoto. For birds, you'd never use the 28-70mm range anyway. It's also slightly faster at the long end.

The 70-300 is sharper, but bear in mind that both get somewhat soft beyond 200mm. Apparently it's better to shoot at 200 and crop than shoot at 300.

I don't think there's a way round that at those prices.

[shrimperblue]

How about with the teleconverter?

SB

[stylgeo]

Read that 28-300 is not a good lens at all. Used to have the 70-300 and as said before it's not bad for the price, but it gets softer at 300mm. What's your budget exactly? Can't you stretch your budget to get the excellent Canon 70-300 IS ?
The 70-300mm APO DG is not bad, but the Canon is a lot better, but more expensive.

[shrimperblue]

450 max :)

SB

[silverJON]

Oh... you have a lot more freedom :) forget the budget Sigmas!

...dare I say it, the Canon 70-200 F4L?

[shrimperblue]

Just sold my 200 f4 wasnt happy with the 200 restriction. A nice lens though I want to get closer.

SB

[andrewc]

£ 450 - secondhand Sigma 100-300 f4 EX and a 1/4 TC?

Secondhand bigma?

[shrimperblue]

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM looks like a nice a lens.

[dazzajl]

Canon EF 70-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM looks like a nice a lens.

It is and on a good day will probably almost match a crop from the lens you just got shot of. ;)

[StewartR]

Bird photography is horribly demanding on lenses. 200mm is nowhere near enough, but nor is 300mm most of the time. If you don't get the longest lens you can afford, you'll always wish you had. The idea of a second-hand Sigma 50-500 sounds good to me.

[shrimperblue]

So does anyone have an idea what type of quality I would get from the Sigma 70-300mm f/4-5.6 APO and a 1.4 or 2x tele conv?

SB

[dazzajl]

Well with the 1.4 you will probably get some reasonable images ona very bright day. The 2x is more than likely going to usable only on the very best days where you can stop down 3 stops and shoot at f32.

Sadly getting good magnification into a camera is a horribly expensive business. Why do think that people here spend £3k+ for a 500mm lens. If it was as easy as buying a £200 300mm and getting a 2x............ :)

[stylgeo]

Not good I guess. First of all you'll lose AF. If that's not a problem, as you may know, using TCs there is a decrease in IQ. Having a lens which is soft, and then use it with a TC, well, I don't think you can produce usable photos. I remember that if I stopped down a lot with the lens, around f/10, the images were sharp. But with the TCs we are talking f/14 to f/20 to get a decent shot. Try and get a decent shutter speed with that aperture.

I think a SH sigma 100-300 f/4 + TC, or a SH 50-500 is your best option here.

[shrimperblue]

Agreed. 50-500 is ideal but the price is scarey!!

[stylgeo]

Try ebay. You can get really cheap offers (http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Sigma-50-500mm-f-4-6-3-EX-APO-DG-HSM-for-Canon-AF_W0QQitemZ280212823458QQihZ018QQcategoryZ30070QQ tcZphotoQQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem) if you go the SH road.

[ilikebowens]

Hello,
The difference between long lenses is rather less than the difference in wide lenses.
Most people would see the difference between a 28mm and a 24mm even though the difference in focal length of 4mm seems quite small, go down to 14mm (“only” 10mm further down) and the difference is huge in the picture.

On the other hand the difference between 200mm and 300mm is quite small in the image you get. Imagine your bird taken with the 200mm and it’s a small dot in the frame. Now imagine taking a third off the frame and enlarging the rest to fill the frame. It’s a bigger dot but it’s not filling the frame! That’s the difference between 200 and 300mm only a third of the frame.

You either need to get very close with a normal tele lens (perhaps 10 meters) like a 300mm or find a really really long lens of 1200mm.
There is an alternative in the form of Digiscoping. Get a Terrestrial telescope and bolt a digital compact on the back. There’s a lot help on the web about this. The basic idea is that the telescope magnification is further magnified by the cameras lens (i.e. a 3X zoom lens on the camera = 60X on a 20X scope. 3X20). It’s harder to equate this to a focal length and you may have to crop the image if you get a dark edging, which can be severe but it works well. Try searching Paul Hackett on the net, he is a leading exponent on the subject. Also contact LCE in Winchester as they have a range of adapters to mount camera to scope (as well as ‘scopes for that matter).

You are clearly keen an photography so you may well have a digi compact already, your budget would certainly get a half decent ‘scope, try Opticron for good optics at good prices. The thing to look for is a big objective on the scope of 77mm+. The bigger the brighter.

Lastly use a really stable tripod!

Hope this helps
ilikebowens