Is this lens worth it?

[pgowder]

Ok I can't afford the price of a professional 600mm lens. So I was looking at the ones below. Are they worth it? Are there problems with them?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...sPageName=WDVW

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...856042457&rd=1

[straightarm]

Of the two, I'd recommend the Sigma 600mm mirror lens. I had a couple of these for Canon cameras and they were adequate.

They suffer from the the usual mirror lens problems

You can't really hand hold them, you really need a good solid tripod

It won't be autofocus and the f8 aperture makes manual focussing difficult.

The aperture is fixed, so the only ways to control the exposure are by the shutter speed or using ND filters.

The price is fair. Adorama who are generally regarded as reputable want USD399.00 for the Minolta fit lens.

However they do have an overstock on Minolta fit
Sigma 500mm f7.2 lenses at USD199.95. That seems a real bargain

http://www.adorama.com/BVMAX4.html

Simon

[Clemmie]

I can identify with that! I can't afford $7500 for Minolta's 600 'G' Pro lens, either.

I generally recommend steering clear of the Sigma lenses with a Minolta camera. Sigma chose to 'reverse engineer' their interface with Minolta's electronics, instead of properly licensing it - and there are a lot of compatibility issues. This one being a fixed-aperture, manual-focus lens, MAYBE that wouldn't be an issue. But I think the $249 for a mirror lens, when almost all the other mirror kits are $109-$139, is a bit much.

Your second selection here, the Opteka 500-1000 kit - Just happens I currently have this set on order myself, so I'll be finding out by Christmas if it's any good. (It's due in tomorrow, in fact - but I've gotta get back on the road today - so it'll be a few weeks before I can try it out). This one is a 7-element lens made in Japan, where most in this price class are a primitive 4-element design made in Korea or China - so I am hopeful it is superior to those, but it remains to be seen.

With either of these lenses, we'll have to shoot in Full Manual - aperture always dialed to f/8 to match the fixed aperture of the lens, and using Shutter Speed to adjust for the lighting. And manual focus, of course.

You didn't mention which Maxxum you're using, so your setup may vary a bit. On my Maxxum 7, it will be necessary to change two of the custom function settings: one to allow the shutter to fire without first verifying there's a lens attached (these are T-mount lenses - no electrical interface) - and one to switch the shutter release from focus-lock priority to release priority (so it'll fire when you press the button, instead of requiring AF lock). Plus setting the focus mode control to MF (so it won't be trying to engage the autofocus drive).

Minolta does make a 500 Mirror lens which will supposedly autofocus - but it runs near $600. The world's only autofocusing 500 mirror type. I am a bit dubious about autofocus lock at that length, though - and at the price, won't be finding out for myself. And it, too, has a fixed aperture at f/8. If it had variable apertures to go with the possible autofocusing, then I'd give it a lot more consideration.

[pgowder]

Thanks for the info!

Right now I had an old Maxxum, not sure of the model. But I'm looking at the Maxxum 7d. Would these lenses work with that?

[Clemmie]

They should - and the setup would be the same as I detailed above for the Maxxum 7.

However, on the 7D there is a 1.5x 'crop factor' - meaning the effective focal length would be 1.5x the labeled focal length (i.e.: 500 becomes a 750, 1000 becomes a 1500). Likely to give the Anti-Shake a real good workout.....but man what a view!

[straightarm]

I generally recommend steering clear of the Sigma lenses with a Minolta camera. Sigma chose to 'reverse engineer' their interface with Minolta's electronics, instead of properly licensing it - and there are a lot of compatibility issues. This one being a fixed-aperture, manual-focus lens, MAYBE that wouldn't be an issue. But I think the $249 for a mirror lens, when almost all the other mirror kits are $109-$139, is a bit much.


The cheaper lenses fall into the Can't Recommend A Purchase category. The Sigma is more but it's worth it as is a Vivitar 600mm solid cat, with suitable mount.

Simon

[Clemmie]

Well - especially in light of widespread criticisms (such as the previous post) of these low-end 500mm lenses, I can say I am Very Pleasantly Surprised with the initial test results of the one I just bought.

This is the Opteka 500/f:8 - which came with a 2X Teleconverter (not pictured here) - for $109.95 from 47th St. Photo/New York. The construction is mostly metal, so it is on the heavy side, and quite solid.


As a baseline for our first sampling - this is the view from my front door, with a regular Minolta 50mm lens. Take note of the distant speck of light at dead center of this picture.


Now, the same shot from the same position, with the Opteka 500mm. Notice that distant speck is now a Volkswagen.......


Now we'll add the 2X Teleconverter, taking it to 1000mm......


Now, I'll grant the naysayers that there are some sharper lenses on the market - for a substantially higher price.

I think these test shots clearly show that, for the money, this particular cheapie lens is pretty darn good. It has its place in the market. I doubt a Pro would want to depend on it, but it does quite nicely for those of us on tight budgets. So, I WILL RECOMMEND IT!

[Outdoorsman]

If you are going to buy one or the other, go for the mirror lens.
I bought one of those cheapie 500mm + 2X TC kits. It was horrible! Resolution was lousy, it was very slow and the imprecise manual focusing drove me nuts. I never got any kind of a keeper image with it. I ended up selling it for like a third of what I paid and I was happy to see it go.
The mirror lens will be more fun, I think, since it's so much smaller.
But also consider getting a good converter for a 300mm or maybe even a zoom with a 300mm end. I use my 70-300 with a 2X converter. Gets me 600mm with funky AF but still gives me keepers. I would like a better converter, but all in good time...
Good luck!