{"id":1254,"date":"2009-04-22T10:02:09","date_gmt":"2009-04-22T10:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/?p=1254"},"modified":"2009-04-22T10:02:09","modified_gmt":"2009-04-22T10:02:09","slug":"finds-stf-tc-protection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/?p=1254","title":{"rendered":"Finds STF TC Protection"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nAmazing finds of the century at YL Camera, Pudu Plaza! Left is the rare Minolta 80-200mm F2.8G HS APO<\/b>, right is the Sony 70-300mm F4.5-5.6G SSM<\/b>, both amazingly fast-focusing lenses! (Bottom-right corner shows the Minolta’s blemished hood; the Sony doesn’t even come with a hood which might explain the price.)<\/p>\n


\nMinolta 80-200mm F2.8G HS APO at 200mm F2.8.<\/p>\n


\nSony 70-300mm F4.5-5.6G SSM at 150mm F5.6.<\/p>\n

I’d have to say it’s a fair tie in image quality. Other factors like practicality start to take precedence – the Minolta is nearly twice the weight of the Sony, and has a poor minimum focus distance of 1.8 meters. The Sony does 1.2 meters close no matter what. Of course, the Minolta can do F2.8 at all focal lengths.<\/p>\n


\nAnd then I went to Sony Style KLCC to find out if the Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus<\/b> was affected in image quality by the Sony 2x APO Teleconverter<\/b>.<\/p>\n

Top-left<\/b>: Sony Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 135mm F1.8 ZA at 135mm F1.8 1\/200s ISO320
\nTop-right<\/b>: Sony Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 135mm F1.8 ZA through a Kenko 2x MC4 teleconverter at 280mm F3.5 1\/125s ISO800 (minor swirliness at the bottom, not always obvious)
\nBottom-left<\/b>: Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus at 135mm F2.8 (transmission factor T4.5) 1\/125s ISO800
\nBottom-right<\/b>: Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus through a Sony 2x APO Teleconverter at 280mm F5.6 (transmission factor T9.0) 1\/80s ISO3200<\/p>\n

Yes, the Sony counts 135mm with a 2x TC as 280mm instead of 270mm for some weird reason, but I’ll refer to it as 280mm anyway for the rest of this entry.<\/p>\n

So, I could conclude that the Sony 2x APO Teleconverter does not degrade the bokeh of the STF lens<\/b>.<\/p>\n


\nDoes it degrade sharpness? Not by much of a noticeable bit for me. 100% crop of the 280mm T9.0 1\/80s ISO3200 shot.<\/p>\n


\nHowever, it does bring out some chromatic aberration. 100% crop of the 280mm T9.0 1\/80s ISO3200 shot.<\/p>\n

I shot X-Fine Large JPG which isn’t the best way to bring out the image quality of the A900 but this was a quick snap, all other factors the same.<\/p>\n


\nLeft<\/b>: Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus with a Sony 2x APO Teleconverter
\nRight<\/b>: Sony Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 135mm F1.8 ZA with a Kenko 2x MC4 teleconverter<\/p>\n


\nHeight comparison to my Minolta 50mm F1.4 Original.<\/p>\n


\nPhysically though, the Sony 2x APO Teleconverter has its front element sticking out further nearer to the mount, while my Kenko 2x MC4 is quite deep inside.<\/p>\n

The Sony is fussy – you just cannot physically mount most lenses in front of it because of the front element. On the plus side, it’s optically better because of this.<\/p>\n

It fits all the non-black Sony lenses, with the exception being the STF. So that means the white Sony 70-200mm F2.8G SSM, Sony 300mm F2.8G SSM, Sony 70-400mm F4-5.6G SSM and Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus.<\/p>\n

My Kenko, meanwhile, accepts any lens or teleconverter. So I could stack it!<\/p>\n

So does that mean I can stack the teleconverters? Of course, though only in a certain order.<\/p>\n


\nSo here’s the result, 560mm F18 1\/40s ISO1600.<\/p>\n

Stacking order<\/b>: Sony 135mm F2.8\/T4.5 Smooth Transition Focus – Sony 2x APO Teleconverter – Kenko 2x MC4 teleconverter – Sony A900<\/p>\n


\nAlso at 560mm F18 1\/40s ISO1600. The STF gives 1:4x magnification, and putting a 2x teleconverter doubles the magnification. Obviously then, putting two<\/b> 2x teleconverters quadruples the magnification to give 1:1x life-size magnification!<\/p>\n

Okay, so shooting macro with a full-frame isn’t all that great.<\/p>\n

However, you might not want to use the STF with a 2x teleconverter, because:<\/p>\n

– the STF is manual focus only, without a focus confirmation light (refer to my findings here<\/a> why it just cannot detect focus)
\n– the light transmission ends up being T9.0 which is quite dark
\n– on an APS-C body, 280mm gives the equivalent of 420mm which is long and hard to use. Already the STF without teleconvters is hard to use on APS-C for portraits due to the length.<\/p>\n

On a side note, how do you secure your camera from flying paintballs? Using a thick plastic bag!<\/p>\n


\nLeft<\/b>: Put the hood in the corner. Right<\/b>: Carve out a hole using a knife or a pen.<\/p>\n


\nFinally, tape it to the hood! Here’s my Carl Zeiss 135mm F1.8 with my Minolta Dynax 7, all inside a Borders plastic bag! Not rain-proof completely as the back is still exposed, but it is covered enough for splashes and paintballs!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amazing finds of the century at YL Camera, Pudu Plaza! Left is the rare Minolta 80-200mm F2.8G HS APO, right is the Sony 70-300mm F4.5-5.6G SSM, both amazingly fast-focusing lenses! (Bottom-right corner shows the Minolta’s blemished hood; the Sony doesn’t even come with a hood which might explain the price.) Minolta 80-200mm F2.8G HS APO […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geek","category-pictures"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1254\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glaringnotebook.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}