A900 crop vs. A700 - 2

[Lonnie Utah]

I am sure Barry and Lonnie can easily replace my 3300+ posts with nonsense, landscapes, and portraits of family members.

As opposed to the same 3 pics of rocky the squirrel that you seem to post over and over? Got any of Bullwinkle the moose?

FEED THE TROLL! FEED THE TROLL!

[Lonnie Utah]

Here you go, keep digging.

[bfitzgerald]

What about some more fish shots
Or more repeated urban graffiti

[bossel]

Today is my lucky day, I just poured myself a glass of wine! Cin Cin!

Oh, and Don, take care the door doesn't hit your back on the way out

[David Kilpatrick]

Two hours ago I pmd Don, after this last outburst, and set up to delete his account and all posts. I warned him that I could only delete all posts. I then went to weed my garden - I had a rosebed set up in March, but because a few really attractive poppies came up too, I didn't weed it and the whole thing got taken over by ground elder. Don reminded me of that and I went and spent an hour mowing and an hour clearing the bed right out so I could see the roses again.

Then I came back in again, to find an insulting pm from Don (insulting two or three others, insulting me) basically saying that his repeated posting was to put right 'nonsense' from me and if I 'did the right thing' and reinstated the original thread he would stay. Then he sent me another pm asking to be removed, so I had no hesitation and pressed the OK button. It is not reversible.

David

[harvey]

The original post referred to 200-300mm,
David

Actually, 200-450mm covers my interests.

As to one of your other points I'm not bothered if other cameras get you a little more
resolution due to higher pixel density.

The big picture seems to be that cropped A900 at the end of your exisiting lens range is going to get you acceptable images in this comparison.

I was interested in the cricket comparisons and I can see the point about wider field of view based on the Airshow shots I was recently taking with a fixed focal length. I'm not sure it would be practical to zoom to get the same thing with a zoom lens unless the lens keeps focus. It would be more useful to me to have autofocus points further out so you can catch something moving laterally into the centre of the frame rather than focus and adjust the framing to get the subject off-centre.

A more controlled (harder and time consuming) comparison of the same image would give you a real handle on the relationsip between the sensor pixel-density and image quality. I doubt it will be significant enogh for me to get another camera (at least for this specific reason).

I have been really busy so didn't have much time to consider all the comments people have been making.

Harvey

[David Kilpatrick]

I realise that you referred to 200-450mm, my mistake in quoting that. I also realise that the air show and related subjects benefit from the larger framing area of the A900 - certainly one thing you do not need to be doing is zooming out when following a subject just to keep it in frame, and the A900 offers more leeway. You are probably lucky you were to busy to check the original thread (which will not make so much sense with Don's posts now removed) as it became really unpleasant, so did '-2' earlier today before Don was permanently removed.

I had a go today with the A350 and 500mm f/8. That was extremely difficult. The equivalent field of a view of a 750mm turns out to be VERY hard to target at a moving subject (ducks on the Tweed, nothing more ambitious) and with only 5.33 degree of diagonal coverage, no wonder. The focus issue gets worse with the reflex lens, as it automatically forces the use of the central sensor only. Continuous focus jitters around like mad, so does AF-A, and AF-S demands that you jab the shutter the moment the beep confirms focus, or the subject will have moved out of the focus plane.

However, though nearly all the shots were wrongly focused, one test of the Kelso town clock showed that I had focused on the hands, but the real point of focus was the glass covering the face. This is maybe 2-3 inches difference at 100ft.

clock500mm.jpg (97.19 KiB) Viewed 6324 times

This shows the ACR window with the full frame and the section I have cropped out at 100%

clockdetail100pc.jpg (41.58 KiB) Viewed 6324 times

Clearly the 500mm f/8 mirror is extremely sharp, though I had poor results from the A900. Here it has resolved enough to reach the limit of 14 megapixels. I think I will use the A900 micro AF adjust for the first time, so far it has not been needed.

sparrow500mm.jpg (156.31 KiB) Viewed 6324 times

This is on the A350 with the 500mm reflex at absolute minimum focus. Sparrows had taken over the supermarket coldstore trolleys parked in the supermarket yard (presumably some food always gets on them) and I was able to get close. But this is the limit with this lens, larger scale of subject not possible. On the A900 it would be an even smaller part of the frame.

Gustav (Kingfisher) has the only correct answer - A700, A900, 200mm, 300mm whatever - the solution is not the format or the lens, but being able to get in the right position relative to the subject. With wildlife that could mean a hide, with events and sports it could mean getting a press pass or special facilities from organisers.

David

[pakodominguez]

Then he sent me another pm asking to be removed, so I had no hesitation and pressed the OK button. It is not reversible.

David

Auch!
this is very sad.
It was hard sometimes to stand Don's etat d'ame, but it's harder now that I realize all the amount of valuable information he brought here is just gone. Dam Don!

:-/

[sury]

I have an outside possibility to see an air show this Saturday. These are my long lenses: Tamron200-500, Sigma APO70-300, Beercan and Pentax 300/f4 with M42 (non chipped) adapter. These are my bodies: A900, A700 and A100. I used Tammy and A100 couple of years ago.

With A100, I found that the long end was often too long (due to proximity) and typically forced to zoom out. FWIW, I have also taken pictures of air show with my KM Dimage A1/A2, Olympus14-B (3X converter) and a custom bracket with good results.

I am tempted to take A900 and keep A700 just to be on safe side. Only trepidation is to carry the weight. Am I better off carrying another lens than body? Inquiring minds want to know. I could use any advice on body/lens combination that I should carry. There are no visual obstacles for this airfield in Salinas, CA, USA.

With best regards,
Sury

[David Kilpatrick]

Pako, re Don, agreed. In amongst the mess was some valuable information, including many links. However, Don's last email to me threatened to replace the links to his own sites with abusive messages unless I deleted all his posts. He has threatened to do this before now. I've had it with trying to restrain his attitude, whatever the loss.

Sury, the airshow is difficult. The Tamron is a monster compared to the 70-300mm and does not really zoom back out much. With a Sigma 120-400mm or 140-500mm (or even better 50-500mm) the A900 on its own would be versatile. I would take both A900+Tamron and A700+Sigma. I would not try using the Pentax but it may have great quality which you just want to experiment with.

David

[pakodominguez]

Pako, re Don, agreed. In amongst the mess was some valuable information, including many links. However, Don's last email to me threatened to replace the links to his own sites with abusive messages unless I deleted all his posts. He has threatened to do this before now. I've had it with trying to restrain his attitude, whatever the loss.

David

no backups?

just kidding...

[sury]

Sury, the airshow is difficult. The Tamron is a monster compared to the 70-300mm and does not really zoom back out much. With a Sigma 120-400mm or 140-500mm (or even better 50-500mm) the A900 on its own would be versatile. I would take both A900+Tamron and A700+Sigma. I would not try using the Pentax but it may have great quality which you just want to experiment with.

David

That sounds like a good combination to try though heavy load to carry. I may carry along the Pentax for some experimentation.

With best regards,
Sury

[Greg Beetham]

I've been to a couple of air displays (back in my film days), and I really think you would be much better off limiting the amount of gear you give yourself to hump around, then you can concentrate on getting good shots with what you do take. Personally I'd probably take the A700 and the Siggy, there is usually an opportunity to get most of the planes from a reasonable distance while they are in the air.
I suppose you could always put the Tamron in the bottom of a backpack or such just in case it's needed, then there is the static displays to consider, and that means a short lens as well....
Greg

[David Kilpatrick]

In the original thread, I took a lot of flak from one direction because of my suggestion that the A900 - with whatever lens was in use - was a better choice for football photography than a crop APS-C camera because of the real difficulty of getting all the right parts of the players, plus the ball, into the frame at the moment of exposure. A larger field of view avoids the too-tight crop or the unaccepted 'ball out of shot' which used to get my press colleagues loudly abused by the picture editor.

A well-respected dPreview poster, and good photographer, nbercasio, has posted some examples:

http://www.bercasio.com/photos/realmadriddcunited/

Taken with the A700 and 70-300mm SSM. Nice PP effect (colour and contrast palette) but if you look through his set of pix, you'll find exactly what I was talking about. There are shots with player action and the ball is gone - shots with player and ball only the player's head is cut off at the frame top, and other similar instances.

Most if not all of these pix would have been 'intact' at the same focal length with the full frame camera. While I have said I would not choose the A900 for sports or wildlife, I would choose it over the A700 in these apparent circumstances for this type of sport. Wildlife is a bit different and it depends on whether the wildlife is closely approachable and moving fast, or at a long distance and static. First option, A900; second one, A700 or even A350 to grab extra resolution.

David

[pakodominguez]

http://www.bercasio.com/photos/realmadriddcunited/

Taken with the A700 and 70-300mm SSM. Nice PP effect (colour and contrast palette) but if you look through his set of pix, you'll find exactly what I was talking about. There are shots with player action and the ball is gone - shots with player and ball only the player's head is cut off at the frame top, and other similar instances.

I'l speak as a photographer AND as a Real Madird fan:
I don't like the PP. I don't like the composition.

And I think that if the photographer miss the ball is mostly because his (lack of) technique and not because the APS camera -he will probably miss the ball with the A900 too!

At least he got the action of the 1 goal...