[Mike.P®]

Chuckle!

I already have the D FA 150-450mm lens. (It arrived on Wednesday). I've pre-ordered the K-3 II. I hope it arrives in time for me to use the combination at the RAF Cosford Airshow on 14th June! I will be going to several UK airshows with this combination over the summer.

I'll try to remember to post about it to these forums.

I have nothing until RIAT so have a few months before I need to jump .... I will be watching your posts with interest.

[Zygonyx]

Just another point for those thinking Sigma zooms are "2 to 3 times cheaper"...

D-FA 150-450 : full aperture switch from F/4.5 to 5.6 is set between 270 and 290mm recorded values.

DG EX 50-500 : same switch is set btw 100 and 115mm.
F/5.6 to 6.7 is set btw 270 and 310mm.

That's a quite signifiant difference.

[Zygonyx]

In addition to the K-S2 and K-3 (still bugged), this lens is now full functionnal with K-S1 due to FW 1.10 just released.
I wouldn't have thought of it
The good things is that it works fine and keeps the data even if you shut off the body.
That's a really interesting function for wildlife shooting, for example in a hide, as the return to whished AF position is speediest than when you have to re-focus, though not "beeping" once AF is OK.
Well done Ricoh !

[wkraus]

I've postet some samples in the dedicated picture thread: https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/122-lens-clubs/294721-post-your-hd-pentax...ml#post3245645

And here I have some comparison shots (F/5.6 and F/8) at 450mm. Camera was on a sturdy tripod. I used a remote control and 3 sec MU. No additional sharpening applied.
First the whole picture an then some 100% crops:

The distance to the tower was about 2,5 km.
As you can see, the lens is sharp, but slightly "hazy" (for the lack of a better word) at F/5.6.

I'm late to reply but then no one has commented this so far...
Thanks for the samples! I'm wondering if there isn't some motion blur involved in these images. I think it is there on both shots, but a lot more on the wide open image. Incidentally, I found that my very sturdy Manfrotto tripod (about 4.5 kgs) is next to unusable with the DA* 300mm in portrait orientation, although in landscape orientation it is doing fine. So with tripod vibrations--essentially a form of resonance--a lot of factors matter. The fact that you have a twice longer exposure on the f/8 shot can help a lot. In my analog days I ran a test with my LX and the lowly M 200mm--a very lightweight combination which nevertheless meant trouble for the tripod I used at the time, not a bad one either. Vibrations were worst around 1/250 and 1/125, but much better at 1/60 and essentially gone at 1/30.

[wisent]

I'm late to reply but then no one has commented this so far...
Thanks for the samples! I'm wondering if there isn't some motion blur involved in these images. I think it is there on both shots, but a lot more on the wide open image. Incidentally, I found that my very sturdy Manfrotto tripod (about 4.5 kgs) is next to unusable with the DA* 300mm in portrait orientation, although in landscape orientation it is doing fine. So with tripod vibrations--essentially a form of resonance--a lot of factors matter. The fact that you have a twice longer exposure on the f/8 shot can help a lot. In my analog days I ran a test with my LX and the lowly M 200mm--a very lightweight combination which nevertheless meant trouble for the tripod I used at the time, not a bad one either. Vibrations were worst around 1/250 and 1/125, but much better at 1/60 and essentially gone at 1/30.

Thanks for your reply! I will have to look into that. Maybe I need to retest with some sort of beanbag/ricebag instead of a tripod.
But the thing is, that at least my copy of the 150-450 lacks a bit of sharpness at F/5.6. I can see it not only in my test shots, but in the "everyday shots" too. As soon as I switch to F/6.3, the pictures get sharper. I even tried it with very short exosure times (1/1600-1/3200). That's why I don't think it's (only) motion blur. Looking through the pictures other people have taken with this lens wide open, I wonder if my copy is not as good as it could be.

I did a comparison today with my Sigma 100-300mm and the Pentax 150-450mm. Both at about 300mm and both wide open (Sigma F/4, Pentax F/5.6). The Sigma is considerably sharper wide open. That got me thinking. Both are 3x zooms, so I would expect the Pentax to be similar to the Sigma regarding sharpness wide open. For twice the price...
Just for fun I also tested the HD 55-300mm. It is way worse than the other two.

[Stavri]

Thanks for your reply! I will have to look into that. Maybe I need to retest with some sort of beanbag/ricebag instead of a tripod.
But the thing is, that at least my copy of the 150-450 lacks a bit of sharpness at F/5.6. I can see it not only in my test shots, but in the "everyday shots" too. As soon as I switch to F/6.3, the pictures get sharper. I even tried it with very short exosure times (1/1600-1/3200). That's why I don't think it's (only) motion blur. Looking through the pictures other people have taken with this lens wide open, I wonder if my copy is not as good as it could be.

I did a comparison today with my Sigma 100-300mm and the Pentax 150-450mm. Both at about 300mm and both wide open (Sigma F/4, Pentax F/5.6). The Sigma is considerably sharper wide open. That got me thinking. Both are 3x zooms, so I would expect the Pentax to be similar to the Sigma regarding sharpness wide open. For twice the price...
Just for fun I also tested the HD 55-300mm. It is way worse than the other two.

I don't own the 150-450 thus I wouldn't presume to know fist-hand what it's like wide open (I just view the images posted with the lens), but I had the Sigma 100-300/f4 (and lots of other telephoto lenses 400mm telemacro, 300/f2.8, F* 300/f4.5 just a few) The 100-300/f4 was not sharp at 300mm wide open, in fact it renders very similarly to the 70-200/f2,8 HSM II @ 200/f2.8 (low contrast images with a glow) the F* 300/f4.5 for instance was much much sharper at f4.5. I suggest you test the 150-450 for user error (focus issues) because from what I've seen this lens is off the charts ( on one recent test done by a member @ f/6.3 it was sharper than the Ex 500/f4.5 @ f8.0...)

It looks to me that at the moment the D-FA 150-450 is the second best telephoto lens in production (DA 560 being the first)

[wisent]

I don't own the 150-450 thus I wouldn't presume to know fist-hand what it's like wide open (I just view the images posted with the lens), but I had the Sigma 100-300/f4 (and lots of other telephoto lenses 400mm telemacro, 300/f2.8, F* 300/f4.5 just a few) The 100-300/f4 was not sharp at 300mm wide open, in fact it renders very similarly to the 70-200/f2,8 HSM II @ 200/f2.8 (low contrast images with a glow) the F* 300/f4.5 for instance was much much sharper at f4.5. I suggest you test the 150-450 for user error (focus issues) because from what I've seen this lens is off the charts ( on one recent test done by a member @ f/6.3 it was sharper than the Ex 500/f4.5 @ f8.0...)

It looks to me that at the moment the D-FA 150-450 is the second best telephoto lens in production (DA 560 being the first)

I tried my best to eliminate user error. On all my sharpness test shots I used CDAF to ensure right focus. I even focused manually on some additional ones, using the LV magnification funktion.
Maybe my copy of the lens is below average.
Just as your copy of the Sigma 100-300mm must have been, because mine is quite good wide oben.

[Stavri]

I tried my best to eliminate user error. On all my sharpness test shots I used CDAF to ensure right focus. I even focused manually on some additional ones, using the LV magnification funktion.
Maybe my copy of the lens is below average.
Just as your copy of the Sigma 100-300mm must have been, because mine is quite good wide oben.

Feel free to post a wide open shot of the Sigma 100-300/f4 (and i'll post one of mine...for comparison)

[JinDesu]

Hooray for sample variations

[Stavri]

I've owned a lot of legacy Ex primes. 50, 85, 70-200, 100-300, 180/f3.5, 300/f2.8 so I am just wondering how good his copy of 100-300 is, a Sigma Ex legacy glass that's almost 10 years old having better sharpness and contrast than the D-Fa wide open.

[JinDesu]

Stay out of this

No fun...

But that being said, seeing the resolution from the other user's 150-450, perhaps wisent should consider having his checked out or swapped at the place of purchase. Sometimes it could be a very tiny misaligned element that changes everything.

[Shanti]

I tried my best to eliminate user error. On all my sharpness test shots I used CDAF to ensure right focus. I even focused manually on some additional ones, using the LV magnification funktion.
Maybe my copy of the lens is below average.
Just as your copy of the Sigma 100-300mm must have been, because mine is quite good wide oben.

Hi can you say where you bought it & serial #. if there is a bad batch perhaps? my DA*300 was off from new & needed adjustment,more than the in camera AF adjust could do
at that price it must be perfect

[Nicolas06]

Wait, I don't get those ISO ideas at all. If we have two lenses that are f2.8, but one is is t2.8 and the other is t4 (for sake of argument), the camera would just choose a higher ISO or longer shutter to match the same EV, the same histogram curve. So you would end up with the same image, just different metering/settings. I mean, if the lens is darker, than the metering wouldn't know whether its lens or light conditions, so it would choose the settings that would give the desired overall EV. One lens and another would only expose differently if you were in M mode and kept the same shutter, aperture, and ISO. Then t4 would produce a darker image. But it would only bring more noise if you chose to set a higher ISO, or use PP to brighten it. Neither of these is affected by lens. The only way a lens could affect noise directly is if one lens would be radioactive to the point that it would affect the sensor (unlikely, I don't think thats how physics work) or if it would block incoming noise from outside of the camera. These two are both based on the premise that outside things can affect the noise performance. Now, maybe heat can affect noise, but this is usually ambient heat and sensor-generated heat, so again the lens would have next to no effect.
I am curious about this, maybe someone can link to research or an article. I did in the past think that some lenses are a little noisier than others, but I think that was just before I understood EV and didn't know that the f4.5-5.6 lens would use a higher ISO than the f2.8 lens in the same ambient light



Wonderful! Looks like the lens is a winner, at least in good hands!

High isos wash out small details in noise... Lenses do the same to a different extent. When we see sharpness results for example we usually keep look at the number for 50% sharpness. That you have some high contrast black and white scene and the lense transform them into ligh gray, dark gray scene due to loss of contrast. If you accept this level of degradation you'll still be able to see say 50 lines per mm. But if you don't accept to loose 50% contrast but only 10% you'll get only 35 lines per mm.

If you take a higher end, better performing lense, it will keep more of the initial signal strength than a lower end lens... At least, that's one factor to get a better lense. In both case the signal will go through the high iso setting but if the signal is clean enough there still be some signal visible in the noise. If the signal is already heavily degraded with the addition of iso noise it might be completely lost.

Say you look at some feathers with 10% constrast on the original image. There is just a few tones differences. This is the very fine detail you only see at @100 crop but that's a setting birders use all the time because they really need more a 2000mm than a 300mm! One lens keep 50% of this small detail, the other 20%, this give us 5% contrast on the final image for one lense, 2% for the other lense. The 5% contrast will wash out completely at some iso setting while the 2% contrast will disapear at a lower iso setting.

When you add good light, you can lower the iso (maybe even to iso 100) and you also increase the overall contrast of the image. On the initial scene with bad light the initial contrast might be only a mere 2-3% while the same feather will appear much more contrasty at maybe 10% in good light.

That why routinely a medium quality lense will still perform much better in good light at low iso than a great lense in bad light at high iso. But if you have the same conditions, the better lense will give better results. The conclusion through is that in some circonstances it might be better to think of getting better gear (if it too difficult to improve shooting conditions) or that in other cases it much better to improve the shooting conditions...

All the blury, low constrast heavy crop with cromatic aberation shoots we see with very expensive gear, especially from birders show that you can have the best gear in the world, it will simply not replace working in good conditions. It get you a bit more at the same settings, no more.

[Chris Mak]

High isos wash out small details in noise... Lenses do the same to a different extent. When we see sharpness results for example we usually keep look at the number for 50% sharpness. That you have some high contrast black and white scene and the lense transform them into ligh gray, dark gray scene due to loss of contrast. If you accept this level of degradation you'll still be able to see say 50 lines per mm. But if you don't accept to loose 50% contrast but only 10% you'll get only 35 lines per mm.

If you take a higher end, better performing lense, it will keep more of the initial signal strength than a lower end lens... At least, that's one factor to get a better lense. In both case the signal will go through the high iso setting but if the signal is clean enough there still be some signal visible in the noise. If the signal is already heavily degraded with the addition of iso noise it might be completely lost.

Say you look at some feathers with 10% constrast on the original image. There is just a few tones differences. This is the very fine detail you only see at @100 crop but that's a setting birders use all the time because they really need more a 2000mm than a 300mm! One lens keep 50% of this small detail, the other 20%, this give us 5% contrast on the final image for one lense, 2% for the other lense. The 5% contrast will wash out completely at some iso setting while the 2% contrast will disapear at a lower iso setting.

When you add good light, you can lower the iso (maybe even to iso 100) and you also increase the overall contrast of the image. On the initial scene with bad light the initial contrast might be only a mere 2-3% while the same feather will appear much more contrasty at maybe 10% in good light.

That why routinely a medium quality lense will still perform much better in good light at low iso than a great lense in bad light at high iso. But if you have the same conditions, the better lense will give better results. The conclusion through is that in some circonstances it might be better to think of getting better gear (if it too difficult to improve shooting conditions) or that in other cases it much better to improve the shooting conditions...

All the blury, low constrast heavy crop with cromatic aberation shoots we see with very expensive gear, especially from birders show that you can have the best gear in the world, it will simply not replace working in good conditions. It get you a bit more at the same settings, no more.

I have the DA560 and owned the Sigma 500/4.5 for two years. My experience is that the modern Pentax lenses resolve finer detail than the older Sigma lenses, but sample variation may play a bigger role with medium priced zoom tele lenses, than it does with high end prime lenses.
You say some very sensible things here, especially with crop sensors, the circumstances are going to play a big role in getting good results. High iso and flat, low contrast light are a recipy for loss of image quality with Apsc crop sensors in particular.
In this context, the DA560 has a big advantage in that it apparently has very high light transmission. I routinely use t-av mode with this lens, shutter time set at 1/400s and aperture at f7.1. In normal good daylight it leaves me with 75% of my images at iso 100, and properly lit. This is a huge advantage over my Sigma 500/4.5 + 1.4tc combo at the same aperture: I never had this low iso results. I did not scientifically test this, but it's obvious that the DA560 has very high light transmission. Images are plain better at iso 100-200 than at higher iso values: more color depth and better tonality to start with.
The new HD DFA 150-450 may have similar quality glass and coatings, but it will not have the same high light transmission, so the DA560 will have a head start under similar circumstances, certainly when the DFA 150-450 needs the 1.4tc to match the reach.
I would not compare these lenses, they are made with a very different use in mind. The DA560 is my thing, but the DFA 150-450 is a very versatile wildlife/sports lens, not a dedicated high end birding lens.

Chris

[derekkite]

I have the DA560 and owned the Sigma 500/4.5 for two years. My experience is that the modern Pentax lenses resolve finer detail than the older Sigma lenses, but sample variation may play a bigger role with medium priced zoom tele lenses, than it does with high end prime lenses.
You say some very sensible things here, especially with crop sensors, the circumstances are going to play a big role in getting good results. High iso and flat, low contrast light are a recipy for loss of image quality with Apsc crop sensors in particular.
In this context, the DA560 has a big advantage in that it apparently has very high light transmission. I routinely use t-av mode with this lens, shutter time set at 1/400s and aperture at f7.1. In normal good daylight it leaves me with 75% of my images at iso 100, and properly lit. This is a huge advantage over my Sigma 500/4.5 + 1.4tc combo at the same aperture: I never had this low iso results. I did not scientifically test this, but it's obvious that the DA560 has very high light transmission. Images are plain better at iso 100-200 than at higher iso values: more color depth and better tonality to start with.
The new HD DFA 150-450 may have similar quality glass and coatings, but it will not have the same high light transmission, so the DA560 will have a head start under similar circumstances, certainly when the DFA 150-450 needs the 1.4tc to match the reach.
I would not compare these lenses, they are made with a very different use in mind. The DA560 is my thing, but the DFA 150-450 is a very versatile wildlife/sports lens, not a dedicated high end birding lens.

Chris

If I remember correctly the design of the DA560 has relatively few elements. Each element reflects or absorbs a bit of light. The coatings and fewer elements would give you a lower Iso in the same conditions.