Originally posted by Khukri Hullo everybody! I'm new in town. One of the reasons I'd say many people - like me - may consider a shift to Pentax (from say Canon/Nikon) would be the K10D's SR. But I see very little discussion on this subject of SR efficiency in hand held shooting vis-a-vis Canon's IS or Nikon's VR lenses - say 300mm IS or equivalent; or equually at the othe rend - macro range with a 100mm lens, hand held. May I request people with experience of both to shed light on this please? Thank you.
Advantages:
Works on all lenses including wide angle lenses
Can correct for rotational as well as lateral and verticle movement
Involves a relatively large movement and a heavy mass to move, so provides good precision for large displacement, slow movements
Does not compromise lens quality by adding extra elements that move relative to optical path.
Disadvantages:
Cannot see the effect of SR in viewfinder. This is possibly why some users dont find it as effective because they cannot "time" the precise moment to press the shutter.
Does not currently sense panning motion and allow for it (though may do so in another iteration).
Is less efficient at correcting for short, jerky motion than a tiny lens element that has a limited degree of movement and is very light.
Does not enable camera maker to charge 2X the price for adding it to your favourite lens
I'd say honours are even as to effectiveness, but expectations are possibly over the top. SR works less and less well (in terms of stops gained) the lower the shutter speed because the longer the viewfinder is blacked out the higher the chance you have of drifting off target.
SR can correct very well if you are wobbling around a steady midpoint (net angular drift = near 0) but if the mid point is also shifting its less effective because it eventually runs out of movement (net angular drift >0). If the VF is blacked out even for a 1/5 second, its possible to drift off target quite a bit...
On a 20mm lens, normal hand held speed would be 1/20. With SR you may get down to 1/10 quite reliably but thats only a stop. I've managed shots at 1/5 second but not with 100% success. Its still useful (an F4 lens at 1/10 and ISO1600 allows you to go pretty dark).
However on a 300mm lens normal recommended shutter speed is 1/300. In this case its perfectly possible to shoot down to 1/75 (2 stops) with excellent reliability and 1/40 (three stops) with a good success rate (around 60%). Net angular drift on such a short shutter opening is much less partly because the VF blackout is so much shorter and you can still se what your were aiming at.
Either way, in body SR is a great asset and a very cost effective solution. However, it really helps if you maintain technique (in other words do all the things you always would have done to get a steady shot and dont rely on the SR mechanism to make up for being sloppy - this is important because there is no VF feedback).
My own use would indicate its worth around 1 stop gain at wide angle and 3-4 stops at telephoto. Again these results are not valid if you are shooting macros when the depth of field is too small that even slight back and forth movement changes the focus point, but for subjects at a distance I'd say they are about right.