[Rondec]

I don't think it's light for what it is (F/5.6), it certainly isn't airline friendly or hand-hold-friendly (too long), it was expensive, ridiculously so when I was in the market for a long lens, and although it might be usable wide open, so is the Sigma 500mm F/4.5, and the MFD is way too long, and as wide as it gets (only F/5.6) it still vignettes quite a bit on full frame.

No doubt photographers could use it to make great photos. But, for what I wanted, it checked basically none of the boxes.

That's fine. I don't really use long lenses, so a little beyond my ken. Others have said that it has a pretty fast t stop and so it ends up shooting at faster shutter speeds than you would figure based on its aperture. This from folks have shot both the Sigma 500mm and the Pentax FA 600 f4.

[normhead]

Man I hate arguments that say "perhaps" .

HD 560 x 1.5 crop factor = 840 with 1.4 TC = 1176... you want 1200mm, there ya go.

[BeerBelly]

I'm using the D750 + Tamron 150-600 combo at the moment and am happy with it. I also tested out the Sigma 150-600 Sports, but didn't see enough/any improvements in the long end to make me want to switch over. This is an example of the Tammy at 600mm and wide open. Non sharpened full image and 100% crop.





It's not the sharpest lens, but quite usable I would say even at wide open. Sigma 150-600 yields very similar results wide open and at 600mm.

[normhead]

Sounds good. What sport is your 'match'?

---------- Post added 05-13-15 at 01:13 PM ----------



I don't have a 750, that's the other poster. I'm considering a few different lenses. 400 f/5.6 has more subject isolation than 200 f/2.8 so that's not the problem, the problem is that using a 2x teleconverter doesn't help much over cropping, af speed suffers, etc.

I wonder though, is that because of the amount of light coming through the lens? How much worse is the AF at 400 ƒ5.6 than a dedicated prime would be?

[biz-engineer]

It's not the sharpest lens, but quite usable I would say even at wide open. Sigma 150-600 yields very similar results wide open and at 600mm.

Not bad. The full frame is less demanding in terms of resolution, the softness of the Tamron @ 600 is more visible on APS-C. From what I seems from many 100% crop @ 600mm from the Tamron 150-600 and Sigmas 150-600, they are about equally soft at 600mm. So it looks like the Sigma 150-600 S is considered higher quality more because of the build/sealing rather than optically.

[normhead]

I'm using the D750 + Tamron 150-600 combo at the moment and am happy with it. I also tested out the Sigma 150-600 Sports, but didn't see enough/any improvements in the long end to make me want to switch over. This is an example of the Tammy at 600mm and wide open. Non sharpened full image and 100% crop.





It's not the sharpest lens, but quite usable I would say even at wide open. Sigma 150-600 yields very similar results wide open and at 600mm.

Too bad we don't have a copy of the "sharpest lens" for comparison. I'd be really curious to know what an image taken with the "sharpest lens" would look like in comparison.

Since the Tamron 70-200 stacked up nicely in real world comparisons with both Nikon and Canon 70-200s, I'm really starting to wonder if a guy who uses his lenses part time and doesn't test the limits of the build quality or the lack of WR, actually gets anything using for buying expensive glass. It seems these days, a wider aperture and better build is what you pay for, not necessarily IQ/ And with Sigma and Tamron catching up in the build quality...

At some point you would expect computer lens design, to allow third party manufacturers to come up with some great product. Maybe these lenses are the start of that.

[normhead]

DFA 150-450 plus TC....
630mm @ ƒ8




Maybe a 150-600 would be better, but, the 150-450 is in the ball park.

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/10-pentax-slr-lens-discussion/299352-k3ii...-wildlife.html

After going through the images in the DFA 150-450, most of which are very sharp, I can't think of a reason why this lens wouldn't work with a 1.4 TC.

https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/122-lens-clubs/294721-post-your-hd-pentax...ctures-24.html

I'd love to see a thread on the 150-600 that's as good.

A few more 150-450 with 1.4 TC from Mike.P®







And one without the TC....


The TC doesn't seem to make a lot of difference to IQ, and definitely doesn't to auto-focus speed or anything line that, you might have to improve your technique to handle 630mm instead of 450.

---

Last edited by normhead; 10-07-2015 at 09:53 AM.

[Rupert]

Can anyone say why Sigma left Pentax out of the 150-600 Sport? I'd really like to have that lens.

I love what I see from the new Pentax 150-450, but most long shooters always want a little more range if available.

My 50-500 Bigma HSM OS fulfills my needs, I am no Pro and mostly just use my shots for card fronts, but more range is always tempting.

Getting the right light and enough of it is my main obstacle, and none of the long lens zooms are going to help me much there.


I have been thinking of the DA300 f4...many of my shots would be easier with f4 and since I crop most everything anyhow, it might serve for many of my shots in the ranges I mostly shoot. Of course, that is going backwards in the range argument....

Regards!

[normhead]

Funny how you consider 150-600 more reach, then say you would like ƒ4.

The Sigma 50-500 and 150-600 are 4.5 to 6.3. That DFA 150-450 is 4.5 to 5.6. 450 compared to 600 is about 33% more reach. 5.6 to 6.3 is about 33% more light. So 33% of one thing traded for 33% of another thing. You never get it all unless you pay the real big bucks.

[jppp]

Sounds good. What sport is your 'match'?

My 'normal' sport is football (the one with a round ball), but this year I shot a couple of matches of American football as well. It's a small sport in our small country, but from a photographer's point of view I found it interesting.

These ones were taken with Nikon D750 and Nikkor 70-200 VRII, some also with added Nikon 1.7x TC.









If I remember right, all of these were shot wide open, aperture being either 2.8 or 4.8 depending wether or not the TC was used.

A 70-200 lens is still too short to cover the pitch as well as I'd like, and I'm currently concidering my options. The latest addition to the list (Sigma, Tamron...) was of course the new Nikkor 200-500, which seems very interesting. I'm waiting eagerly for some test results, comparisons and pictures to show up online. And for historic reasons I'm also interested how the Pentax 150-450 fares against the others.

Weather sealing is one important point in this concideration. With the mentioned lenses, Sigma Sport is the only one which offers that option. Pentax is already out of the question when regarding sports shooting because I've already invested quite much into the Nikon system which offers vastly better AF.

For the record: coming from K-5 to D750 the AF system is from another world. I haven't calculated any persentages but the amount of in-focus images is up significantly. The focus tracking is simply amazing, whereas with the K-5 (and the old version of the Tamron 70-200) I had no chance of using the AF-C at all.

[Rupert]

Funny how you consider 150-600 more reach, then say you would like ƒ4.

I think I pointed that out Norm!

You never get it all unless you pay the real big bucks.

That is always a pretty good answer, and for good reason, it's a fact most of the time!

The question remains....anyone know why Sigma left out Pentax with the Sport?

Regards!

[ElJamoquio]

The question remains....anyone know why Sigma left out Pentax with the Sport?

Regards!

Same as always... not enough ROI.

[normhead]

The question remains....anyone know why Sigma left out Pentax with the Sport?

My guess is they are losing money on everything they have in a Pentax mount, and what they do have, they are just selling off existing stock. If they thought they could cover costs including paying the shareholders a decent rate of return and make $5,000 in profit, they'd go for it.

[reeftool]

Not having the recent 150-600's available in K mount is disappointing. I'm just glad I snagged the 150-500 while it was still available. I'm happy with the results I'm getting from it.

I seriously entertained the thought of picking up a used D300 at KEH to use as a long lens solution. They are around $350 right now and there would be no lack of long telephotos. The problem is, I just can't afford them so I was going to end up with the same choice of Sigma lenses I was currently looking at. Sigma put the 150-500 on sale for $769 about the same time they announced the 150-600's. I went the cheapest way and I'm not complaining. If I hadn't bought the 150-500 when I did, buying a used D300 and a 150-600C would have been a considerable savings over the DFA 150-450 and even a bit cheaper than 50-500 Bigma in K mount. We are rapidly loosing third party lenses for Pentax cameras and that is disturbing. The 150-600 Sport is out of my budget range as is the Pentax 150-450.

BTW, I did shoot Nikon in the film days and still have some Nikon glass which my daughter, who shoots Nikon, still uses so it wouldn't have been a total switch of systems. I spent more money fixing my last Nikon camera than it originally cost and the experience left me with a bad taste. That was the principal reason I went home to Pentax when I went digital and also the fact that my 35 year old Spotmatic ( even older now) still worked.

[dc1500]

I think you'll find that all of the above mentioned combinations will produce high quality sharp images. Nevertheless I went for a mid range Nikon body(D5300) and the Sigma 150-600mm 'C' ,(Combo cost me just over £1100 new) I kept my existing K3 DA*300 + Pentax 1.4TC. The main reason I went for this combination was wanting action wildlife on a budget.
So far I would say focusing speed, tracking, stabilisation are,sadly, in a different league to the Pentax combination! And if the Sport version is sharper it must be one hell of a lens because this combination, after his slight cropping to get same image size, is matching my mates Canon 7D(ii) plus 100-400L (new). IQ is as good or better at full reach than the Pentax +TC combo.
The best IQ is probably still the DA*300mm on its own and where focus and reach aren't an issue, and throw in f4, I would use that, especially as the K3 is a superior camera.
Dave