Micro Four Thirds and manual focus?

[Russell Edwards]

Hello,

I'm keen to know whether any of you seasoned bird or wildlife photographers regularly use micro four thirds cameras and/or manual focus lenses?

I am looking at taking on one of Olympus's offerings in this format as my first serious foray into digital photography. There are a few reasons for this I won't bore you with here :). But I am curious as to whether a fringe benefit this outfit could be a reasonable means of entry into wildlife and bird photography, which I never seriously attempted in my film days.

Why I think it might offer bang for buck when it comes to birds/wildlife is the crop factor of 2 combined with easy adaptability of quality inexpensive old manual lenses (e.g. Nikkor). The field of view is doubled compared to 35mm format. So a 300mm f/5.6 gives the field of view of a 600mm on a 35 mm camera, with the speed of a 600/5.6 and the depth of field of a 600/11. Plus, the Olympus bodies have in-body image stabilisation.

Obviously the lack of AF is a distinct disadvantage, but I'm curious as to how much. I never had AF with my film SLRs; my sole experience of it is with a cheap point-and-shoot family snaps camera. In that context I find it very infuriating. It's Russian roulette as to which part of the field the camera chooses to place in focus. I would much rather it had a manual focus ring, and aperture ring, and shutter speed dial! I have no doubt DSLRs offer very much improved AF performance but I guess my real question is, how much harder is it with manual focus? Are things like birds in flight just a bit harder or do they become near-impossible?

At the end of the day if I found myself being seriously drawn into wildlife but hampered by MF, I could splurge on one of the native supertelephoto zooms with AF. I can't afford those initially--- plus in any case, apparently the Olympus' contrast-based AF despite improving greatly is still well behind phase-based AF of SLRs.

Anyway, there's my thoughts- I'm very interested to hear some input!

[Roger Clark]

Hello,

I'm keen to know whether any of you seasoned bird or wildlife photographers regularly use micro four thirds cameras and/or manual focus lenses?

I am looking at taking on one of Olympus's offerings in this format as my first serious foray into digital photography. There are a few reasons for this I won't bore you with here :). But I am curious as to whether a fringe benefit this outfit could be a reasonable means of entry into wildlife and bird photography, which I never seriously attempted in my film days.

Why I think it might offer bang for buck when it comes to birds/wildlife is the crop factor of 2 combined with easy adaptability of quality inexpensive old manual lenses (e.g. Nikkor). The field of view is doubled compared to 35mm format. So a 300mm f/5.6 gives the field of view of a 600mm on a 35 mm camera, with the speed of a 600/5.6 and the depth of field of a 600/11. Plus, the Olympus bodies have in-body image stabilisation.

Russell,
There is a lot of misconception over crop factor. This is so common these days, as one reads these misconceptions in photo books and magazines as well as on the web.

So to start, your statement that "a 300mm f/5.6 [on micro-4/3] gives the field of view of a 600mm on a 35 mm camera" is correct but should end there. It does not give the "speed" of a 600 f/5.6. Nor does it give the resolution on the subject of a true 600 mm lens,and there are misconceptions regarding depth-of-field. Look at the size of a real 600 f/5.6 lens: it would have a lens diameter of 600/5.6 = 107 mm. A 300 mm f/5.6 has an aperture of only 300/5.6 = 53.6 mm. That is a 4x light loss on the 300 f/5.6 compared to the 600 f/5.6. Finest detail resolvable on a subject is limited by clear aperture. The true 600 f/5.6 would deliver twice the resolution of a 300 f/5.6.

Some references with more on these subjects from my web site:

http://www.clarkvision.com/articles/does.pixel.size.matter/

http://www.clarkvision.com/articles/cropfactor/

http://www.clarkvision.com/articles/telephoto_reach/




Obviously the lack of AF is a distinct disadvantage, but I'm curious as to how much. I never had AF with my film SLRs; my sole experience of it is with a cheap point-and-shoot family snaps camera. In that context I find it very infuriating. It's Russian roulette as to which part of the field the camera chooses to place in focus. I would much rather it had a manual focus ring, and aperture ring, and shutter speed dial! I have no doubt DSLRs offer very much improved AF performance but I guess my real question is, how much harder is it with manual focus? Are things like birds in flight just a bit harder or do they become near-impossible?

At the end of the day if I found myself being seriously drawn into wildlife but hampered by MF, I could splurge on one of the native supertelephoto zooms with AF. I can't afford those initially--- plus in any case, apparently the Olympus' contrast-based AF despite improving greatly is still well behind phase-based AF of SLRs.

Anyway, there's my thoughts- I'm very interested to hear some input!

My recommendation for a starting wildlife photographer is (I know the Canon series, perhaps a Nikon user can chime in with an equivalent Nikon setup):

Canon T2i (or 6D or 7D) (18 megapixels)
300 mm f/4 L IS lens Or 400 mm f/5.6 lens (no IS).
1.4x teleconverter.

The T2i is the entry level, lowest cost DSLR. The 60D for amateurs, and 7D advanced amateur/pro. Even a T1i would do very well.

You could also buy older manual focus telephoto lenses for the canon (be sure to confirm compatibility), but I find manual focus, even with live view, difficult with telephotos because as you try and focus, the image is shaking. With the high magnification of the telephoto, that makes getting critical focus difficult, but not impossible at 300 mm.

Finally, if money is an object (I've been there too), try buying used. A used 40D or 50D and a used 300 f/4 or 400 f/5.6 can be quite reasonable. But in my opinion, going straight to a DSLR with phase detect autofocus will save you money in the long run and frustration in the short run. And with a DSLR you can grow into with a full set of lenses.

Good luck.

Roger

[subhrashis]

The nikon equivalent would be Any Nikon DSLR except D3000 with D3100, now discontinued D5000, D90, D7000 or D300(S) in increasing order of capability/luxury (but very good images possible even with the D3100).
The lens choices are a lot limited as of now compared to canon, with a non stabilized 300/4 AF-s + 1.4 or 1.7 TCs as the only option apart from 3 rd parties.

[Flavio Rose]

I believe that old Nikon lenses can be mounted on current Nikon bodies subject to the caveat set out here: http://www.bythom.com/lensacronyms.htm. However, old Canon (FD) manual focus lenses can't be mounted on current Canon bodies as far as I know.

Agreeing with Roger, I find live view manual focus somewhat difficult on my 7D. It is also for me difficult to get the lens properly pointed at the bird with live view compared to using the viewfinder. (Maybe that's just a matter of practice.) My manual focus experience is mostly with the 400 f/5.6 + 1.4tc, for which the regular autofocus on the 7D doesn't work. I wound up preferring to use manual prefocus through the viewfinder followed by live view autofocus.

I sort of imagine that using a micro 4/3 camera for birds would be similar to using my 7D in live view only.

A further possibility to think about if you go Canon is a used 300 f/4 non-IS. I very much endorse using a Rebel for static and slowly moving birds. You can even get good bird in flight photos as long as the bird is moving roughly parallel to the sensor plane.

[Desmond Chan]

Hello,

I'm keen to know whether any of you seasoned bird or wildlife photographers regularly use micro four thirds cameras and/or manual focus lenses?



Take a look at the photos taken with a Panasonic DMC-G1, a micro four thirds camera:


http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikewiz/