On Tuesday, October 30, 2001, at 07:19 PM, tom wrote: > David Hatfield wrote: >> >> I still say, though, that what you're doing with five lenses I can do >> with >> two. Since I don't own any of the lenses you mention I can't speak >> from >> first hand experience, but I still contend that with proper >> photographic >> technique in place we can take comparable shots, enlarge to 11x14 or >> 16x20 >> and there won't be any discernible difference in quality, contrast or >> sharpness even to the most critical eye from a normal viewing distance. > > Have you ever actually done this?
When I was at Sterling, we ran a 200mm shootout. The contestants were mostly in Pentax mount, since the person who wanted to know which lens was best at 200mm was looking for a tele for their MZ-10. The lenses were: Sigma 70-210 AF (the cheap one) Pentax 80-200 AF (not the 2.8...forget what the aperture is) Pentax 80-320 AF Sigma 70-300 AF (the Super one, as I recall) Pentax A* 200mm f2.8 (mine) Tokina 80-200(ish) f2.8 (the boss') Those last two were in there for a bit of friendly rivalry. So, the camera (an MZ-5, I believe, except for the Tokina, which was in Nikon mount on an F90) was on a tripod, shutter tripped via self timer to avoid shake. We shot each lens wide open, f8 and f22. The resulting images were printed 4x6, marked on the back as to which lens they were from, separated into aperture groupings (i.e. all the wide opens together) and then those piles were shuffled. Then we asked customers all week long which looked to be the sharpest pictures. Well, the Tokina and the A* were hard to tell apart, but were the clear winners. The Sigmas were in the middle of the pack, with the Pentax 80-200 above them and the 80-320 below. None stank at 4x6, though the Sigma 70-210 showed a decided lack of contrast. But the only zoom that wasn't easily identifiable as definitely less sharp on a 4x6 print than the A* prime was the expensive Tokina. -Aaron - This message is from the Pentax-Discuss Mail List. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.pdml.net and follow the directions. Don't forget to visit the Pentax Users' Gallery at http://pug.komkon.org .
