Will This Print On Faa?

The cardinal does not appear to be in focus.

It is pretty soft that's why I was wondering if it would even print. I Tried to sharpen it, but it only adds noise, and then of course when you reduce the noise it softens it more, which I did soften it a little because increasing the clarity added some noise.

Does anyone use Tamron or Signa 500 mm lenses? How do you rate their quality. I'd rather get a Carl Zeiss 500 mm, but can't afford that.

its a tough call, the bird isn't in focus and there is a lot of aberration. you may want to run it through a painter filter. and while your at it, remove the lower right branch in the corner and don't center it like that.

i like tamron lenses because of the long warranty they have on them. i have a sigma 180macro, and didn't like it that much. it was hard to clean the lens due to the metal around the lens cutting my cloth apart.

but this has more to do with spot focus, too many branches in the way, or the lens is back or front focusing.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

My old Sigma 17 to 70 mm turned me off of any lens that isn't a Canon. It killed more than a few shots of mine due to softness. I had a friend who swore by Tamron though.

Mike - When you say painter filter - are you referring to giving it a filter that makes it look like a painting such as an Oil Painting?

I've heard that Tamron is better and have questioned the glass on a Sigma. Some around here like Sigma, but I someone who likes Carl Zeiss lenses, etc. I took with is a Sony 70-200 mm and think a lot of the issues have to do with using the teleconverter and I didn't have a tripod on hand when I saw him. Plus, I took it through the kitchen window.

I'll try making it look like a painting (digital art). Maybe the only way it would work.

yeah, i use DA PAINTER. its perfect for images that aren't in focus but to much of a shame to toss. or noisy and cursed images. this kind of thing may look better painterly.

i think the lenses are about the same in quality. i think sigma either has a harder plastic body or a metal one, where as tamron is usually plastic. but it's what i've been using and while slow, it does the job. it's a 28-300vc in case your wondering.

if there was a screen in the way that would create some blur. but the window itself may mess up the metering. in any case for things like this i put it on the smallest spot focus and it should get just the bird.

---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

i think if you have really good glass, anything in comparison will look bad. if i had the arm strength, room and money, i'd go for canon. they have my same lens in an 8lb model that's a mere $4000 or something like that. it was enough to say... oh how interesting, click... closed.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

Lol... I hear you Mike. The lens I'd like to have is over $10,000. Doesn't look like I'll ever own that one. Okay, I'll remove the photo. Will be tomorrow before I can post a new one. Is that Da Painter something I can get online? I have a landscape photo that I was just working on a few days ago, and I made it look like an oil painting in Gimp. Thought it looked pretty cool. I haven't uploaded it yet, but will soon.

Thanks Joseph. A bad lens will kill anything. I'll just stay away from Sigma which is my main thought to do anyways.

http://www.mediachance.com/dap/

its a little tricky to use at first, but you can save your own profiles, but you have to load them up each time the program runs. the plus side, is you can save it as a 32mp image now, so you can take tiny images and make them larger.

i think sigma has the 50-500 bigma - and many do like that large heavy lens. seems to take good pictures from what i remember.


---Mike Savad
MikeSavad.com

New Sigma lens:

http://www.shutterbug.com/content/sigma-debuts-24mm-f14-art-lens-and-150-600mm-contemporary-lens-hands-photos

Thanks Mike and Jessica. I'll look into these. I saw a brief youtube video on DA Painter. It did look tricky to learn. I'll give it a try. If not, I'll just go to Gimp.

While I don't own one, I recently rented the Tamron 150-600mm f/5-6.3 SP Di VC for my Canon 70D. I really liked it. Most of my shots were taken at f8, handheld. It is fairly heavy so if you are shooting in lower light, you many need a tripod for shots but I didn't have a problem on a fairly sunny day. I rented from Lensrentals.com which has pretty reasonable rates that include return shipping. They were really easy to use. Maybe try renting the lens if you aren't sure you want to make a commitment to purchase yet. These are a couple photos I took with the lens.

I really like the Sigma 150-500 lens mostly for birding - if I could afford the Canon I definitely would but not in my budget.

@Kristia= where do you rent your lenses from?

I used Lensrentals.com. They shipped the lens FedEx Ground (or will do UPS for a fee). They provide you with a return label so at the end of your rental, you just box it up in the same box it came in and drop off at a Fed Ex facility or shipping store.

Those are nice Kristia. I've played with one before in the camera store so I do know how heavy they are which is something I know I'm not looking forward to. My camera bag is heavy enough. That's going to pull me backwards with that addition. Lol

Debbie do you have any softness issues like I've heard a lot of others talk about? Tamron & Sigma are about the same price.

Thank you Jennifer! One reason that I decided not to buy it was because it is so heavy and I don't really want to carry it around all the time. I think I will just stick to renting it a few times a year when I want to do a birding trip. Because of its size, it wasn't easy to quickly switch lenses so if I were to take it out shooting, I think I would just stick to that lens for the day. I don't see myself using it quite enough to bite the bullet and buy it.

There is a review of the tamron on luminous landscape, and they are impressed by it. Now they only need to make It with m43 mount.

Jennifer this image was shot handheld with the Sigma at 500mm - I have noticed a slight softness but, for me, it is the best for the price and I am happy with it, although it is heavy

I use a 70-200 lens with a 1.7 teleconverter for a lot of my bird photos and the combination works really well for me. How close were you to the bird? I'm able to get pretty close to the birds about 8 to 10 feet away generally by shooting through a window. I have bird feeders hung in the area of a tree near the window so it brings them closer in to me. You might do better with your lens/ teleconverter combo if you can get the birds to come closer to you. I agree with Mike, this one would look better if you did some sort of painter program on it since it it isn't very detailed so you could go with it and just take it in the other direction to make it look more like a painting.

Ok, so after 3 1/2 hours, this is what I came up with. I downloaded the trial of DA Painting, however it puts their logo on it so I couldn't use it. I ended up using several Artistic mixes form Gimp. I used Oilify and Cartoon. Also added a Canvas Texture to help sharpen it a little bit. I then went through and cleaned out the Aberration and drew in some outlines that the cartoon filter didn't get along with other drawing affects to make it more painting like. What do you think? Will this one print. I left the other one up for comparison.



Lara - I was probably 25 -30 ft away. That's the closest tree to the back of my house and we also have bird feeders, water baths, etc.

Kristia - I understand on switching lenses. I wish they'd come up with an affordable good quality lens that goes from say 50 - 500, but I've only heard bad things about the ones that are out there. I have 2 camera's, so when I go on vacation, I don't have to switch lenses, I just carry both on me and use which one a need. I have one with a wide angle, and the other a zoom. Makes it so much easier especially when you don't have time to switch lenses. But, the weight does concern me.

Thanks Steven, I'll check it out.

I like this new version much better! It got rid of the fringing and now looks like a painting. :)

I think you could highlight the bird a bit more so its not in shadow

Thanks. I've already highlighted the bird quite a bit. It was taken early in the morning so he was dark to begin with. I haven't tried highlighting him since I converted it over to digital painting. I can play with it at lunch.

The one you did with the gimp stuff will print. The first one the ghost around the tree branches bothers me more than the bird.

Thanks David. It bothered me too. I think it was because I took it through a window.

I found an older Tamron 200-500 for $549!!! The reviews all seem great, but I am concerned about it being older/used, and some did say it had somewhat had slower focus and softness at 500 with larger aperture, however smaller apertures worked better. Anyone have experience with this older lens? I did watch a Tony Northup review on the 150-600 lens which seemed soft compared to the Canon lens. However Kristia's photos above don't look to bad. That one is $500 more than the 200-500.