Pictures taken with Hila 2.2 Tele

[dpmonk]

After very disappointing results Ecomphoto store agreed to take back the Hila and ship a Panasonic 1.7 as I originally ordered. However they pointed out that I needed to set the FZ200 menu setting to Teleconverter.

So I am giving the lens another shot. Posting 3 pictures all taken at quite a distance. The owlet was extremely backlit and not much I could do about that. What I am looking for is opinions on the quality of the lens, Not the feeble attempts of the photographer.

[saly]

I'm sorry that this is not working out for you. And I'm not sure if I agree that you need to switch to Teleconverter mode. That forces the lens to zoom out beyond vignetting, and increases the image stabilization capability. I've tried both settings and saw no difference and prefer not to use it.

I recommend you trying shooting something stationery in the distance to check image quality.

[SIMON40]

Well,they look a tad soft,though given that the birds are buried in branches,tricky for the AF point- even using the small,center AF mode...!
As for the Fringing....ooh-er... looks like an old Fuji I once had...!
I had to try and fix the owl...!

[Tullio]

Sorry but those images look pretty bad to me. Lots of CA, lack of sharpness and funky colors. I'd return the lens w/o a doubt.

As for the teleconverter setting, it does what saly said. It does not help improve IQ in any way.

[Ozzie_Traveller]

G'day Paul

To expand on Saly & Tullio ~ the menu setting for "teleconverter' locks the lens into a minimum zoom of 3x [so that it is now 3x to 18x] so that there is no edge cutoff at 1x or 2x settings. Beyond 3x, it has no effect upon your shooting

As to the 2,2x lens - I would follow each above and return it as a non-starter
The colour fringing & overall lack of sharpness does not excite me at all

ps- if it's of any help, here's a link to another site that has some info [and sales stuff as well] about teleconverter lenses for the Panny. Maybe it will give you some extra info to talk with your local shop people

http://www.safari-guide.co.uk/panaso...rsion-lens.php


Hope this helps as well
Regards, Phil

[dpmonk]

Originally Posted by Tullio

Sorry but those images look pretty bad to me. Lots of CA, lack of sharpness and funky colors. I'd return the lens w/o a doubt.

As for the teleconverter setting, it does what saly said. It does not help improve IQ in any way.

Well I took about 150 pictures today. Most of them didn't turn out too well. Posting a couple of the better ones, but truth is I think the FZ200 with no converter would do better. I am sending the 2.2x back and will wait for the Panasonic 1.7. Seems like I could get decent pictures if I kept zoom to 600 or less, which would equal 1200 which the camera will do with iq zoom (but no cropping). The 2.2x converter looked pretty good through the viewfinder even up to the cameras max 1200mm. Makes for a pretty good telescope, unfortunately the pictures don't look like the viewfinder, if that makes any sense. Fortunately the camera store is giving me no problems about exchanging.

[saly]

Oh yeah, you need to send this back. You should be able to do much better.

[Ozzie_Traveller]

G'day Paul

Agree with your conclusions

If you are able to return & swap - all well & good
I had an even worse problem with the Canon converter lens I bought for my previous Canon SX-1 superzoom. It just gave me a small circular image with whopping vignetting ~ totally unfit for the purpose it was sold to me for.
The Canon Australia dealer refused to accept the lens back, despite many emails & phone calls ~ so $200+ of lens went into the bin sometime later. Needless to say my love for Canon {Australia} disappeared overnight

Regards, Phil

[Tullio]

These last two shots are slightly better than the first ones in terms of CA but I do see a lot of blue and green fringing particularly along the edges of the white birds. The overall IQ is still very poor. On the Egret shot you can see a funky swirl all around the center subject. The images are soft...not usable IMO.