telephoto lens suggestions - Vitacon

[Mark Shea]

One of the restrictions I find with the xf100 is the zoom. I tried the digital zoom but experienced soft focus.

I was wondering if anyone could suggest a good telephoto lens?

I'm currently in Singapore and was looking at some vitacon telephoto ( 2 x and 2.5x)

Does anyone use this brand, is it any good?

[Lou Bruno]

Save your money. Any telephoto lens will soften the picture plus vignetting. The camera does not offer interchangeable lenses thus adding glass atop glass will soften the picture.


Use the 1.5 digital zoom only and save money.

[Jim Martin]

Use either the Canon Tele-Converter or the Century......better glass and a proven track record.

Jim Martin
Filmtools.com

[Mark Shea]

tried the vitacon in the shop, there was a distinct fuzziness to the edge of the picture. Be good for weddings, but not much else

[Jim Martin]

Yep, with lesser glass, the softness shows up in the corners/edges.....its easy to do the middle.

Jim Martin
Filmtools.com

[Doug Bailey]

Hi Mark,
Fully agree with Lou. I shot some test footage with the XF100 & found the 1.5 tele in the menu retained sharpness. The 3.0 & up was too soft. Assigned a button to have instant tele when needed.
Regards,
Doug.

[Mark Shea]

thanks Doug and Lou
will stick to 1.5 tele setting

[Lou Bruno]

Good choice. Doug brings up a good point that I also do: Assign one of the settings to tele-photo. The 1.5 works well. All others, lose definition.

[Charles W. Hull]

Originally Posted by Lou Bruno

Good choice. Doug brings up a good point that I also do: Assign one of the settings to tele-photo. The 1.5 works well. All others, lose definition.

My experience is that you lose quite a bit at 1.5; when you shoot 1080 the results are about the same as shooting 720, or maybe a little less.

But I got excited, I've recently been shooting 720 60p with the XF 100 and I wondered if Canon was smart enough to just use the center 720 by 1280 pixels when you selected Tele-converter 1.5 (that would be the right ratio and would be fantastic). So I tested 720 60p at 1.5 and it is AWFUL! The algorithm must be something like to first drop rows and columns to get to 720 and then select the center 2/3 of that and interpolate back up to 720. The results would barely get you on YouTube.

But 720 60p itself with the XF100 is very nice; so I just orderd the Canon TL-H58 extender.

[Doug Bailey]

Hi Lou,
The assigning of a button for tele use came from one of your earlier posts, so all credit to you for a great tip. Watched your airshow movie on YT recently, beautiful work & thanks for sharing.
Regards,
Doug.

[Lou Bruno]

Thanks Doug. By the way, the 1.5 digital magnification was used in quite a few distance shots. No degradation with the 1.5. Putting glass on top of glass produces vignetting, edge softness and CA.

[Charles W. Hull]

Originally Posted by Charles W. Hull

... so I just orderd the Canon TL-H58 extender.

I've been using the TL-H58 1.5x extender with the XF100 for the last couple of weeks, mostly for surfing and windsurfing. The video quality is very good; I don't see any loss of quality with the extender. I sandwich a polarazing filter between the lens and the extender to control glare off the water.

With 1080p I can also add 1.5x tele-converter and get good results with a small amount of sharpening in post. This gives 684mm equivalent; pleanty for water sports.

No doubt the XF300 would be a better option since the zoom range is limited with the extender, but well, I have an XF100.

[Bo Sundvall]

Hi

Charles, is it possible for you to show some test videos with the tele adaptor on your XF100? Especially high detail/contrast scenes. It would be nice to see how such scenes look with the tele adaptor and to see how much artefacts the telephoto lens adds to the original picture. I have plans in the future to by a new camcorder and the XF100 is on my list of possible camcordes, but what holds me back is the small zoom range. I'm used to the XH-A1 650mm and the HV20 430mm tele. The XF100 will only have around 300mm (all 35mm equivalent) which I find to small for my needs. Unfortenately the XF300 is both too heavy and too expensive, so a XF100 with the tele adoptor might fit my needs better.


Regards,

/Bo

[Charles W. Hull]

Originally Posted by Bo Sundvall

Charles, is it possible for you to show some test videos with the tele adaptor on your XF100? Especially high detail/contrast scenes.

Bo, here are some jpegs cut from a quick video.
1. 304mm
2. With TL-H58 extender; 456mm
3. With TL-H58 extender and 1.5X Tele-converter, sharpened in post; 684mm

[Bo Sundvall]

Hi

Thanks for the pictures, I will check them out! On a first look they look absolutely OK.


Rgards,

/Bo