Thanks, Philippe, that's exactly how I've done it. The self-timer
eliminates the motion induced by my finger pressing the shutter, but the
mirror upswing and maybe even the shutter curtain may be causing motion.
The more I think about it I believe a heavier tripod will help immensely.
The lens + camera probably weighs more than the tripod, so I will give the
heavy surveyor tripod a go.
Charlie
On Mon, May 11, 2020 at 3:40 PM Philippe <photo.philippe.amard@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
> The more you extend the tripod, the more prone it is to vibration -
> collapse it all, and use the tilt-screen while squatting. Self-timer also
> helps.
>
> Amities
>
> Philippe
>
>
>
> > Le 11 mai 2020 à 21:37, Charles Geilfuss <charles.geilfuss@xxxxxxxxx> a
> écrit :
> >
> > Thanks for the info, Moose, and you could be right. I have only shot
> with
> > it on a tripod (Manfrotto aluminum with Markins ball head). I've taken
> some
> > pretty good images in the daytime, mostly wading birds, and as you point
> > out the contrast is low. But that easy to fix in Photoshop. In moon
> shots,
> > the image looks tack sharp in Live View and in the view finder but the
> > images are soft. I use a two second delay but the mirror seems to induce
> > camera shake. I may try mounting it on my telescope tripod which weighs
> > about 35 pounds.
> >
> > Charlie
> >
> > On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 11:51 PM Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> >
> >> On 5/7/2020 1:28 PM, Charles Geilfuss wrote:
> >>> I've been playing around with a recently acquired 600mm Vivitar Solid
> >> Cat.
> >>> Looking through it the images appear very sharp but camera shake is a
> >> bear.
> >>> Need to dig in the E-620 manual to figure out how to pre-fire the
> mirror.
> >>
> >> Are you sure it's that?
> >>
> >> 1. It's simply impossible to hand hold a 1200 mm eq. lens without IS, in
> >> this case IBIS.The IBIS in the E-620 is an
> >> early design, much less effective than later versions for µ4/3.
> >>
> >> DPR had this to say: "The E-620 doesn't have the top-tier IS system we
> saw
> >> in the E-30 but Olympus is still confident
> >> enough to claim a 4-stop advantage for this IS system (though our tests
> >> have never shown an improvement on that scale)."
> >>
> >> And "As you can see, [50 mm lens] there's a clear 2 stop advantage to
> the
> >> camera's IS system. While this isn't the best
> >> performance we've ever seen, it's enough to drastically increase the
> >> number of sharp, stable images you get."
> >>
> >> When I first started using two cameras around my neck in the field, one
> >> was an E-M5, for the 75-300 zoom. The other was
> >> an E-PM2 for the 12-50. I loved many aspects of the E-PM2, but in the
> end
> >> it became obvious that the IBIS wasn't up to
> >> the job, particularly for macro, which suffers from some of the same
> high
> >> magnification problems as long tele.
> >>
> >> The review of the E-PM2 doesn't mention IBIS. I suspect that, 3.5 years
> >> later, it's at least no worse than the E-620.
> >> With an F8 lens, I imagine you've not been using really high shutter
> >> speeds, either.
> >>
> >> 2. At that magnification, even the tiniest subject movement causes blur.
> >> With the recent advent of Topaz Sharpen AI,
> >> I've been impressed, occasionally amazed, at the improvement the
> Stabilize
> >> Mode has made in images where I would have
> >> credited some softness to lens quality and air movement.
> >>
> >> 3. Tripods are not all created equal. You may recall that Gary's lens
> >> tests didn't look so good for the 600/5.6 and
> >> 1000/11 OM Zuikos. He went so far as to use a lens support and/or two
> >> tripods, with the tripod legs frozen into the rink
> >> ice. He later said he had gotten much better results resting the lenses
> on
> >> heavy sandbags on the roof of a car.
> >>
> >> Walt was an advocate of bags of shotgun pellets resting on top of camera
> >> and lens. The common solution of hanging a
> >> weighty bag from the camera center column is not nearly as effective,
> >> especially with mid weight aluminum tripods.
> >>
> >> 4. Contrast! These lenses are low contrast. What we call sharpness is a
> >> technically undefined idea that combines parts
> >> of resolution, overall contrast and edge contrast. Take an image of a
> >> Yin/Yang symbol, manipulate contrast so white
> >> areas are 129 and black are 127, and it all appears to be neutral gray.
> >> Yet, resolution is exactly the same as if black
> >> is 0 and white 255.
> >>
> >> This effect is definitely going on with long shots with mirror lenses.I
> >> am, coincidentally, working up a demonstration
> >> of this on a moon photo. It's not so big a deal these days for those
> with
> >> post processing abilities, but it was a big
> >> deal in film days.
> >>
> >> The VivSCat is pretty low contrast. Here's a site where the guy
> summarizes
> >> the old PopPhoto mirror lens tests and adds
> >> his own MTF tests. Two of the mirror lenses I have, Sigma 600/8 and Oly
> >> 500/8 are included, along with your Vivitar.
> >> <
> >>
> https://jimchungblog.com/2017/03/07/the-most-ultimate-mirror-lens-shootout-in-the-world/
> >>>
> >>
> >> Low contrast tends to make photos look like they are not sharp.
> >>
> >> 5. Resolution. The PopPhoto tests make the Viv the lowest resolution,
> by a
> >> fair margin. The MTF tests aren't as
> >> different, perhaps a little lower than the Sigma 600. So it's not clear
> >> just how low it is, but its resolution is
> >> apparently not all that great. OTOH, I think my Sigma 600/8 is a pretty
> >> good lens, on a solid tripod, remote release, no
> >> wind, etc.
> >>
> >> Sooo . . . There are several factors that affect the final result, in
> some
> >> combination or other.
> >>
> >> And . . . If you want a mirror lens, especially for hand held, the OM
> >> 500/8 is the likely candidate.
> >>
> >> --
> >> What if the Hokey Pokey *IS* what it's all about?
> >> --
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> >>
> >>
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> >
>
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