70-200 with 2 converters?

Timppa

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Hi!
Im wondering if someone has tried to combine a 70-200 2.8 lens with a 1.4. AND and 2.0 converter?

I would love to know the outcome of this, because it sounds a great solution for wildlife.

70-200 at 2.8
200-280 at 4
280-400 at 5.6
400-560 at 8

Any ideas?
Or do i just make it myself easy and find a sigma or tamron 150-600?
Or just 1x a 2.0 converter on a 70-200?

Thanks for advice! :)
 
Stacking a 1.4 and a 2x TCs will garner you an f/10. That's ungodly slow for shooting wildlife.

And I'd venture a guess the images will be useless, even with the best TCs available.
 
If you need that kind of range, I think you are better off buying the Nikon 200-500 5.6 VR. That's going to give you far better image quality than a 70-200 2.8 with stacked converters.

Honestly, I'd look into the 1.7x TC, it's a compromise. 340mm at f/4.8 I believe. Not too shabby.

I can't find many people that are generally happy with the 2x TCs. They just tend to hinder the image quality a lot more than the 1.4x and 1.7x converters.
 
I've also been looking at these. I've used some low end manuals in the past, and just wasn't thrilled with the results. A good quality one that supports full automatic operation for my camera is bumping $500. That's a good down payment on a zoom, so I would also be interested in comments from actual users.
 
Hi!
Im wondering if someone has tried to combine a 70-200 2.8 lens with a 1.4. AND and 2.0 converter?

I would love to know the outcome of this, because it sounds a great solution for wildlife.

70-200 at 2.8
200-280 at 4
280-400 at 5.6
400-560 at 8

Any ideas?
Or do i just make it myself easy and find a sigma or tamron 150-600?
Or just 1x a 2.0 converter on a 70-200?

Thanks for advice! :)

Oh I like this idea. It's like having a car wreck on a railroad crossing with a train speeding down the track toward the crossing.

Has anyone tried it. Undoubtedly YES. Do you wonder why you don't see posts talking about it? Because it didn't work.

TC's were designed for use on top quality long prime lenses. They can be used on top quality zooms with varied results.

Every time you put a TC on a lens it magnifies the image. It also magnifies the flaws in the lens it is attached too. What you are proposing to do is take a zoom lens, ad a TC to it to magnify the view and the problems including softening the overall IQ and then adding another TC to even further magnify the view as well as further magnify the problems of the lens including the already degraded IQ.

Add to that the three stops or more of light you will loose and at best you auto focus will be slow at worst it will be non existent.

If your idea worked well there would be no reason for lenses like a 400mm f2.8.
 
I should have given all my toughts :).
Indeed, stacking converters will remove a lot of sharpness, and maybe i just asked to much ^^. I really like the idea of having a 200-500 or 150-600. No messing about. But im also worried that shooting birds and wildlife in darker forests, will have to slow aperature. So having a 200mm 2.8 will help, but then there is not the reach... Getting the new nikon 300mm f4 sounds fantastic too, but thats the top of the budget and i still dont got the reach, i want to have at least 400+... If they could invent a 100-250 f2.8 with a doubler already on it (switch on or off), that would be just fantastic! :D
 
... If they could invent a 100-250 f2.8 with a doubler already on it (switch on or off), that would be just fantastic! :D
Ah, but they have (or close). Have you considered Sigma's 200-500/2.8 that includes a matched 2x teleconverter for 400-1000/5.6? It's the perfect match!
Sigma 200-500mm f/2.8
:1219:
 
I should have given all my toughts :).
Indeed, stacking converters will remove a lot of sharpness, and maybe i just asked to much ^^. I really like the idea of having a 200-500 or 150-600. No messing about. But im also worried that shooting birds and wildlife in darker forests, will have to slow aperature. So having a 200mm 2.8 will help, but then there is not the reach... Getting the new nikon 300mm f4 sounds fantastic too, but thats the top of the budget and i still dont got the reach, i want to have at least 400+... If they could invent a 100-250 f2.8 with a doubler already on it (switch on or off), that would be just fantastic! :D


Well, here ya go! The answer to all your prayers.
 
Very funny, i clearly wrote that nikon. 300 f4 is the price limit :p
 
I think that a better solution these days might be to use the better of the converters, and to then take the image file into post processing and up-scale the image in Photoshop in 10% size up-steps, until you've achieved double the image size. After the up-rezzing is done, correct lens errors like chromatic aberration and vignetting, and then crop the big image as needed.

The idea underlying this is to take a decent image, with the least amount of acceptable optical degradation, up-scale it, then make the final crop. This is kind of the way this used to be done back in the 2.7 and 4.2 megapixel d-slr days, back when Genuine Fractals or S-Pline were the up-rezzing apps of choice. Photoshop's bicubic interpolation does okay at up-rezzing in 10% steps.

But two converters on a 70-200? No way. My experience with the "old" 70-200 2.8 VR and the now-old TC-20e-II converter were not good at all. The Tc 14.e-II is pretty good, but the old lens needed to be closed down one stop from wide-open to get the corners acceptable even on DX.

NOW? Nikon has the world's first 2x TC with aspherical element design, and it is quite good on their big primes (200/2,300/2.8,400/2.8) and is allegedly very good on the "new" 70-200 VR, their Mark II variant of that lens.

You've got to TEST each converter on each specific lens, and see if it's good enough for your own uses and subjects: football players? Easy subject. Not a lot of fine detail, the action is the key; feathers small waterfowl? Detail is a requisite.

What you might not be considering is how high the megapixel and detail level actually is, today, with 24- and 36-MP Nikons...cropping and up-rezzing make more sense than adding a TC that will likely optically degrade the image. It's better to start with better image quality, up-rezz, and then crop.
 
The 300mm f/4 AF-S + the TC-14e-II is actually a very,very viable, affordable long-range option for anybody on a budget. it's a 420mm f/5.6 that is not that large in size.
 
So upscaling an image with 10% doesnt harm the picture? First time im reading this, it made me really interested!
The 300mm f4 with 1.4converter does sound extreemly attractive, but not in budget at this time. I guess i put it on hold for a while, and see what sigma, tamron and nikon will bring further this year. And if i can upgrade that budget :D
 
I was referring to upscaling about 100 percent, in 10 small steps. It's an old method.
 
I was referring to upscaling about 100 percent, in 10 small steps. It's an old method.

How much does this effect IQ?
 
It does pretty well. The key is starting with a GOOD image at the pixel level--and that eliminates the use of two, stacked converters, immediately. Look into "image resizing" on seach engines, and you will find some links.

Check out where Genuine Fractals and their original technology has ended up: ON1 Resize 10.5 – ON1, Inc.

Back in the early 2000's, up-rezzing images was VERY common among professional shooters, because back then we had digital cameras that basically, resolved wayyyyyy less than we have today, and they wanted big images, from 2.7 or 4.2 or 5.4 megapixel d-slr cameras.
 

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