Contemplating the new Tamron 150-600, thoughts or suggestions?

kenerickson · May 7, 2014

I am contemplating purchasing the new Tamron 150-600 lens for my Sony A77 body. For me, this is a major purchase, price wise. I am looking for thoughts as to how much of an improvement I might see under the same shooting circumstances compared to the telephoto zoom I am using now.

The lens I have now is a Tokina 75-300 4.5-5.6 that I purchased used from the large online auction house.
Assuming I took this same picture under the same lighting/distance etc, with the Tamron what can I expect as far as sharpness etc.

shutter speed 1/160
F6.3
iso 640
300 mm focal length
The distance was about 30 yards, 7:30 pm so the light was starting to wane a bit.
Cropped about 1/3 out of the original
Shot with a window mount from a stationary vehicle.

I know what I am asking is very subjective in nature but I would appreciate any and all thought.

dxqcanada · May 7, 2014

That image does not look very in-focus/sharp. If this is a typical example of your lens, I would suspect the new Tamron would be better.
My wife's Tamron 200-500mm is much sharper than your image with the same crop, using the Sony A57.

wyogirl · May 7, 2014

you can always rent the lens to find out before you buy it.

BGeise · May 7, 2014

I think we are all waiting for some reviews to come out for the Sony. I would like to get one too. But i would imagine your IQ would be better than your current lense

kenerickson · May 8, 2014

Thanks for the feedback! I agree about my photos with the Tokina never seem sharp or a tad out of focus.

kenerickson · May 10, 2014

I was out and about with my A77 and Tokina today. I shot in raw, and turned off auto-focus and used focus peaking in manual focus mode. Marked difference in sharpness I think, although I had more light. It makes me wonder if a lens can fool a sensor when in auto-focus mode or are these pictures much sharper because of the light and shooting in raw?

dxqcanada · May 15, 2014

If you get better results in MF ... maybe you need to play with the micro focus adjustment.
You should continue to shoot in raw.
Is you peaking level at high? The second shot missed the bird and got the grass in front.

kenerickson · May 15, 2014

Dennis,
I have my peaking level set on "high" "yellow".
Please explain micro focus adjustment?

dxqcanada · May 15, 2014

I don't have an A77, but ... How to micro adjust autofocus on Sony SLT77 | Art-ville Photography

If you have the peaking level high then you can get too much indicated in focus.

kenerickson · May 15, 2014

Dennis,

Thanks so much for the info and link! Very interesting indeed. A feature that my A77 has that I had no idea of, or how it worked.

nzmacro · May 16, 2014

Yes missed the focus point in a couple of shots . Nice shots BTW, just a little more practise in MF.

I use the Sony NEX-7, only MF lenses here (Canon FD) and use focus peaking set on low with yellow. On low it picks out a much finer contrast point to focus on, rather than on high where too much seems to show and its not as accurate. You do need decent sunshine and fairly fast lenses to use low though.

On a static bird I use the magnify function of the EVF although focus peaking is on full time. BIF's is where I use and rely on focus peaking more. Its not perfect, but its pretty darn good.

That Tamron in the right hands is producing some stunning shots. Jacaranda on here is using it and the shots are sharp and detailed. Hang on and I'll grab his flickr link ........

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jacarandaphotos/

All his new shots are from the Tamron 150-600. Check them out

Price wise I would consider that lens a bargain. Remember though, he is darn good.

All the best.

Danny.

kenerickson · May 16, 2014

Thank you Dennis and Danny! I did some initial playing around with the micro adjustment and found a big improvement with a setting of -4 with my Tokina lens. My printer happened to just run out of black ink ,so I was not able to print the complete calibration target and scale.

dxqcanada · May 17, 2014

Good to know that it just needed adjustment ... and not the lens itself.
You need to post an after tweak shot of something.
Too bad my A57 did not have that ... maybe I will upgrade to the A77II.
Also, you might want to change Focus to Zone Spot Centre. I found that better with stationary birds.

And you have not noticed ... the comments from those that have the Tamron 150-600mm are positive.

kenerickson · May 17, 2014

I did want to thank you guys and gals for the suggestions and help.

I printed and made a calibration chart. These are three photos I just took, indoors with the camera set on my tripod and set on a 10 second timer. Shot in raw, auto spot focus, no editing other than to crop and convert to jpeg.

The first picture has a correction of -4
The second picture has 0 correction
The third picture has correction of +4

Keeping in mind that I messed up and have Scotch tape over the bottom portion of the scale, does it look to your eyes I can give it even more - adjustment?