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Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm lens, Canon 1.4x, Clear Image Zoom...
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Feb 7, 2018 00:39:53   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
This is a not so scientific or, "a quick and dirty," overview of what the combination of features in the subject line can do when combined using a Sigma MC-11 adapter. There's been talk and this is an attempt to clarify what the outcome may be. It is also noteworthy that I have autofocus with this combination of features all the way up to 1680mm and only 1 stop of light loss from the added 1.4x TC.


I apologize for the shabby subject matter but I was sitting inside my house and had the idea for this thread. The rope is ten feet on the other side of the window I shot through which was about forty feet from where I was sitting or roughly 50 feet from the camera.

These shots were handheld and with me holding the gear during the shots there's lots of room for improvement. This Canon EF400mm f/5.6L lens is the non-image stabilized (IS) version but the Sony body has in-body-image-stabilization and the reason I got it was in hopes it would add IS and let me have that advantage with the lens for the first time since I bought it in the late '90s to use on EOS film cameras. The purpose of this test was to see just how well the IS performed on the lens under different shooting circumstances.

The first shot below was using just the 400mm lens on the a6500 which, being a crop body offers up a Field of View (FOV) of 600mm as most everyone will know. The second shot was to demonstrate what using the maximum zoom of Sony's Clear Image Zoom (CIZ) which would give a FOV of 1200mm. Third, I put my Canon EF1.4x II Teleconverter on which gave me a field of view of 840mm, and finally I gave it max CIZ which boosted the FOV up to 1680mm, again, with all shots handheld, not to be boastful but to test the effectiveness of the IBIS in the a6500. I used shutter priority at 1/500th and auto iso. All the data is in the exif of each shot.

If there's anyone out there who has been wondering about these issues, hopefully this will provide some answers. My personal assessment is that, being a hobbyist non-pixel peeper that I am, this combo will do very nicely for wildlife and with somewhere around 11 frames per second, I think I might even luck out and occasionally catch some distant wildlife action or perhaps even a bird in flight with this rig that weighs under 5 pounds.

These images have been cut down in size so they will load on uhh in the download mode. Bear in mind that I am about to be 81 in a few days and am not interested in seeing how much I can carry or if I can get better shots than others but just get out there and enjoy myself and have enough reach to stay out of harm's way at this point. I think this setup does those things for me very nicely.

Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6L non-IS lens FOV 600mm
Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6L non-IS lens FOV 6...
(Download)

Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6 lens and max 2x CIZ, FOV 1200mm
Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6 lens and max 2x CI...
(Download)

Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6L and EF1.4x TC, FOV 840mm
Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6L and EF1.4x TC, FO...
(Download)

Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6 lens, EF1.4x and max 2x CIZ, FOV 1680mm
Sony a6500, Canon EF400mm f/5.6 lens, EF1.4x and m...
(Download)

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Feb 7, 2018 05:50:16   #
WessoJPEG Loc: Cincinnati, Ohio
 
gessman wrote:
This is a not so scientific or, "a quick and dirty," overview of what the combination of features in the subject line can do when combined using a Sigma MC-11 adapter. There's been talk and this is an attempt to clarify what the outcome may be. It is also noteworthy that I have autofocus with this combination of features all the way up to 1680mm and only 1 stop of light loss from the added 1.4x TC.


I apologize for the shabby subject matter but I was sitting inside my house and had the idea for this thread. The rope is ten feet on the other side of the window I shot through which was about forty feet from where I was sitting or roughly 50 feet from the camera.

These shots were handheld and with me holding the gear during the shots there's lots of room for improvement. This Canon EF400mm f/5.6L lens is the non-image stabilized (IS) version but the Sony body has in-body-image-stabilization and the reason I got it was in hopes it would add IS and let me have that advantage with the lens for the first time since I bought it in the late '90s to use on EOS film cameras. The purpose of this test was to see just how well the IS performed on the lens under different shooting circumstances.

The first shot below was using just the 400mm lens on the a6500 which, being a crop body offers up a Field of View (FOV) of 600mm as most everyone will know. The second shot was to demonstrate what using the maximum zoom of Sony's Clear Image Zoom (CIZ) which would give a FOV of 1200mm. Third, I put my Canon EF1.4x II Teleconverter on which gave me a field of view of 840mm, and finally I gave it max CIZ which boosted the FOV up to 1680mm, again, with all shots handheld, not to be boastful but to test the effectiveness of the IBIS in the a6500. I used shutter priority at 1/500th and auto iso. All the data is in the exif of each shot.

If there's anyone out there who has been wondering about these issues, hopefully this will provide some answers. My personal assessment is that, being a hobbyist non-pixel peeper that I am, this combo will do very nicely for wildlife and with somewhere around 11 frames per second, I think I might even luck out and occasionally catch some distant wildlife action or perhaps even a bird in flight with this rig that weighs under 5 pounds.

These images have been cut down in size so they will load on uhh in the download mode. Bear in mind that I am about to be 81 in a few days and am not interested in seeing how much I can carry or if I can get better shots than others but just get out there and enjoy myself and have enough reach to stay out of harm's way at this point. I think this setup does those things for me very nicely.
This is a not so scientific or, "a quick and ... (show quote)


out of focus.

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Feb 7, 2018 08:30:14   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
WessoJPEG wrote:
out of focus.


Hmmm. Thanks. Must be my cataracts. Well, hopefully the good parts of the post reaches people who might be interested, if there are any. My apologies.

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Feb 7, 2018 09:18:22   #
WessoJPEG Loc: Cincinnati, Ohio
 
gessman wrote:
Hmmm. Thanks. Must be my cataracts. Well, hopefully the good parts of the post reaches people who might be interested, if there are any. My apologies.


Did you hand hold? Ramp up Sutter speed, steady your camera.

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Feb 7, 2018 09:52:46   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
WessoJPEG wrote:
Did you hand hold? Ramp up Sutter speed, steady your camera.


Thank you. I am aware of those things and certainly could have provided better images but that wasn't the crux of my intent. You must not have read my entire text. The images weren't the point here although perhaps my message might have been stronger had I provided "better" images but I explained that. The critical part of my message was that the combination of equipment and features work together and that I, a declining 81 year old, had hand-held all four of those shots to demonstrate that the IBIS did improve the ability to hold the non-IS 400mm lens fairly steady and that the Sigma MC-11 facilitated the combination and provided autofocus and IS for anyone who has that 400mm lens and wanted to add some more utility to the combination. In my mind, the fact that I could get any kind a recognizable image hand-holding a FOV of 1680mm shot at 1/500th was also a matter of interest and a central part of the point I wanted to make. I apologize for not making my main point clearer.

I felt that there are others "out there" who, like me, own the 400mm f/5.6 lens and have wondered if there was a body like the Sony a6500 they could adapt and get better use of the 400mm lens. The purpose of this thread was to let those people know what is possible so they won't have to experiment and drop a wad of money to add more usefulness to the 400mm lens. Obviously I failed to make my point clear and for that I, once again, apologize - old, tired, middle of the night, take your pick.

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Feb 7, 2018 10:20:59   #
WessoJPEG Loc: Cincinnati, Ohio
 
gessman wrote:
Thank you. I am aware of those things and certainly could have provided better images but that wasn't the crux of my intent. You must not have read my entire text. The images weren't the point here although perhaps my message might have been stronger had I provided "better" images but I explained that. The critical part of my message was that the combination of equipment and features work together and that I, a declining 81 year old, had hand-held all four of those shots to demonstrate that the IBIS did improve the ability to hold the non-IS 400mm lens fairly steady and that the Sigma MC-11 facilitated the combination and provided autofocus and IS for anyone who has that 400mm lens and wanted to add some more utility to the combination. In my mind, the fact that I could get any kind a recognizable image hand-holding a FOV of 1680mm shot at 1/500th was also a matter of interest and a central part of the point I wanted to make. I apologize for not making my main point clearer.

I felt that there are others "out there" who, like me, own the 400mm f/5.6 lens and have wondered if there was a body like the Sony a6500 they could adapt and get better use of the 400mm lens. The purpose of this thread was to let those people know what is possible so they won't have to experiment and drop a wad of money to add more usefulness to the 400mm lens. Obviously I failed to make my point clear and for that I, once again, apologize - old, tired, middle of the night, take your pick.
Thank you. I am aware of those things and certain... (show quote)


Same here, sorry I didn't read enough. I apologize.

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Feb 7, 2018 11:03:57   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
WessoJPEG wrote:
Same here, sorry I didn't read enough. I apologize.




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Feb 7, 2018 11:31:10   #
repleo Loc: Boston
 
The Clear Image Zoom is pretty impressive. I have a A6000 and an A7Rii but haven't tried the CIZ yet. Looks good enough that I might re-evaluate my future long lens needs/wants. I am saving my spare change for the FE 70-300. If I put that on my A6000 I should get equivalent FOV of 450mm by virtue of the crop sensor. So could I get this up to 900mm FOV with the CIZ on the A6000? I wonder how the IQ would compare vs 600mm FOV on the A7Rii and cropping the pic.

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Feb 7, 2018 13:13:38   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
repleo wrote:
The Clear Image Zoom is pretty impressive. I have a A6000 and an A7Rii but haven't tried the CIZ yet. Looks good enough that I might re-evaluate my future long lens needs/wants. I am saving my spare change for the FE 70-300. If I put that on my A6000 I should get equivalent FOV of 450mm by virtue of the crop sensor. So could I get this up to 900mm FOV with the CIZ on the A6000? I wonder how the IQ would compare vs 600mm FOV on the A7Rii and cropping the pic.


Yep, your a6000 with a 300mm lens should/will go up to 900 FOV, 2x450. My limited understanding is that you get very little IQ loss, if any, because CIZ is in-body upsizing and the stretched pixels are filled in as if in a "content aware" method. I wouldn't be the person to answer the question you raise comparing the results from the two cameras you have but since you have them, you sound like an ideal person to answer your question and share it with the rest of us.

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Feb 7, 2018 14:36:43   #
repleo Loc: Boston
 
gessman wrote:
Yep, your a6000 with a 300mm lens should/will go up to 900 FOV, 2x450. My limited understanding is that you get very little IQ loss, if any, because CIZ is in-body upsizing and the stretched pixels are filled in as if in a "content aware" method. I wouldn't be the person to answer the question you raise comparing the results from the two cameras you have but since you have them, you sound like an ideal person to answer your question and share it with the rest of us.
Yep, your a6000 with a 300mm lens should/will go u... (show quote)


Point taken. The weather should be better by the time I get the 70-300 and I'll give it a try.

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Feb 7, 2018 17:34:13   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
repleo wrote:
Point taken. The weather should be better by the time I get the 70-300 and I'll give it a try.


I'll look forward to seeing the results of your experiment. Thanks.

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May 4, 2018 07:38:15   #
TedC
 
Hey gessman thanks for the post. I just got my a6300 and decided to check out the CIZ, inspired by your experiment. I assigned it to a custom key and played with the zoom on the dial, so that's cool and easy, but I see that CIZ is not available if I'm shooting RAW + JPG - does that sound right? So if I want to use that zoom, it has to be for JPG only? I guess that's because the CIZ is a software-driven manipulation of the sensor data, so the resulting file is already "processed"?

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May 4, 2018 08:58:49   #
dsmeltz Loc: Philadelphia
 
The shots look quite stable to me. There is a bit of noise, but that was not the point. If you can hand hold at 1680MM and get these results, then the combination is working. The 1680 image without zooming is much better than 600mm shot zoomed to the same framing. So, yeah, something good is going on.

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May 4, 2018 12:15:06   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
TedC wrote:
Hey gessman thanks for the post. I just got my a6300 and decided to check out the CIZ, inspired by your experiment. I assigned it to a custom key and played with the zoom on the dial, so that's cool and easy, but I see that CIZ is not available if I'm shooting RAW + JPG - does that sound right? So if I want to use that zoom, it has to be for JPG only? I guess that's because the CIZ is a software-driven manipulation of the sensor data, so the resulting file is already "processed"?


Thanks for the feedback. I was beginning to wonder if anyone saw past the sloppy procedures and got the message. Everything you said is "right on." I, too, normally shoot Raw+jpg and Raw with CIZ would sure be nice but a good "dialed in" jpg can occasionally suffice in a pinch if it'll get a shot that we'd otherwise have to walk away from. I haven't contemplated all the possible ramifications of CIZ yet but the fact that it can convert and double the power of a sharp prime lens into a zoom, if needed, sure doesn't disappoint me. For a little confidence boost about shooting jpgs, visit the following url and have a look at the work of fellow UHH member Imagemeister. He shoots jpg only and sorta forces us to ask ourselves what's actually necessary:" https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/larry-nieland.html

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May 4, 2018 12:49:38   #
gessman Loc: Colorado
 
dsmeltz wrote:
The shots look quite stable to me. There is a bit of noise, but that was not the point. If you can hand hold at 1680MM and get these results, then the combination is working. The 1680 image without zooming is much better than 600mm shot zoomed to the same framing. So, yeah, something good is going on.


Right, dsmeltz, and well stated. You were able to look beyond my sloppy procedures using poor subject matter and clearly state what I intended to show. To get images this close to "good" hand-holding 1680mm at 81 with slight hand tremors, with a slight breeze blowing the rope around outside, shooting out of a dark house into bright light with a shutter speed less than 1/3rd of the focal length there was a potential for a complete disaster and it didn't happen. So, yep, there's a LOT of good going on. I'm certainly not the right candidate but I suspect that if you put this rig in the right hands it sure looks like it has strong potential to facilitate added shooting capability. Thanks for the reply and clarification.

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