I am wondering if any of the currently available mirror lenses are any good.
I can live with fixed aperature, manual focus and donut shapped OOF highlights. I can even live with merely decent, rather than excellent build quality. But I cannot live with poor IQ.
I'm looking for something around 500-600mm, around f/8. I know there are previous threads on this topic, but they mainly seem to be discussing options that no longer seem to be available.
All of the currently available lenses seem too cheap to deliver decent IQ, but I would appreciate any info to the contrary.
This is one situation where in body IS would be a great advantage. I bought an alpha 350 and the excellent Sony 500 f8 mirror lens - with the stabilization I can actually get decent handheld shots - which lets me have a 500mm in my camera bag. Quite useful at times.
I don't know of any current mirror lens options not already discussed, sorry. I have an alternate suggestion though if size is not an issue for you.
If your goal is 500-600mm at f/8 have you considered the Canon 400 5.6 with a 1.4 TC ? If I'm not mistaken that would give you a 560mm f/8 plus whatever crop your camera is. Probably cheaper than the contax mirotar but a heck of a lot longer.
I know it's not a mirror lens and I don't know what you are looking for in terms of size or price but I thought I would throw that out there as an alternate option if you had not considered it.
DisrupTer911 wrote:
I've got a Rubinar 1000/10 mirror lens that stills available I think
rugift.com also lists a 500/5.6 and a 500/8. However, those Russian lenses don't seem to have the best IQ unfortunately, decent at best, plus they aren't cheap: the cheapest is $300. If you want a quality mirror lens, you pretty much stuck with a used lens. I'd personally say look for a Tamron 500/8, as they seem to be the best of the third party mirrors, and they can be had for about $150, although the price seems to be going up of late.
RCicala wrote:
This is one situation where in body IS would be a great advantage. I bought an alpha 350 and the excellent Sony 500 f8 mirror lens - with the stabilization I can actually get decent handheld shots - which lets me have a 500mm in my camera bag. Quite useful at times.
True, but not really an option for me ):
Masahara wrote:
{snip}
If your goal is 500-600mm at f/8 have you considered the Canon 400 5.6 with a 1.4 TC ? If I'm not mistaken that would give you a 560mm f/8 plus whatever crop your camera is. Probably cheaper than the contax mirotar but a heck of a lot longer.
{snip}
Let us know what you find !
The 400/5.6 + 1.4x is definitely what I will get if I can't find a good mirror lens at a reasonable price ... watch this space ... but it might be a while!
Yes the 400/5,6+1,4 is a lot better than all mirror lenses that I have tried. I owned a Sigma 500 mirror lens a long time ago. And the IQ. was a lot worse than the cheapest zoom lens that I have used
The best IQ mirror lenses are probably the Vivitar Series 1 Solid Cats (catadioptric) 450/4.5, 600/8 and 800/11. They were made in the USA by Perkin Elmer, who also made the mirrors for the Hubble telescope. I had a 600/8 Cat, and it had very decent IQ, but I found the doughnut bokeh highlights too distracting for me. OTOH, it's a long focal length in a short package (L=105mm, D=106mm). The 450/4.5 is regarded as having the best IQ of the bunch, and f/4.5 isn't bad for a 450mm lens. The 450/4.5 is rare, and goes for around $1000 in really good shape, with the filters. The 600/8 and 800/11 go for about $300 to $450.
The Solid Cats are actually solid, hence the name. The optical elements all nest tightly into each other, and so there are no air spaces in the body of the lens. This provides an unusually robust lens, which is not easily susceptible to going out of alignment when it gets bumped against something (which most mirror lenses are). If you decide to go after a Solid Cat, then make sure you get the matching set of filters that screw onto the rear of the lens, over the rear element. They're required to complete the optical formula, and so the lens is less sharp without one of them attached.
