rscheffler
Offline
• • • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
|
 p.13 #2 · p.13 #2 · Official Nikon Z 180-600mm f5.6-6.3 VR Image Thread | |
rscheffler wrote:
Hi all, just wandered over from the Canon board through a link. This lens looks like it could be really compelling for daytime sports on a Z8. Wondering if anyone is doing so (field sports like football) and finding the AF and wide open sharpness is acceptable, particularly at the long end of the zoom range when subjects are not filling the frame? (Some lenses seem to fall apart in respect to sharpness at longer distances.) I'm currently using the Canon 200-400/4 with internal 1.4xTC often engaged to give me 560/5.6. So 600/6.3 isn't much of a 'downgrade' in respect to maximum aperture. The compromise is more being stuck at f/5.6 on the wide end, but also not so bad.
...Show more →
armd wrote:
Not sure that I could say and I haven't heard of anyone using the 180-600 for this application. As you know, the bokeh takes a hit when shooting at f/6.3. When I used to be shooting football, one body had the 400 f/2.8 + 1.4x TC and I was always shooting at f/4 or 4.5, and typically had a 70-200 f/2.8 on the other body (or sometimes wider).
Just to illustrate how much the field has changed, I recently had the opportunity to be on the sidelines for a B10 game and the number of agency or freelance photographers has dwindled down to a handful. The rest of the shooters are young people hired by the respective programs who are handed vests and cameras. After watching them for a few minutes it was clear that they've been given minimal training and had little experience. Interestingly, there were a couple big whites and at the particular game it was 2/3-3/4 Canon and about 1/3rd Nikon. I didn't see any Sony shooters at all. Many of the youngsters were sporting EF 100-400 IS II f/4.5-5.6 lenses, which were released about a year after I stopped shooting sports commercially. I saw one or two 200-400's too.
...Show more →
Thanks for the reply. I've been shooting football for about 30 years and things definitely have changed, and not just with equipment. But to keep it equipment-centric, for a couple decades the 400/2.8 was my staple lens. Way back when shooting Kodachrome 64, f/2.8 was needed even in full direct sunlight.  In 2013 I dumped the super-tele primes and transitioned to the Canon 200-400/4 with internal 1.4x TC and still use it. Last weekend I brought a Canon RF 100-500 CPS loaner lens to a game and mostly shot pre-game with it. It might be sharper than the 200-400 and looks to have somewhat higher contrast too, but yes, f/7.1 at 500mm isn't like the look of the faster super-teles. But not sure that matters so much any longer. My client is actually requesting photographers shoot at f/4-5.6 for *less* background blur, believe it or not. So it got me thinking about lenses like the Canon 100-500, this Nikon, Sony's 200-600... What I didn't like about the 100-500 was the external zoom's uneven zoom resistance through the zoom range that overall had too much resistance, even when set to the smoothest resistance setting. Anyway, for a midday game, it seemed like it would work OK, so I'd imagine this Nikon 180-600 would be similar in respect to technical considerations. But night/indoor games would be a bit more of a challenge. With the 200-400 with the 1.4x in use at f/5.6, I'm often at ISO 6400 or 8000. So to lose another 1/3 to 2/3 of a stop is somewhat undesirable.
The NFL sidelines I visit have a pretty healthy mix of brands, but it is primarily Canon and Sony with some Nikon. Many still shoot with 400/2.8s, but it's much less universal than it was even 5-6 years ago. Many more xxx-500/600 style zooms, and of those the Sony 200-600 seems most prevalent. The Canon 200-400 is fairly popular, but not as much as earlier in its release. And yes, a fair number of 100-400s, particularly with those shooting video. What I see much less of are 500mm or 600mm primes; they're almost non-existent now. Sony made pretty significant gains in this space among photographers covering NFL games with the release of the a9 in 2017 and especially with the high MP a1. Most are now shooting mirrorless but this transition for many has been only in the past year or two, including me last year. Only last year did Nikon respond to Sony's a1 with the Z9 and we're still waiting on a ~50MP stacked sensor from Canon. These high MP cameras have also changed lens considerations, due to the ability to crop deeper while retaining decent resolution, meaning longer than ~400mm isn't as necessary for these games as in the past.
|
