FYI: I just received an email from Leofoto that the new SF-04 foot for the Sony 400-800mm is available for preorder. With the NAB2025 code discount, it is $71.20 shipped.
CPWarner wrote:
FYI: I just received an email from Leofoto that the new SF-04 foot for the Sony 400-800mm is available for preorder. With the NAB2025 code discount, it is $71.20 shipped.
CPWarner wrote:
FYI: I just received an email from Leofoto that the new SF-04 foot for the Sony 400-800mm is available for preorder. With the NAB2025 code discount, it is $71.20 shipped.
CPWarner wrote:
FYI: I just received an email from Leofoto that the new SF-04 foot for the Sony 400-800mm is available for preorder. With the NAB2025 code discount, it is $71.20 shipped.
Many thanks for passing along the info, just preordered one. If there's anything for me to complain about the new 400-800... it's the foot... I'm looking forward to this replacement.
jav_eee wrote:
where can i find more info about this?
Sony AF is sensitive to vertical lines only. Just like Nikon. And Canon, excepting R1. And Fuji.
You won't find much on it. Nobody is shouting it from the roof tops. There's probably a good reason for that.
Sony A9 has 693 PDAF points.
Sony A1 has 759 PDAF points.
OM-D E-M1 Mark II was released December 2016. 121 PDAF points, all cross type.
Olympus OM-D has 1053 PDAF points, all cross type.
Canon R1 has 1053 PDAF 'Zones' and 'Cross Type YES', whatever that means.
Nikon has...who cares. Not having a go at Nikon, more, I just don't think it matters.
What was a valued featured of DSLRs does not seem to have much advantage for mirrorless.
Stacked sensor, software and processors, that's where the performance comes from.
hatch1921 wrote:
Many thanks for passing along the info, just preordered one. If there's anything for me to complain about the new 400-800... it's the foot... I'm looking forward to this replacement.
Thanks again,
Hatch
I love the foot!
Specifically, the fact the foot is attached to the lens by 4 x 3mm screws.
So much better than a dovetail with clamp, as per 70-200 2.8, 200-600 and now even the 300 2.8.
That system is prone to failure by way of 'overtightening' of the thumb screw causing the clamp to fracture.
That's a total failure, you know, bang, smash, cry.
4 x 3mm screws means everything other than those screws will fail. Without the clamp force, the material between the attachment to lens and the actual foot is the weak point and even those injaneers who bribed the teacher for their degree could design that to be strong enough. So almost any aftermarket foot should be fine.
In the case of just attaching a generic plate to the OEM foot, that will be fine too.
Choderboy wrote:
I love the foot!
Specifically, the fact the foot is attached to the lens by 4 x 3mm screws.
So much better than a dovetail with clamp, as per 70-200 2.8, 200-600 and now even the 300 2.8.
That system is prone to failure by way of 'overtightening' of the thumb screw causing the clamp to fracture.
That's a total failure, you know, bang, smash, cry.
4 x 3mm screws means everything other than those screws will fail. Without the clamp force, the material between the attachment to lens and the actual foot is the weak point and even those injaneers who bribed the teacher for their degree could design that to be strong enough. So almost any aftermarket foot should be fine.
In the case of just attaching a generic plate to the OEM foot, that will be fine too.
I have no issue with the construction or the mounting of the foot, it's the size, it's too small IMO. Also, not being Araca-Swiss is a bummer. The Leofoto SF-04 Replacement Lens Foot has been shipped, I'm looking forward to swapping them out. I replaced the foot on the 200-600 as well, no regrets.
Swimming_trouble_718 wrote:
I haven't had a chance to read the whole thread, but does anyone have any thoughts on the 400-800 vs the 300 gm 2.8 with a teleconverter? Obviously these are in different price points, have different focal lengths, different conveniences. etc. but I'm trying to decide if I want to keep the 400-800 I got recently or if I want to return it and go for either a 300 gm or the sigma 300-600 f4.
I ran this exact comparison today and have to say that even after the 300GM w/2X was cropped to match the field of view of the 400-800mm at 800mm, the 300GM w/2X was sharper. This was a lower light situation with ISO around 3200 to 5000. But the GM was sharper even with the crop. I was shooting off a large tripod with gimbal head. The image on the left below is with the 400-800mm and on the right 300GM + 2X. It is hard to show the comparison with the limits for image size here on FM, but the difference is obvious when looking at it on the screen. Some may say pixel peeping, but even when showing the full images the difference is obvious. I will head back to the owl nest tomorrow and try some additional comparisons and use manual focus with focus peaking on to see if there is an autofocus issue with the 400-800 or if it is just not as sharp. I may have a back focusing issue with this lens but need more time to evaluate that.
This had me thinking ^^^ this morning as I've rented and shot with the 300 + 2x combo and I now own the 400-800.
According to ChatGPT: On a 50MP Image (Sony A1): Original resolution: 8640 × 5760 pixels
After cropping to match 800mm FOV:
8640×0.75=6480
5760×0.75=4320
Resulting resolution: ~28MP
✅ So you’d be left with about 28 megapixels — not bad, but:
You've lost 44% of your original resolution. You lose flexibility for further cropping or printing large.
Plus, if you didn't want to crop to get the 800mm FOV with the 300+TC combo, you would need to be 25% closer to the subject to fill the frame.
There's tradeoffs for sure... I found the combo to be very sharp as well and shooting at F/5.6 was great. My copy of the 400-800 is very sharp, I'll have to go back and look at images I shot with the combo to compare. The flexibility of the zoom is a plus, I wasn't a big fan of swapping out the teleconverters, it was a big negative for me. The 300 F/28 is an amazing lens but is it worth the additional $4k to be able to shoot at 600mm vs 800mm? Yes, you can go crop mode in camera but you can do that with the 800mm and you end up at 1120mm. These are great problems to have IMO, our lenses have never been better IMO. Thanks for sharing your experience with the two lenses
I hear you on the loss of MP with cropping on the 300GM, but in this case I was just not getting sharp images. I am starting to think this is a back focusing issue, but need to take some images to evaluate that. FYI, I am not in any way making comments on $ value here. And, I also think the zoom has huge value in the field, particularly for birds in flight. I was just purely evaluating sharpness comparison as someone asked about this comparison in this thread.
To me the real comparison is the 600GM with and without the 1.4X or 2X. That is the direct competition. The 300GM requires teleconverters to even get into the range of the 400-800G without converters. I see the 300GM as augmenting the 400-800G as a fast shorter lens instead of the 100-400GM.
CPWarner wrote:
I hear you on the loss of MP with cropping on the 300GM, but in this case I was just not getting sharp images. I am starting to think this is a back focusing issue, but need to take some images to evaluate that. FYI, I am not in any way making comments on $ value here. And, I also think the zoom has huge value in the field, particularly for birds in flight. I was just purely evaluating sharpness comparison as someone asked about this comparison in this thread.
To me the real comparison is the 600GM with and without the 1.4X or 2X. That is the direct competition. The 300GM requires teleconverters to even get into the range of the 400-800G without converters. I see the 300GM as augmenting the 400-800G as a fast shorter lens instead of the 100-400GM....Show more →
I thought back focusing was not a "thing" with mirrorless, but I would definitely like to know if you're seeing it. Some of my early images with this lens and the A7R5 seemed to miss the focus point despite super high shutter speed and bright light. I heard some rumblings somewhere (can't find the link at the moment) about the 400-800 on the A7R5 potentially having focus issues, but I can't verify that.
Things happen and some lenses are duds, my first 200-600 was complete trash, I had to send it back and the replacement is very sharp. Maybe this is the case with yours, it sucks, but it's possible.
Have you turned off the Full Time DMF switch? I found myself hitting the AF ring while shooting and it impacted my images. Once I shut it down, no issues. It's nice to have when the situation warrants but the ring is so smooth, I easily moved focus when I didn't want to.
Just a thought if you haven't tried turning it off.
aae991 wrote:
I thought back focusing was not a "thing" with mirrorless, but I would definitely like to know if you're seeing it. Some of my early images with this lens and the A7R5 seemed to miss the focus point despite super high shutter speed and bright light. I heard some rumblings somewhere (can't find the link at the moment) about the 400-800 on the A7R5 potentially having focus issues, but I can't verify that.
I thought so too, but I saw areas of the tree that were physically behind the owlets that were in focus. So something was off. Maybe as was also mentioned I was hitting the focus ring and have the full time DMF on. So I have a couple things to try. Most likely this is user error. But for the shear number of images that were off and focused behind the subject and the actual focus area that was locked on (checked using a Lightroom plugin), I am wondering. Plenty to try and see what is going on.
I will try with both my A1 and A7R5. Note that the images where I was having challenges was on an A1.
hatch1921 wrote:
Things happen and some lenses are duds, my first 200-600 was complete trash, I had to send it back and the replacement is very sharp. Maybe this is the case with yours, it sucks, but it's possible.
Have you turned off the Full Time DMF switch? I found myself hitting the AF ring while shooting and it impacted my images. Once I shut it down, no issues. It's nice to have when the situation warrants but the ring is so smooth, I easily moved focus when I didn't want to.
Just a thought if you haven't tried turning it off.
CPWarner wrote:
I thought so too, but I saw areas of the tree that were physically behind the owlets that were in focus. So something was off. Maybe as was also mentioned I was hitting the focus ring and have the full time DMF on. So I have a couple things to try. Most likely this is user error. But for the shear number of images that were off and focused behind the subject and the actual focus area that was locked on (checked using a Lightroom plugin), I am wondering. Plenty to try and see what is going on.
I will try with both my A1 and A7R5. Note that the images where I was having challenges was on an A1....Show more →
Thanks. I recall the focus point said it was right on a heron’s eye yet the final focus was on its neck 🤪😞
CPWarner wrote:
I ran this exact comparison today and have to say that even after the 300GM w/2X was cropped to match the field of view of the 400-800mm at 800mm, the 300GM w/2X was sharper. This was a lower light situation with ISO around 3200 to 5000. But the GM was sharper even with the crop. I was shooting off a large tripod with gimbal head. The image on the left below is with the 400-800mm and on the right 300GM + 2X. It is hard to show the comparison with the limits for image size here on FM, but the difference is obvious when looking at it on the screen. Some may say pixel peeping, but even when showing the full images the difference is obvious. I will head back to the owl nest tomorrow and try some additional comparisons and use manual focus with focus peaking on to see if there is an autofocus issue with the 400-800 or if it is just not as sharp. I may have a back focusing issue with this lens but need more time to evaluate that. ...Show more →
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aae991 wrote:
I thought back focusing was not a "thing" with mirrorless, but I would definitely like to know if you're seeing it. Some of my early images with this lens and the A7R5 seemed to miss the focus point despite super high shutter speed and bright light. I heard some rumblings somewhere (can't find the link at the moment) about the 400-800 on the A7R5 potentially having focus issues, but I can't verify that.
Thanks for testing this out. Interesting that the 300 GM is sharper even when cropped with a 2x TC. I also had some issues with focusing on my A7rv with stationary animals (I don't even bother with birds in flight with the a7rv). I wonder if an A1 would compensate better for the micro movements that happen at 800mm. When I look at focus points on my camera playback the green square is often not perfectly on the eye and I think that has to do with a7rv AF speed. Like it may focus on the eye initially but when I move ever so slightly at 800mm or the animal moves that autofocus point gets messed up and the camera doesn't compensate fast enough. I could be wrong on that though.
Here's a few photos with screenshots of 100% crops. I'm overall conflicted whether I want to keep the lens or not. I think it renders nicely and can be sharp in the right circumstances (even if 100% crops don't look super sharp), but I'm not sure if I should return it and spend more for the 300 GM or the Sigma 300-600. This is my first super telephoto so I'm not sure what to expect in regards to sharpness.
I did a bunch of experimenting today and found that on the tripod, the 400-800mm both with and without a converter, 1.4X or 2X, can produce reasonably sharp images. However, it takes a LOT of care at that focal length, particularly in lower light when you cannot use high shutter speeds. My path was to first turn off full time DMF as I was apparently bumping the focus ring. Next, when on the tripod, lock things down (even with the gimbal for stationary subjects) and use a remote release. I got my best results with OSS off and could see odd vibration in the viewfinder with it on when I triggered focus with a remote release. I had to ditch the baseball cap as I kept tapping the camera with it. With all of that, I tried a couple things with autofocus vs manual with peaking, and saw no differences with them. But camera shake is difficult to remove. There were some trucks at the park in Mount Joy, PA today doing some work. When they drove by, I could see things shake. But in the end here is a shot with the 400-800mm and the 2X that I was pretty happy with. The 600mm GM would likely outperform this, but at this price point, size and weight, I think the 400-800mm acquitted itself well.
I should add, the only crop here was to crop to 8.5x11 format from native 3x2. Post processing included denoise in Lightroom and some adjustments of lights, brights, and shadows, then convert to jpeg to meet size requirements for this forum.
ILCE-1FE 400-800mm F6.3-8 G OSS + 2X Teleconverter lens1600mmf/16.01/500s2500 ISO-0.3 EV
