image courtesy: grittymonkey
Grittymonkey published his considerations about the brand new XF 55-200 here. Among other things he says that:
“the AF performed perfectly during my first day of shooting with it! It is fast (normally fast, I am not talking here about lighting speed, but it is not slow either) and reliable (it locked where asked every time instead of the fruitless hunting I have experienced with other lenses and former versions of the firmware). […] The manual focus is again well implemented with just the right amount of turn to be made to adjust the focus. […] Racked out at 200mm and wide open, the XF55-200mm produces a pleasant bokeh, with uniformed and perfectly round circles of light, and very smooth blurred areas.
All in all, this new lens is a great addition to the XF lens lineup and I cannot wait for the ultra-wide zoom to come out in a few months. After that, I will have a complete set up to take with me whenever on travel, and my DSLR will definitely stay at home (my back already loves that idea).”
XF 55-200 pre-order: USA: Adorama / BHphoto / AmazonUS / DigitalRev / Uniquephoto / Pictureline / Europe: AmazonUK / AmazonDE / PCHstore Brussel / Worldwide ebay: slidoo (available in Japan)
6 Responses
Looking good! I’m really not a big fan of zoom lenses or the tele-spectrum of focal lengths, but this lens makes me want to kill two stones with one stone (metaphorically, don’t worry, no animals are hurt) and play around with the long side 😉
*two BIRDS with one stone, of course :p
Eurasian Tree Sparrow (Passer montanus).
My production copy is still stuck in some UPS truck, scheduled for a late delivery today. So I’ll probably get it tomorrow, because I’m leaving the house quite soon. I’ll try to have an article on it wither this or next Friday. We’ll see. Given the terrible weather forecast for the remainder of the week, probably next week. 😉
I would like to know if anyone can compare the AF speed between this zoom and minolta 70-210/4 on a translucent camera since if it is about the same, I will sell all my sony gears and go all-in to fuji…
Hi GrittyMonkey,
How do you feel about the lack of a tripod collar? Seems like it would be awfully front-heavy without one when it’s on a tripod.
Marius