The following review is a guest post by Barry Wells. It has been first posted on SonyAlphaForum. Test with the [shoplink 36436 ebay]Kowa 500mm (here on eBay)[/shoplink] and [shoplink 36435 ebay]Kowa 850mm (here on eBay)[/shoplink] lenses.
A7 with 500mm & 850mm telephoto
Three years ago, I switched from a Canon DSLR system to the Sony Mirrorless system. I spent some time looking for a super telephoto lens to replace my Canon 500mm F4 IS which I had been finding too heavy and cumbersome to carry around. Eventually, I purchased the Kowa Telephoto lens. Unusually, you buy the basic lens and then add a 350mm, 500mm or 850mm adapter. I chose TX10 500mm F5.6 adapter to use with my Sony A6000 body for bird photography.
The Canon lens it replaced weighed 3870 grams, but the Kowa comes in at 2 kilos lighter, at 1970 grams producing a significant weight saving over a conventional DSLR set up. In addition, by removing the lens hood and focal length adapter, the lens measures a mere 250mm (9.8”) in length, making it really practical for travelling.
The lens unit features dual, manual focus rings, incorporating quick and ultra fine focus options. Used in conjunction with Sony’s superb focus peaking/magnify functions, focussing is quick and accurate. However, being manual focus only, shooting ‘Birds In Flight’ is quite challenging. Featuring fluorite and extra low dispersion lenses, the optical quality is excellent and compares favourably with my old Canon 500mm F4. Build quality is also first rate.
I recently added the TX17 850mm F9.6 adapter as I had bought an A7 and found I needed the longer reach with a full frame body. The 850mm is not as sharp as the 500mm but is still quite acceptable – a bit like adding the 1.4x extender to the Canon 500mm, and you do need good light with a F9.6 aperture.
Both TX adapters are Sony ‘A’ mount, so you will need a Sony LA-EA3/4 adapter to connect them to the A7 and A6000 bodies.
Obviously without image stabilisation, a tripod is recommended, but not essential. The Meadow Pipit was taken hand held with the 500mm. With a minimum focus of 3 metres, closeups like the Wheatear image are quite possible with the 850mm.
The Kowa will not suit everyone, as manual focussing on moving subjects is a tricky skill to acquire, but the results from this unusual lens are very rewarding.
http://www.kowaproducts.com/kowa-telephoto-lens/KowaTelephotoLensSpottingscope
Ebay links: [shoplink 36436 ebay]Kowa 500mm (Click here)[/shoplink] and [shoplink 36435 ebay]Kowa 850mm (Click here)[/shoplink].
23 Responses
thats an a7 in the photo
No, it’s an a6000. I shoot with one myself, and I can tell you, that’s it.
That was a a7 this morning I own a a7s a7r and a77 also other comment state it wasn’t a. A6000
sorry to tell you but that is not a a6000.
i also don´t believe the photos are shot with that lens.
it´s a new member with his first post.. probably a fake.
no exif infos in the photos.
i had that lens and the quality sucked big time.
i would be really suprised if the images where shot with that lens.
Manual focus with long lenses requires a lot of practice. You may think the lens is bad, and change opinion after some effort and training.
it looks like its a M3/4 adapter there, not an LA
It’s so hard to look through the rumours on this site, since you blink for five minutes and a load of off topic posts have been made. Please can you make the rumours easier to find admin or stop spamming
Hi Aggro!
On Sunday I post readers stuff. It’s not like I work on rumors 24 hours per day!
And you just have to check that page:
http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/category/rumors/
And voilà…rumors only 🙂
The worst spammers are the ones who post ” don’t say that because I don’t want to read it ” instead of just not reading it.
now the headline says a7 and the picture shows the a6000.. what´s wrong with you? 🙂
There are two cameras… look at the bag closely…
Of course he also took the A7 to take the picture of his A6000 set 🙂
Sorry, copy and paste error!
I use a M43 on a FF Tokina 300mm with a 2x for 1200 “affective” mm’s of reach. It’s craptastic, but on facebook you’d never know. Get’s the job done and the birds seem to like it.
How do you get the birds to shave before you photograph them?
My bird photos always show those fine whiskers around their beaks.
I’m guessing you had this problem when using the Canon 500mm also.
Thanks for posting this. Great shots of the birds, especially the first one.
Is this the Barry of @animalsbybarry:disqus fame?
If so, Barry: are you also shooting that amazing little Nikon 1 monster tele as well? How does it compare? I’d imagine that the autofocus is pretty snappy, but how about the IQ for larger prints? Hard to compare a 1″ Sony sensor to APSC or FF, but I hear that the little Sony does quite well.
I just acquired a Pentax SMC Takumar 300mm f/4 manual focus lens, giving me a 600mm FoV on M43. Even with peaking, that’s given me added appreciation for your shots above — clearly, I’ve got some new skills to build for sure.
Thanks for the article, Barry! I’m strongly tempted by this combination for doing moon silhouettes! 🙂 I’ve been meaning to do that for a while, but still have to get a long enough telephoto.
No way animals hold still for long enough to pose for photos. No way. That has to be a fake bird.
Its CGI… 😐
For the millionth time there is no magic going from FF to APS-c or 4/3 unless there is greater pixel density. Thank you. http://www.josephjamesphotography.com/equivalence/index.htm
I would love to switch to Sony as a bird photographer but it is just NOT possible to use manual focus on any regular basis. Is there a 500mm lens you can use with Sony that maintains auto-focus (and is not the Sony $13k lens)? I currently use a Canon 500mm with 1.4 extender on a 5d mkii.
Stick with your 5D. I hear that Canon 500mm is quite lovely.
The 500mm from Sony is very expensive, indeed. But you can use Tamron lenses with a mount if you choose the a77 II or a99. If you use a7 II you need an additional adapter to use a mount lenses on e mount body. But that supports AF as well.