Telephoto - not happy

[rjones315]

I bought the 70-300mm 4-5.6 lens and am not really happy with it. I think I should have saved my money longer and bought a faster lens. On a bright sunny day, the fastest you can get is around 1/500. This MIGHT seem fast, but I'm shooting at ISO 200 and can't keep the noise down in shadows.

Also, the auto focus action isn't all that great either.

[Jonathanp]

Olympus 50-200 2.8-3.5 Digital - eBay (item 300222624683 end time May-13-08 10:10:25 PDT)

I am not sure what to say other then I agree with you and it's not the best lens for low light telephoto.

"but I'm shooting at ISO 200 and can't keep the noise down in shadows."

What body is giving you that bad of noise at ISO 200?


-J

[Paul Shields]

I'd advise upping the ISO to get the faster shutter speed with a lens like that. On a bright sunny day I wouldn't expect noise to be an issue myself. I was shooting at ISO 400 only yesterday in order to get faster shutter speeds and they all looked pretty clean to me (E-3):



Camera Make: OLYMPUS IMAGING CORP.
Camera Model: E-3
Flash Used: No
Focal Length: 78.0mm
Exposure Time: 0.0002 s (1/6400)
Aperture: f/3.2
ISO equiv: 400
Exposure Bias: -0.30
White Balance: Auto
Metering Mode: Matrix
Exposure: aperture priority (semi-auto)
Exposure Mode: Manual

[rjones315]

I'm shooting the e-500.

[rjones315]

2 with the new lens

It was overcast so these aren't as nice as they could be.

[Paul Shields]

They look good to me. I think overcast is the perfect light for photography - but each to their own .

[Raist3d]

Yeah, was going to say that too actually. But then I thought about it maybe overcast is not flattering to birds, maybe you want those colors to pop as oppose to say a portrait of a person, the shots may look too flat. But yeah, in general overcast = good. Maybe overcast with some somewhat shiner part in the sky so you can get a nice gradient

Of course you can do that with a reflector but I don't think that would work well with flying birds

I just got (finally!) two light stands and a 2nd FL50R that now I realize may have been overkill. I am shooting a weeding at the end of may. I feel that maybe instead of the FL50R I should have gotten two FL36R's.. that way I have very portable wireless flash power and two of them, and when I need the bigger gun, I already have one FL50R.

- Raist

[Paul Shields]

I'll be interested in how you find working with the FL-50R Raist. I've one too but have yet to use the wireless flash option. How are you mounting them? It comes with a little plastic stand, but it didn't look like it would be that useful .