Quote:
Originally Posted by gary396
Interesting that Grant. I have a Nikon 70-300 which is reasonable but not up there with their best and I'm considering trading it in for the Nikon 70-200 f2.8 which is similarly highly regarded (i.e. similar performance wise to your Canon I think).
I find that I rarely use the 70-300 beyond 200mm at most circuits (it's a bit soft up towards 300 in anycase). I miss out on the 'head on' shots which often need a longer length (but they don't tend to do a lot for me anyway). So if I'm brave enough to splash out on the 70-200 I would also combine it with an extender.
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Hi Gary,
I should also have mentioned that I'm using this attached to a Canon 1D3 mostly in the anticipation that the 'Pro' elements of body and lens will be at least a little more effective than 'lesser' bodies, at least for fast action stuff and follow focusing.
The head on shots really do need at least 400mm in my view. 500 at f4 even better unless you have a lot of croppable resolution to play with.
I have an old 600mm full manual lens that, by the time an adapter is fitted, is probably closer to 800mm and then multiply by the sensor crop factor.
When everything comes together (mostly needs good light from a useful direction) the 'head on' results can be excellent. Pan shots are, to say the least, somewhat trickier!
The great thing about long lenses and wide apertures is the extremely short DoF available Blurred backgrounds, mostly hiding circuit mess, are more readily accessible. The problem with 400mm f5.6 for large parts of most circuits is that even when panning the background crud spoils things in most locations around the circuit. Even when panning. So you end up with putting up with the the tyre wall/fences/whatever or limiting the places you shoot from.
It's not quite so bad if the circuits are 'dressed' for a big event.
However, in the absence of a large investment budget and a packhorse for transportation a 70-200 from almost any part of a manufacturer's lens range is a flexible choice and usually rewarded with very sharp images.
FWIW I also have a 70-300 and it too is a little soft at the 300 end - though not as soft as it was before service and recalibration ...