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welshnutteruk

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chris
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Hi i have a sony alpha 290, and also a 75-300 28-200 and the standard 18-50 lenses. I am thinking of upgrading in april to a new sony (so i can make use of the lenses) and also get a 70-200 f2.8 lens for sport got about 1500 to spend on camera and lens any ideas what i should go for
regards chris
 
I love the A77 but the question then is which 70-200 would you get.

The Sony one is the best but very pricey. I doubt you'd get a used one either within the budget after taking off the price of the A77.

The other choices really are Sigma & Tamron.

The Tamron 70-200 A01 is a great lens. I have one which I've used on occasions for weddings but the AF is quite slow and can be a bit hit & miss so I wouldn't recommend it for sports. I love the IQ though.

Which pretty much leaves the Sigma. Again that's quite pricey but you may get lucky.
 
What sport are you thinking of, and do you need to have a 2.8??
I have the Sony 70-200 2.8 G, but I also have the Sony 70-300 G .. both very good, and I use the 70-300 for some football and airshows.
The only reason I got the 2.8 was because I do speedway photos, predominantly evenings under poor lighting
 
gadgeteer said:
I love the A77 but the question then is which 70-200 would you get.

The Sony one is the best but very pricey. I doubt you'd get a used one either within the budget after taking off the price of the A77.

The other choices really are Sigma & Tamron.

The Tamron 70-200 A01 is a great lens. I have one which I've used on occasions for weddings but the AF is quite slow and can be a bit hit & miss so I wouldn't recommend it for sports. I love the IQ though.

Which pretty much leaves the Sigma. Again that's quite pricey but you may get lucky.
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I would tend to go along this line of thinking - get the lens first & then the body.
The USD version of the Tamron should be along shortly if you can wait & that may have the best overall balance of AF speed/IQ & value - wish they would fit a focus limiter though.
 
Hi i was looking at the sony a65 and a Tamron SP AF70-200mm F/2.8 Di LD (IF) MACRO about £600
i want to do more rugby day and evenings
 
i set my target on getting them in april , *** i dont like to rush, so i have plenty of time to look, a few friends use the 70-200 32.8 for rugby and both say theres not much diffrence in the tamaron or sony apart for one being 900 quid more
 
the Sony is definitely better than the Tamron - AF is faster & it has a focus limiter but IQ is similar. & now there is the 70-200 G II imminent. Whether that's worth the extra to you is a personal thing.
The Sigma HSM II has faster AF than the Tamron but the IQ isn't as good. Then there is the new Sigma OS version ~ £900.
 
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With the rumours of a upgraded Sony 70-200/2.8 coming this year, there might be some deals on the current model in the coming months, and a few more coming on the used market. I'd be inclined to wait a while on the lens. In fact I'm holding fire on replacing my Minolta 80-200/2.8 for that reason.

The a77 price is good. The suggestion is that the lower models (57/65) will get a minor upgrade (new hotshoe, etc) this year, but I should imagine the 77 will take longer (and include a new sensor). On that basis you can expect the price to fall a bit further, not not by much until the end of the year (at the earliest).

The Sony 70-300G is great for daytime sports. Not a lens for floodlit games, though.
 
anyone have the link for ice bristol cant find them
 
welshnutteruk said:
i set my target on getting them in april , *** i dont like to rush, so i have plenty of time to look, a few friends use the 70-200 32.8 for rugby and both say theres not much diffrence in the tamaron or sony apart for one being 900 quid more
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If you don't mind missing the odd shot because of the AF then I'd say the Tamron is the lens then. You can pick these up cheaply on eBay.

An alternative is to get the legendary Minolta beer can which is 70-210 f4 whilst you wait for a bargain. I have one of these too and it's built up a bit of a cult following. AF is fast, IQ is great. The only issue is slight CA which can be corrected in post anyway. At constant f4, it's only 1 stop slower than the f2.8's. It's a bit noisy when autofocusing but for outdoors and sports I doubt that's an issue. For a wedding the noise can be distracting. You can pick these up on eBay for about £70-100 which I think is arguably the best value Sony mount lens there is.
 
Hi all thanks for the replies,also if im going to spend some cash this year (missus dont mind as im alway out and about with the 290) thought il go all out and get some filters i have two circular pl's whats the best filter kit to buy that i can use on all my lenses without breaking the bank looking for son ND
regards chris
 
So my budget in april would be about £1200-£1500 (and as the missus said thats your lot for life)
 
Presuming you're sticking with Sony due to having lenses already (I don't think any of those are what would be considered superb though), then I'd say you're maybe better looking at an A57 and invest the rest into a few pre-owned G lenses, and/including a prime.

Maybe the proceeds of the lenses already owned would pay the difference for a pre-owned A77 (or even A65), but on its own, I don't see the A77 being the best use of the budget available, especially if the expenditure has to keep you going for a good couple of years.
 
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Hi Phil, well the missus will think they keep me going dont have to tell her everything
regards chris
 
I agree. A while back I bought the A65 before returning it and intended on getting the A57 because in reality there is very little in it except for the difference in MP and the EVF. The MP isn't a biggy nowadays and whilst I love the OVF viewfinder, it wasn't worth the price difference to me.

In the end I got a Sony refurb'ed A77 cheap and haven't looked back. But I'd agree that for personal use the A57 is much better value than the A65.
 
Many Thanks for the reply i was only looking at the 65 as it was 10fps and i thought it be good for rugby and wildlife
regards chris
ps i read somewhere that one model will give you more lenght on your lenses by some little trick
 
A65 is very suitable for action, sports, wildlife, and what's not to love about the stonking OLED high resolution VF.

Have one, with the 18-250, but it's not for me, so it'll be up for grabs here (if Admin let me in to the classifieds) or the usual places.
Not sure if I'll go straight to a Pentax K5 or sit it out for 8-9 months and see what pre-owned K5 II's are floating about.

Whichever you ultimately opt for, it'll be a good leap from the A290, and serve you well over the next good few years.
 
Hi Chris

The 10fps is more a gimmick imo. Sure it does it but in a rather haphazard way. Because of the EVF you only get a slideshow effect so you can't be 100% sure you are nailing focus and also the buffer is way too small, so you can sustain about 2 seconds worth before your camera turns into a temporary door stop whilst it writes all the files to the SD card. Even using Sandisk 45Mbps cards it takes a while.

The good thing is that because it can do 10fps, on high continuous it's still very rapid and 9/10 I use low continuous.

The only time I find 10fps useful is when you want to make Canikon users jealous lol!

I think by the more length comment you mean the Clear Image Zoom feature on the A57. Essentially this is a clever digital zoom where the camera guesses to add detail. Not used it myself but I doubt it will ever be as good as the real zoom. Otherwise the crop factor on both is still 1.5x
 
gadgeteer said:
I think by the more length comment you mean the Clear Image Zoom feature on the A57. Essentially this is a clever digital zoom where the camera guesses to add detail. Not used it myself but I doubt it will ever be as good as the real zoom. Otherwise the crop factor on both is still 1.5x
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Yes, the A37 and A57 have this - not convinced it's anything more than a gimmick though - why not just crop in post instead? It also works in jpeg only so no good if you shoot raw - plus it means the camera has a zoom button which cannot be reprogrammed to do anything else which might actually be useful. :)
 
applemint said:
Yes, the A37 and A57 have this - not convinced it's anything more than a gimmick though - why not just crop in post instead? It also works in jpeg only so no good if you shoot raw - plus it means the camera has a zoom button which cannot be reprogrammed to do anything else which might actually be useful. :)
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It doesn't just crop the image, it upscales it to full res. Its jpg only, as you say, so I've not used it much, but it can work quite well.

It's a bit like MFNR, handy for when there's no other way to get the shot, but not something you'd choose to use most of the time.
 
applemint said:
Yes, the A37 and A57 have this - not convinced it's anything more than a gimmick though - why not just crop in post instead?
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because if my understanding is correct you still end up with a full size image in MP terms whereas simply cropping in post you don't (although you can also then do in PP what the camera does in body). The pictures that I have seen using it do look better but yes, ultimately it's probably a feature for people who aren't prepared to do lots of PP.
 
Johnd2000 said:
It doesn't just crop the image, it upscales it to full res.
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Ok thanks - didn't realise that. Not really had a need for it yet, but might give it a try out just to see what it's like. :) Of course with the A65 and A77 you have the 24mp sensor which is better if you want to crop (and I assume both those models have no clear image zoom feature anyway?).
 
applemint said:
Ok thanks - didn't realise that. Not really had a need for it yet, but might give it a try out just to see what it's like. :) Of course with the A65 and A77 you have the 24mp sensor which is better if you want to crop (and I assume both those models have no clear image zoom feature anyway?).
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It can be fun using my 500/f8, on aps-c (750mm) at 2 x zoom (1500mm...I think). If I could just keep it steady, I might even get a decent picture with it one day.
 
Clear image zoom is not on the A65/A77.

I guess it's very much like DVD upscaling. Does it really work? Personally I think not. But your mileage may vary. It's an interesting fun feature but ultimately that's all it is.
 
This discussion reminded me about ClearView, so I've been looking through some random test pics I did ages ago (and happened to have here on the iPad).

You know...it's not bad at all. At 2x there are clearly artefacts along high contrast edges, but it looks pretty good, even when zoomed (double tapped from the full screen view in the iPad picture viewer). 1.5x zoom is better. There are artefacts if you really zoom in, but they're not really noticeable at full screen.

Hmm...will have to see if/how the a99 does it.
 
I have the a65 and am looking at selling this soon if you are interested! :)
 
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