Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/01/18

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Subject: [Leica] binoculars - looking for assistance
From: henningw at archiphoto.com (Henning Wulff)
Date: Thu Jan 18 11:42:25 2007
References: <380-220071418181729769@M2W015.mail2web.com>

At 1:17 PM -0500 1/18/07, telyt@earthlink.net wrote:
><thinkofcole@aol.com> wrote:
>
>>  If you want a binocular mainly for birding, you want  one where the
>bird's
>>  image doesn't jump around because it's difficult to  hold the binocular
>entirely
>>  steady without a tripod...The stronger the  binocular's power -- your
>>  Voitlaender is 7 power -- the harder it is to hold  steady on the
>bird...Therefore, I
>>  suggest no more than 6  power.
>
>6x isn't anywhere near enough power to see most birds.  8x is recommended
>most often.  I'm using 10x and the image isn't too jumpy.
>
>Doug Herr
>Birdman of Sacramento
>http://www.wildlightphoto.com

The 15x Canon IS are very easy to use, not too bulky and heavy 
considering the IS and would work well in this application. No 
problem of the image jumping around; they are a lot easier to view 
through for any length of time than any non-stabilized glasses of 10x 
that I have tried.

When I said that the Canons are maybe not up to the very best, this 
was not to say that they are not good. They are very good, and 
certainly better than anything I've seen from most of the mid range 
glasses. I've handled a Zeiss image stabilized set; I think about 
20x60, but the price was a fair bit more than an M8 :-).

As far as top end non-stabilized glasses go, the majority of people 
that I've talked to think that Swarovski has the edge.

I'm not a big user of binoculars; I have a pair of 25yr old 8x20 
Leica glasses which serve well but mostly because they have decent 
performance and are tiny. If I got something in a higher 
magnification for birding now I would head for the Canons. The IS 
technology changes everything.

-- 
    *            Henning J. Wulff
   /|\      Wulff Photography & Design
  /###\   mailto:henningw@archiphoto.com
  |[ ]|     http://www.archiphoto.com

In reply to: Message from telyt at earthlink.net (telyt@earthlink.net) ([Leica] binoculars - looking for assistance)