First experiences with the 500 D Achromat
I bought a [post id=208]Canon 500 D[/post] Achromatic lens to a fair price. In the last couple of days it was time to play arround with ist.
Introduction
Close up lenses are like glasses for a lens. You can get closer to the object, but loose the ability to focus to infinity. You can calcute the distance to the object by the online calculator here.
But every type of glass i attach to an optical system doesn’t make it better ;-), this is why close up lenses in generall don’t have a good reputation. Achromatic lenses like the Canon 500 D are a lot better.
Practise
I used the 500 D achromat on the 70-200/4.0 L IS, the 100-400/4.5-5.6 L IS and the 00/2.8 L IS Macro lens.
Using the achromat with 100mm Macro alsmost doesn’t make sense, but on the 2 telephoto zoom lenses its a gain. You can reach the following reproduction scales and object distances.
| focal length | Scale (infinity) | Scale (closest focus distance) |
|---|---|---|
| 100mm | 1:5 | 1:4 |
| 200mm | 1:2,26 | 1:2,88 |
| 400mm | 1:1,31 | 1:1,25 |
| 70mm | 1:7,4 | 1:4,2 |
| 100mm | 1:5,1 | 1:4,2 |
| 200mm | 1:2,7 | 1:1,6 |
The first 3 entries a for the 100-400 and the last 3 are for the 70-200. The object distance from front lens to object ranges from 38cm to 51cm on the 100-400, with the 70-200 the range is between 30,5 cm and 51cm. Looking on these values using the 70-200 with 500D achromat seems to be more flexible.
But also in the combination with 100-400/4.5-5.6 the achromat is very usefull, mostly due to the object distance. Picture qualitity is pretty good, as far as i can judge after a couple of pictures.
Conclusion
For sure even a high qualitiy achromat is no substition for a specalized macro lens, but it is a very usefull alternative on a telephoto zoom lens in terms of object distances. Reaching reproduction scales near to 1:1 and you are lets say far away. And such a lens is smaller and light in wieght compared to a amcro lens. I’ll keep the 500D and it already found a place in my camera bag 😉
Do you use close up lenses or better achromatic lenses like the 500D. Are they recommendable if one only must shot a close up once in a time. Please leave your comments iwhat you prefer. And like always questions are wolcome, too
ciao tuxoche
