Long Telephoto 100-400mm

June 07, 2024  •  Leave a Comment

Hey Everyone! Hope you're having a great week. This week I want to talk about the final adjustment of me going back full frame. My long Telephoto solution.  As you can see from the title of this blog I have Chosen the Sony 100-400mm lens for this section of my photography kit. But I wanted to give you a review of the lens and why I chose it instead of other lenses in this range. When I was shooting crop sensor I had an effective full frame equivalent of 15-525mm focal length. But since I've gone back to full frame I could only go to 105mm. So I needed a long telephoto. Previously when I was shooting full frame Nikon my longest lens was a 70-200 mm that I used for portraits and landscape. It was a fantastic lens . But I rarely shoot portraits anymore. The 70-200 is a great lens but I wanted something a little more. I mainly shoot travel landscape Cockspur LighthouseCockspur Lighthouse and occasionally wildlife. The 70-200 would be great for landscapes but for travel a little big and for wildlife too short.  When I was shooting crop sensor I liked that I had the option to shoot up to 525mm.  But I rarely shot at the very long end of that focal length.  I could get a third party lens from Tamron or Sigma that would fit this focal length and work great but I wanted to stay with Sony lenses. I also wanted to buy used to keep the cost down. I could have gone 200-600mm but I thought that was just too much especially on how I would use it.  So the Sony 100-400 seemed the right lens for me but there are two versions. The original came out in 2017 and the newer one  in 2022. I decided to go with the older one after watching many reviews and articles on both of them. So the lens I got was the Sony 100-400mm F4.5-5.6 G-Master OSS. What does all that mean? It's a 100-400mm focal length. Maximum aperture is F4.5 at 100mm and 5.6 at 400mm. It's a G- Green HeronGreen Heron Master lens which means it's the top of the line , one of the premium lenses the only one in my kit. And The OSS means that it's optically stabilized . 

So that was my reasoning behind getting the lens that I did let me talk about the lens itself . First of all the build quality is fantastic. Built like a tank! Much like my 70-200 that I had with Nikon. It's a weather sealed lens that means I can get it in a little weather. It has all of the seals to protect it and your camera. It has 4 switches on the side of the lens. It has a AF/MF switch .  It has a range switch Full to Infinity to 3meters, It has a OSS off and on switch. And a mode switch with 2 modes. Mode 1 is for everyday shooting and Mode 2 is for Panning.  It has 3 buttons on it that can be used to control something on your camera like turning Eye Auto Focusing on or off.  It Also has a switch that will tighten or loosen the lens to Zoom more smoothly depending on your taste.  It also has Snowy EgretSnowy Egret a removable tripod collar that can be adjusted or removed as needed.  As of this blog I've only used just a couple of times and it is sharp and easy to use.  There is an art to using longer lenses which I am learning but not great at yet. Maybe it's the weight or the size of the lens but it may take me a while to get used to it. It is a great lens that will give me many years of service.

Well that's it for this week and hopefully the end for all of the gear change blogs that I have been writing lately. LOL So until next week make sure you get out and shoot!


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