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Sp-100 24-1200mm with Red Dot site built in.

Started Jan 29, 2014 | Discussions thread
Hatstand Senior Member • Posts: 1,623
Superzoom with built-in RDS is a great idea

I applaud Olympus for recognising the benefits of a Red Dot Sight to photographers, and being the first to make a camera with one built-in.

Why I love Red Dot Sights
They are incredibly useful for action photography, they allow photographers to instantly put subjects into the frame/viewfinder, no matter what level of zoom they happen to be at. They have long been used by savvy bird-in-flight photographers, who are oft heard to say "I couldn't have gotten that shot without the RDS". And when they were brought to my attention, it was a key factor in finally discarding my DSLR's in favour of superzooms.

Up until then, although a superzoom had emerged that could match my DSLR's for speed of operation, AF speed, burst/continuous, IS etc... and gave IQ that was "good enough" for my purposes... I still clung to my DSLR's for airshows, due to EVF's being either too low-rez, or too slow to be practical (at that time). A red dot sight was the final piece of the puzzle for me.

The sight has no magnification, and once alignment is set, the red dot in the special see-through mirror... always appears over the spot your camera is pointing at. Even if you bob your head around.

Thus, it freed me from the cycle of "zoom out to hunt/acquire subject" and "zoom back in to take the photo". That's a cycle which is particularly painful for superzooms, due to their huge ranges of focal lengths, and usually a motorised zoom too.

And with a suitable change to my shooting technique, it also let me watch airshows with both eyes and a virtually full "normal" field of view, while still taking photos - much more enjoyable. (I hold the camera out, strap taut against the back of my neck to make a "tension tripod" for stability, track or pan with the planes using the the RDS as my viewfinder, with just glances at the rear screen to check zoom/framing).

I also find it helps my panning technique at airshows, and since I have a full field of view - it makes catching aeroplane "crossovers", and planes passing interesting background scenery, cloud formations, moon etc... so easy it feels like cheating!

The SP-100's Red Dot Sight
As a long-time RDS user, I am not sure about Olympus' implementation. Feeding off the camera's battery would be convenient, as would instant access, easy alignment, and freedom from the problems of mounting a 3rd-party RDS.

But I favour a sight that has a large mirror in a thin frame, for the best possible field of view. Not sure how big the sight mirror is on the SP-100... but I'm definitely not impressed with the amount of "stuff" around it.

I'd also want to know what choice of reticles are available, since preferences vary (I favour "dot in a circle")... whether the reticle brightness can be varied to suit ambient light... whether the reticle colour can be changed... and how well the sight keeps its alignment between uses.

I'm also not sure there's much else to attract people to the SP-100... given they could choose any superzoom they like (that has a flash hotshoe), and add their own RDS instead...

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