55-300 PLM with 1.4X Converter

Bernie, they are deffinetly keepers. Thanks for showing.

Tom W

Indeed these look pretty good, as long as you don't pixel peek.

Joe

Using the same lens on my K3II, and have been thinking long and hard on this combo. Thanks for bringing this up...I was about to start a thread about the same thing. Would like to see more examples if anyone else is using the same setup. THanks for posting.

I agree with joe's reply "as long as you don't pixel peek". This is the same as: as long as you don't crop much.


Better results with the converter are obtained with a prime like the DA 300. I don't have the DA 300. I use the 55-300 PLM with the converter for shots that fill most of the frame. The images I have of small objects in the frame like a bird far off in the distance look fair uncropped. They look worse cropped. I assume the poor cropped image is a limitation of the optics, also not sure if my AF focus adjustment is optimal.

My original post was due to my surprise that the combination worked as well as it did for objects large in the frame. Most other reviews I read indicated it would not be good. It did take the -10 AF adjustment for the converter (different than the +8 AF adjustment for the lens) to produce something decent.

Here is one shot (at ISO 400) uncropped & cropped. The cropped version is not good.

Bernie

I’ve always had a difficult time actually seeing focus improvements with the K-3’s single lens autofocus adjustments, even at the extreme ends.

Thank you for posting this information.
I recently got the same lens+TC combo.
And I was having hard time trying to figure out why the images are soft focused and not sharp... (1.4X Converter listed 55-300 PLM lens compatible, so I thought I was going to get the same sharp image out of box)




kp f/9.5 1/2500 iso 800 at 420mm (300mm x1.4)

Today I have to answer Rudiger Maersz repair i Hamburg for a repair on my 60-250. There was something on the zoommechanic.I decided 'Yes" because I had last summer very good results with or without the 1.4 TC in af-c tracking.

But for 100 euro more I can buy the 55-300.

Thanks for sharing

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Looking from my phone right now, so I can not comment on IQ, just to verify that the teleconverter will normally change the AFFA settings of your lenses.

Bokeh is not changed a lot from other photos of the lens i can recall. Enjoy the extra reach.

I finally got around to do the lens fine tuning.
I ended up with -8 at 300mm and -10 at 420mm with TC for mine.
I replaced B + H CP filter with B+W UV- Haze filter and upped shutter speed to 1/3200


kp f/9.5 1/3200 iso 1250 420mm




kp f/8 1/3200 iso 200 294mm with TC

I also tied SMC-F 80-200 + TC combo and that needed -10 as well.