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British Wildlife Centre + 50-200mm 2.8-4

Started Apr 26, 2019 | Discussions thread
Jim Scarff Regular Member • Posts: 342
50-200mm vs. 100-400, but only incrementally and at a cost

There is natural competition between 4 MFT telephoto lenses for wildlife photographers and others.  Of these two are zoom lenses:
Panasonic - Leica 100-400

Panasonic - Leica 50-200

and two are fixed lenses:
Olympus 300 mm f/4 and and optional 1.4 teleconverter

Panasonic - Leica 200 mm f/2.8 + bundled 1.4X teleconverter
There seems consensus that the fixed lenses are somewhat sharper at their focal length, but they are also notably heavier than the zoom lenses.
The competition between the two, approximately similarly priced Panasonic zooms is interesting to me.  Many pundits say the 50-200 is sharper, and it is certainly smaller and lighter. It lacks the 200-400 mm focal length, and in theory can get back 80mm of that with a 1.4X teleconverter, which Panasonic is not selling as a separate item at this time.
At 400mm the 100-400 appears to be quite sharp.  For someone like me who photographs a lot of small wild birds, I am photographing at 400mm a high percentage of the time, it seems I would be having to use teleconverters more than I would like.
For a detailed comparison of how the three Panasonic-Leica lenses  compare check out 
Richard Wong's review of Panasonic 50-200mm lens

 Jim Scarff's gear list:Jim Scarff's gear list
Sony RX10 IV Panasonic Lumix DC-G9 Canon EOS R5 Canon EOS R7 Canon EF 50mm F1.8 II +16 more
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