shooting Olympus 75-300 w/o IBIS

Hello all

Do any of you shoot Olympus 75-300 II with a body that doesn't have IBIS?

I bought it used for my kid, but the camera we have is Panasonic G100, which doesn't have IBIS. I found it quite challenging.

Is this something that with practice could become a non-issue?

Mostly wanted the combo for her to shoot animals/birds at the zoo.

Thanks!

What shutter speed are you using? I imagine you'd need to be at 1/500s or faster.

For me such a small and lightweight combo would be very difficult to shoot with.

jor23 said:

Hello all

Do any of you shoot Olympus 75-300 II with a body that doesn't have IBIS?

I bought it used for my kid, but the camera we have is Panasonic G100, which doesn't have IBIS. I found it quite challenging.

Is this something that with practice could become a non-issue?

Mostly wanted the combo for her to shoot animals/birds at the zoo.

Thanks!

Click to expand...

Keep the shutter speed at or faster than 1 / (FLx2).

For example at 300mm, 1 / (300x2) = 1/600.

If these animals are moving, you'll want a fast shutter speed anyway, especially in the avian areas. For sloths, tortoises, and pensive chimps, IBIS is more helpful. A monopod may be useful. Outdoors you should have more than adequate light to get good exposures.

Correct shutter speed can tame potential motion blur from handholding, so no issues there presuming good light. My experience shooting 300+mm is IS is crucial for taming the viewfinder image for acquiring and following moving and/or distant subjects. I'm certain everybody is unique in their particular abilities here, just know that it's easier with it than without.

Cheers,

Rick

jor23 said:

Hello all

Do any of you shoot Olympus 75-300 II with a body that doesn't have IBIS?

Click to expand...

No

jor23 said:

I bought it used for my kid, but the camera we have is Panasonic G100, which doesn't have IBIS. I found it quite challenging.

Is this something that with practice could become a non-issue?

Click to expand...

Not really. At the long end you would need about 1/750 or faster with good technique. This is extremely limiting as this is a relatively slow lens

jor23 said:

Mostly wanted the combo for her to shoot animals/birds at the zoo.

Click to expand...

You would likely need at least a monopod and lots of practice and breath in anything other than very bright light at the longer end



Overall, this is a very challenging combo and likely too frustrating to consider for handheld work.

Thanks. I am thinking about returning the lens and get the Panasonic 40-150 to start with.

Yeah. I am thinking about returning the lens. It's quite impressive though even wide open at 300m!

jor23 said:

Thanks. I am thinking about returning the lens and get the Panasonic 40-150 to start with.

Click to expand...

Make sure to update the lens firmware.

The 75-300 is a bit more expensive than the Panasonic 40-150. Hard to say which is better, but I find the 14-140 II to have a better range especially for captive areas like a zoo, without changing lenses. There's also the 45-175. Both should have PowerOIS vs MegaOIS, which I believe, is supposed to be "better.

YMMV.

jor23 said:

Thanks. I am thinking about returning the lens and get the Panasonic 40-150 to start with.

Click to expand...

If you want to use this for animals at the zoo then I would suggest the Panasonic 100-300 which has built in stabilization. 150mm is a bit limiting for zoo work.

jor23 said:

Yeah. I am thinking about returning the lens. It's quite impressive though even wide open at 300m!

Click to expand...

these are quite impressive. However, EXIF shows you needed ISO 3200 @ 1/500 sec to get it fast enough. So although these are very good, you need very bright light but also remember that DR drops, and noise rises with higher ISO. This means detail can easily be compromised unless conditions are as ideal as these shots.

Also, as a side note, I had this lens on my EM1.1, and it was very sharp up to about 225mm, then good as long as both the light and technique are excellent. The Panasonic 100-300 would also see a bit of image compromise at the longest FL when conditions are less than perfect.

jor23 said:

Click to expand...

--
Truth never fears scrutiny.

nunyab said:

jor23 said:

Thanks. I am thinking about returning the lens and get the Panasonic 40-150 to start with.

Click to expand...

Make sure to update the lens firmware.

The 75-300 is a bit more expensive than the Panasonic 40-150. Hard to say which is better, but I find the 14-140 II to have a better range especially for captive areas like a zoo, without changing lenses. There's also the 45-175. Both should have PowerOIS vs MegaOIS, which I believe, is supposed to be "better.

YMMV.

Click to expand...

Ha!

I left m43 years ago. What I miss is the choices of affordable, small telephoto lenses!

I already bought the 40-150 f4-5.6 kit lens. Should be sufficient for my daughter to have a blast at the local zoo!

I appreciate the feedback!

This is a gift for my daughter. I think either would work fine. However, without the OIS, I found it quite challenging to get sharp images myself. So, maybe it's not something for a beginner. I am returning this lens and bought a Panasonic 40-150 f4-5.6 instead. She will still love it, I am sure.

Albert Valentino said:

jor23 said:

Yeah. I am thinking about returning the lens. It's quite impressive though even wide open at 300m!

Click to expand...

these are quite impressive. However, EXIF shows you needed ISO 3200 @ 1/500 sec to get it fast enough. So although these are very good, you need very bright light but also remember that DR drops, and noise rises with higher ISO. This means detail can easily be compromised unless conditions are as ideal as these shots.

Also, as a side note, I had this lens on my EM1.1, and it was very sharp up to about 225mm, then good as long as both the light and technique are excellent. The Panasonic 100-300 would also see a bit of image compromise at the longest FL when conditions are less than perfect.

Albert Valentino said:

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

Just saw this. 100-300 is a $500 lens.

I should have bought it on eBay, instead of the Oly for $300 used. But we are leaving early next week for a trip and I wan to have it in hand before that. So, buying new is the only option from Amazon.

The Olympus 75-300mm reportedly has better image quality than the Panasonic 100-300mm, but the Panasonic has optical image stabilization. It all comes down to how steadily she can hold the camera/lens combo or whether she can/is willing to use a monopod. She should practice photographing things in the yard to see if she can hold it steadily.

Yeah. She's 10, so it'll be a bit challenging.

jor23 said:

nunyab said:

jor23 said:

Thanks. I am thinking about returning the lens and get the Panasonic 40-150 to start with.

Click to expand...

Make sure to update the lens firmware.

The 75-300 is a bit more expensive than the Panasonic 40-150. Hard to say which is better, but I find the 14-140 II to have a better range especially for captive areas like a zoo, without changing lenses. There's also the 45-175. Both should have PowerOIS vs MegaOIS, which I believe, is supposed to be "better.

YMMV.

Click to expand...

Ha!

I left m43 years ago. What I miss is the choices of affordable, small telephoto lenses!

I already bought the 40-150 f4-5.6 kit lens. Should be sufficient for my daughter to have a blast at the local zoo!

Click to expand...

I guess that should read Panasonic 45-150mm lens, if it's the Olympus 40-150mm then in the same boat with no stabilisation.

The Panasonic 45-150mm is a good choice, small when stored with hood reversed, nicely built with a metal mount and that Mega OIS gives a nice "floaty" review stabilisation for easier framing and adding maybe 3 stops of stabilisation from my experience. That would make with care around a theoretical 1/40 sec the slowest shutter speed attainable at 150mm.

If picking off zoo animals just for fun then at 150mm some cropping of the result is possible thus taking it past "300mm" equivalent. On my 16MP Olympus the 2xDTC will crop the centre 4MP and interpolate back to 16MP and the 2X result looks pretty darn good on a screen, and it will print OK up to maybe 8x10 inch size for its 4MP actual content.

Yeah. It’s 45-150. The kit lens that normally comes with gx85 in the past.



i had it once. Seems to be better built than the Olympus counterpart.



I think it will work fine.

EDIT: I just saw that the OP already purchased a replacement lens. The following is for others who may find this discussion useful.

I am a big fan of the 75-300, the underrated lens with challenging specifications that trained me to be better, particularly for birding. I used it only on bodies with IBIS, though, where I found that 300mm was often too much even for the mighty Olympus sensor stabilization. 200mm is about the threshold at which I would want OIS.

For your case, I think it is perhaps a bit too much to ask a younger kid to master very long telephoto (600mm equivalent field of view) with no stabilization. But while you have the lens, if you are taking it to known venues to get frequent practice, it may be instructive to develop external stabilization techniques at shorter focal lengths: good shooting posture, using the left hand to hold the very end of the lens/hood steady, leaning on a railing or column for more support. Or if you already have a tripod or monopod that is permitted at your shooting locations, to demonstrate those.

Alternatively, this could be a good opportunity to introduce fieldcraft: getting in better positions to shoot subjects larger in frame without extending to the full 300mm. Fieldcraft can save you thousand$!

Others have described shutter speed, higher ISO, and noise reduction solutions, so I won't get into those.

For lens alternatives, may I also suggest the excellent Panasonic 45-175mm, which can be had at very reasonable prices used and is optically stabilized. This one is also quite underrated – do not be put off by the power zoom lever (which is great for video if you think you'll get into that) and can be completely ignored when shooting stills.

Good luck introducing the next generation to this rewarding pursuit!

Replace it with P100-300 which should offer you dolide 3 stops effective stablization plus a stabilized evf all the time.

It is the best fit for non iBIS Panny bodies.

Despite I have GX85 (around 2 stops effective IBIS) and G85 (around 3 stops effective IBIS), I would still prefer a Panny lens on them because of the 5 stops effective DUSL IS.

Yes, we can live without any in camera stablization, e.g. fast enough shutter speed, good handholding skill or tripod/monopod/any means of support. But as there is a choice why we have to go for the harder solution?

--
Albert
** Please forgive my typo error.
** Please feel free to download my image and edit it as you like **

Don't blame me, I'm just the messenger here:

"The lack of IBIS does not make a camera a bad camera. That is just an excuse for poor photography skills."

https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/67183251

I think everyone's takeaway is that we should really all avoid cameras with IBIS at all costs lest we find ourselves in the position of having to make excuses for our poor skills once we use cameras without IBIS and find that we can't get the images we could with IBIS. The shame really is overwhelming.

Sincerely,

A totally ashamed IBIS apologist