Tamron 70-300vc and converter.

Tamron makes their own telwconverter. And then there is a canon. The tamron is way cheaper. Anybody use the tamron? I would love to get it at that price and have sharpness rather than buy the expensive canon.
Regards

The Canon one won't fit,the Tamron is a rebadged Kenko (I had one),the results were not good on that lens.

Thanks for the reply. Weird, because mine is very sharp otherwise.

The lens is sharp,I have one but the teleconverter does it no favours,you loose a stop or two of light and IQ and depending on your camera autofocus as well, the Tamron teleconverters appear to be the older lower specced Kenkos, I don't think Tamron sell them any more.

The lens is superb by itself.My friend used to have it.I have the Kenko 300 Pro DGX 1.4 X TC,which once was mounted on it.He tried the 'less expensive' way to go to 400+mm reach,but after a single outing dropped the idea.Later went ahead with the Canon 400f5.6.
We also tried it on the Canon 70-300mm USM,which is also a superb lens by itself.The result was not-so-good,both sharpness wise and AF wise,with the TC on.
In my opinion it better to crop the image to take it to a 400+mm comparable pic,rather than to attach a TC with these ' consumer ' zoom lenses.

Now of course the 100-400 MkII also works well with 1.4X TC. I have tested it with the Kenko 300 Pro DGX 1.4 X TC.

Only other zoom I've seen working great with a TC is the Canon EF 200-400mmL USM IS with it's in-built 1.4X dedicated TC.........

Frodge wrote in post #17782656
Tamron makes their own telwconverter. And then there is a canon. The tamron is way cheaper. Anybody use the tamron? I would love to get it at that price and have sharpness rather than buy the expensive canon.
Regards

Heya,

I use a 2.0x Kenko PRO DGX TC with several lenses. Nice and sharp. Inexpensive for what it is.

While you will not be autofocusing with it on that 300mm, that's only from the view finder. With Live View, you can autofocus. So for still shots it's still worth while. Excellent way to get some reach onto the moon, or other relatively slow moving or still things. Not for birds in flight or something obviously, and not for low light use. But you can get away on a tripod with it, at low shutter speed, around F11, and push that ISO real high. Use Live View. And appreciate more pixels on target.

So really it just comes down to whether what you're trying to shoot is something that will allow for a tripod setup, low shutter speed, high ISO, and Live View focusing.

Here's an example of that TC in use:

On a slow F6.3 600mm lens, I stopped down to F8. The TC is in line, so it's now a physical 1200mm lens, and -2 stops of aperture, so essentially F16. I was on a tripod using live view. Very slow shutter, shakes like crazy, but the stabilization helped, and the tripod really helped. Live View was able to focus this thing on a T4i. Decent if you consider it's 1200mm physical on an APS-C sensor (so nearly 2000mm field of view in full frame terms), at F16 and ISO 1600 from a Rebel.

I did it mainly to test it out as a proof of concept to myself. I mainly got the TC for use with the 600mm for the moon to get even more detail, which it's excellent for. I also use this TC with my 200mm prime, and it's very fast, and still very sharp, and I do BIF with it no problem there (it behaves as a 400mm F5.6 prime and I shoot it wide open).

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/padB​gm

Why won't the canon teleconverter fit? BTW malveaux, moon shots and slow moving or non moving objects is what I'd use it for. Not a bird in flight guy. Any recommendations on which one?
Great shot BTW....the tamron has great is BTW.

Frodge wrote in post #17789598
Why won't the canon teleconverter fit?

It's got a big lump that sticks out of the front.

I thought the tamron was designated EF...

Frodge wrote in post #17789674
I thought the tamron was designated EF...

Third party lenses are EF mount. Even if designed for APS-C, they're still EF mount. They will fit and work with teleconverters unless physical limitations (like protruding, etc). On some zooms, the rear element will drop backwards into the TC and hit it, making it physically impossible. Primes are a lot easier to use teleconverters on. That and large telephoto zooms (not wide angles).

Frodge wrote in post #17789598
Why won't the canon teleconverter fit? BTW malveaux, moon shots and slow moving or non moving objects is what I'd use it for. Not a bird in flight guy. Any recommendations on which one?
Great shot BTW....the tamron has great is BTW.

Virtually any non-Canon will work for you. Canon's are picky. Kenko, Sigma, Tamron, etc, they will work. They may not report. But they will work. The Kenko is what I use, because it doesn't care what's plugged into it, it will pass on electronics and work even on ancient stuff, and new stuff, from any maker. Sharp too.

Very best,

Thanks. I'm going to check that out!

Might want to check this out;
https://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthre​ad.php?t=41922


Some thoughts;

Even if a 3rd party T-Con will fit lenses that aren't deigned to handle T-Cons, remember they still aren't designed to handle T-Cons even if you can get one to fit.
ie; it usually means it won't offer good results.

T-cons work best with primes.

Until recently there were VERY few expensive Zooms that really worked well with T-Cons. (usually f/2.8 constant aperture zooms)

There are exceptions to every rule. I doubt the Tamron 70-300mm is one of them.

Just shot the moon. F11, ISO 400 1/125 using a Tamron 70-300VC at 300mm w/ a 1.4x Sigma TC.

Focus is slow but accurate... results are "ok" Cheap reach for sure. I did however literaly just threw it on and walked outside and shot this so nothing fancy and no conditioning of the lens for the outdoors prior.