100-400 + 1.4 extrender soft?

Just to save me doing the research....

Had a request this week for a shot of a family on a ferry as it passed a location fairly close to shore near me
I'm looking at 400-700 meters range, Good light, Early morning, Good contrast and color with no rising heat shimmer or airbourne microdebris. Ideal in fact.
To get the shot I chose my 80D as it's a cropper with 24 mpx to play with as opposed to my 6Dii
My 100-400mm L (original not ii) and matching 1.4x extender ii giving me a maximum aperture of f8

I was early and there was loads of activity on the river so I made on and got loads of shots

Most of these were at f8 ISO 400-640 giving me 1/1000th or faster.

Most were soft at the focus point (In the middle as only the centre point can AF at f8 on an 80D)

Images made at shorter focal lengths faired a bit bitter on sharpness.

Have we a problem?
- or-
Are we simply out-resolving the lens/extender combination with the APS-C 24meg sensor and this is as good as it gets.

that looks about right. so i'll say as good as you're gonna get. I have the 100-400 II + 1.4 III which I use with both my 80d and 5d4 but only for shots that don't require fine detail. also, I think you'd be better off stopped down to f11.

5d4 + 1.4 III

IMAGE LINK: https://erader.zenfoli​o.com/img/s/v-3/p3345233406-5.jpg

IMAGE LINK: https://erader.zenfoli​o.com/img/s/v-10/p3559925683-4.jpg

100-400mm II + 1.4TC II at 560mm on 5D Mark IV while doing practice shots in the parking lot of Nelson Photo in SD (was trying to decide between the Tamron 150-600 G2, the 100-400 II w/ and w/o 1.4x II TC)

Thanks ed Rader

Looking at yours I reckon that one stop would have nailed it.

I saved my backside by also doing a set at close range while the ferry was between the lock gates.

Wonder if the Sigma 150-600 Sport would be better

Canon User wrote in post #18915493
Thanks ed Rader

Looking at yours I reckon that one stop would have nailed it.

I saved my backside by also doing a set at close range while the ferry was between the lock gates.

Wonder if the Sigma 150-600 Sport would be better

Don't overlook the tamron g2, I shot some indoor event pics last weekend with it, on a tripod, and they came out great.

The original 100-400 is known to be not great with either a filter or TC.

I think the 100-400 II is very good with a 1.4TC.
First photo the complete frame, 2nd photo a 3.5MP crop of the original 20MP. (f11)

First photo the complete frame, 2nd photo a 3.5MP crop of the original 20MP. (f8)

Atmospheric distortion.... Combined with the fact that the original 100-400 isn't a very good lens for resolving detail on a dense sensor. It was marginally better than the old sigma 150-500 lens back in the day, and the 50-500 OS was very close.

https://www.lensrental​s.com …-shootout/comment-page-1/

Finally, after looking to these 2 factors, how are you post processing? You can pull alot of detail out of what seems to be a soft image if done properly. Give us a raw, and I suspect you could be amazed by what some here on POTN can do.

I received my first L lens the 100-400 as a barter deal from a friend in 2008. Used and used it. As my L lens arsenal grew, you could see improvements in the newer offerings as the years went by. Christmas of 2018, I decided I needed to have a talk with St. Nick and acquire the new 100-400 L IS Mark II. Wow! What an improvement.
The original lens if I remember was designed in the “Film Days”. 1998.
The image you have with the converter on your Version 1 is what it is.
I finally traded in my 100-400 Push/Pull as it has been sitting home for a year and a half towards a new 70-200 f/4 L IS.
The old Push Pull was a nice lens to use for many, many years.

100-400II with 2xIII, much better than the old 100-400 with even a 1.4x, IMO

good point. I would have never used my version I with TC. and I use TC sparingly with version II. i'll usually crop or switch to 80d before using TC except in cases where I really need reach and i'm not sweating fine detail -- like in the examples I posted.

I never found the MkI 100-400 to respond well with any TCs attached; I would say that example looks about what I would expect from that combo. However, it also looks like some of what you may be seeing as "soft" is some fair chromatic aberration around a number of the smaller surfaces (railings, window ports, etc). May be able to improve the result somewhat by doing a bit of CA removal in post. Won't fix the whole thing, but may help.