High-Power 500mm/1000mm f/8 Manual Telephoto Lens for Canon EOS 80D, 90D, Rebel T3, T3i, T5, T5i, T6i, T6s, T7, T7I, T8I, SL3, 60D, 70D, 5D, EOS5D IV, 6D II, 7D II SLR Cameras

Can’t believe that I almost returned this.
Not sure exactly what I was expecting…something between a useless toy and cheap-n-good. Mostly, something to get a better idea of how long a lens I’ll want when it comes time to buy a ‘real’ supertelephoto (I.E.: mortgage my life for a Canon “L”). I’ve been shooting with SLRs and now DSLRs for a half-century, but somehow I’ve never used anything longer than 200mm. I figured that 500mm would be another world–and it is.None of the review examples posted here gave me more than hint at what this lens would do, but I bought one anyway. Mine came branded Vivitar, but that doesn’t mean much of anything these days. It’s reasonably pretty and the T-mount-to-EF adapter mated nicely. It focuses past infinity. Focus is smooth if a bit stiff, and the f-stop detents are positive. The stop-down ring is much too stiff for my taste. I have no interest in the 2x teleconverter.It has a minimally effective AR coating, but I wasn’t expecting any. I thought that it might be a simple telescope at this price. But being physically shorter than it’s effective focal length, it is a real telephoto lens.After a much less than successful attempt at taking shots of the moon, I was convinced that I wouldn’t learn much from it. So I requested a return.The night that I was packing it up to ship back, I decided to give it another chance. Just an informal quickie. Printed up part of the standard ISO 12233 target and taped it to a toolbox 3 rooms with open doors away, for about 32 feet. An ancient Canon 1D MkII N was all that was handy, but it’s 8.2M pixels were fine for this test. (APS-H sensor, so 500mm x 1.3 = 650mm equivalent.)f/16 (two stops down) for more sharpness and depth of field, indoors at 1/5 second and ISO100. The three pix I’ve posted are the same photo, full frame resized to the maximum width of a review photo, plus two crops at 100% (400×420). Otherwise, straight from the camera. As printed, the finest pitch of the lines on the target measured 1/32″.So this lens is resolving a surprising 32 lines per inch at 32 feet, with decent contrast and only moderate chromatic aberration. If you’ve stared at many resolution targets, you’ll appreciate at how good that is for any lens in this price range. (Check out reviews of the Canon EF 500mm f/4L IS II USM to see how much sharpness $9k will buy,)Now, cheap lenses like this generally have a lot of unit-to-unit variation in quality, and I wasn’t getting that kind of resolution throughout the frame (at least partly because the paper target wasn’t lying completely flat). YMMV.Some other caveats: There aren’t many tripods that are solid enough (mine wasn’t) for a resolution test at this slow shutter speed and I was in too much of a hurry to figure out how to lock up the mirror. Plus, this lens is physically very light adding little mass for stability. So I put the camera on a heavy table, shimmed the lens up to a useful angle, and used the self-timer.The rule-of-thumb for hand held without image stabilization is a maximum exposure time that is the reciprocal of the focal length. So 1/500 second for a 500mm lens. But that’s the maximum for reasonable sharpness with a reasonably stead hand. To show off this lens’ sharpness, maybe an extra stop or two faster shutter when out and about. Sunny16 would suggest full daylight at f/16, 1/1000 second and ISO1000.At f/8 wide open, this is a mighty slow (dim) lens. I wasn’t able to get an accurate focus indoors without a 2.5x viewfinder attachment, and even that was a challenge with 20-20 and OK night vision.Conclusions? 500mm is probably somewhat more than I want on a full-frame body and about half what I’d like from a telescope. I really will need to rent an expensive lens before popping the cash to purchase, but this gives me a rough starting point.All said and done, I’m glad that I bought it, and will definitely keep it to fool around with.

Good lens
Good lens, was nice that it came with a UV filter, the downside is that the UV filter doesn’t fit the lens at all, mine came with a 58mm filter and the lens is 67mm, it is a strictly manual focus lens and it comes with the adapter to go on the camera

Better than expected!
Decided to try this lens out and ordered it on Sunday afternoon around 3pm and it was delivered at 8pm the same day. Already looking good! Well packaged and Big Mike’s Electronics added a 7 page typewritten FAQ and instruction sheet. Looking better. I’ve used T-Mount lenses in the past, so it was easy to assemble the camera mount to the lens. I chose to not install the 2X converter at this time (more about that later). I mounted the lens to my camera (Canon EOS R6 mirrorless) and set the camera menu to allow picture taking with no lens attached (as this lens is totally manual with no electronic contacts the camera doesn’t know its there–you need to do this with any fully manual lens, not just this one). Turned the camera on and voila–it worked. As the minimum focusing distance with a 500mm lens is around 35 feet, I couldn’t really take many photos in the house, and it was already dark outside. So I had to wait until this morning to really try it out.Finally got a chance to take some photos (through my window). I mounted it on my tripod–this is a 500mm lens, it magnifies camera/hand shake tremendously, use a tripod!. Focused on some things down the street, made some photos (attached). Sat down to write this review.If you are used to auto-focus lenses with an aperture that lets you focus wide open and automatically stops down when you take the photo you are going to have to learn new ways of working. Focus is manual. If your camera allows for Live View focusing on the back screen, use that, and magnify it if you can. If you want to work at f/8 (the maximum aperture on this lens) you are all set. If you want to stop down for more depth of field there are two steps after focusing. First note that there are two adjustable rings on the lens. One sets the aperture (F/16 in the attached photo) and the other (marked O/C for Open or Closed) actually adjusts the aperture. Set it to Open to focus wide open letting in as much light as it can. Then twist it to Closed to actually stop down to the desired aperture before taking the photo.About the 2x converter. I have not tried that yet as any 2x will lose two stops of light, making the lens a 1000mm f/16 lens. Need a really bright day or high ISO for that. I will test that another day. My issue with the converter, before using it, is that you need to remove the camera T-mount adapter from the lens and attach it to the converter and then attach the converter to the lens. That’s a lot to go through if you are out in the field and it requires the use of a very small screwdriver for the three setscrews that hold it all together. If you want to be able to use the converter and take it on and off more quickly, I would suggest getting a second t-mount adapter for your camera so both the lens and the converter have it permanently attached. Then you just need to unscrew the lens from the adapter and screw the converter onto the lens.Bottom line, a good value for the cost. Not quite the image quality of a Canon 500mm lens. And no image stabilization or auto-focus. But the Canon 500mm lens sells for $9,000. For the number of times I will need a long lens like this, I can accept the image quality and get a photo that I otherwise wouldn’t get.