to rely on what my eyes tell me and what those subjective attributes known as handling, convenience, and style indicate. I can say right up front that I found all three of these fi ne binoculars to be completely satisfactory, which was no surprise, and justifi ed my buy- ing them in the fi rst place. All three of the binoculars feature central focusing, with right eye individual focusing to compensate for any difference in vi- sion between left and right eyes. On each binocular, the focusing dial on the right-hand eyepiece has some sort of mark that can be placed in reference to an index mark on the frame of the binocular. As a sort of control, I included my
old 8x23 Nikon Venturer II to compare the three new compacts to it as well as to each other. To evaluate sharpness, I set up a target used for sighting-in on a stand and mounted each binocular in turn on my sturdy Manfrotto tripod. Placing the tripod at a distance of 25 yards, the binocular being tested was focused on the target. Incidentally, the correct procedure for focusing a binocular is to select an object some distance away and, while looking through the left eyepiece, use the center focusing wheel to focus on the object as carefully as possible. Next, the right eyepiece is focused by means of the individual focus ring using the right eye. With the binocular focused on the target and the target placed in the center of the fi eld, I proceeded to read the print. I was amazed to see how much better I could see when the binocular was rock-steady on a tripod, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that even the fi ne print was legible. Next, I rotated the head of the tripod in order the move the binocular so that the target appeared on either side of the fi eld of view to check sharpness at the edge. This is not a very scientifi c test, but it does give a good indica- tion of sharpness and a comparison of sharpness at the center of the fi eld of view and at the edges since all three of the binoculars have 8x magnifi cation. As a result of the 8x binoculars
having 25mm objectives, there should be no great difference in image bright- ness. However, apparent brightness depends not only on the size of the objective lenses and magnifi cation but also on the type of coatings used on the
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lenses and prisms. My evaluation in this area was simply to look at objects under various lighting conditions. Lenses for cameras and binocu-
lars sometimes show distortion that can be of two types. One type, known as pincushion distortion, renders lines as if they bow inward toward the cen- ter. The other type, barrel distortion, causes lines to bow outward away from the center of the fi eld of view. I checked the images provided by the binoculars by examining a brick wall using each binocular attached to the tripod. None of the three binoculars showed enough distortion to be noted by my eyes. Because there are subtle differ-
ences in how eyes interact with optical devices, I made it a point to use each of the models tested for an extended period to see if there were issues with collimation or distortion. Keep in mind that it is very likely that two specimens of the same model of any device may exhibit differences in performance. I found no diffi culty in using the bin- oculars for extended periods. By way of summary, my personal
evaluation is as follows. The Nikon and Olympus gave a slightly brighter image than the Leupold which, to my eyes, does not appear quite as sharp as the other two. However, when examining the edge sharpness by moving the binocular after it had been focused with the target in the center,
the Leupold had better edge sharpness than the Nikon or Olympus. With the Nikon and Olympus, the inside edge of the fi eld of view was sharper than the outside edge. When focusing the binoculars on a bucket about 75 yards away, I could discern no difference in reading the label when it was in the middle of the fi eld of view. In terms of center sharpness, the Nikon appeared to have a slightly better performance
This target served as a convenient object to check sharpness and clarity of the binoculars.
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