Foton Binoculars: Anyone Evaluate These Roof Prism Rusian Binoculars??
- Thread starter Gary H
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Grump
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Can you post a pic? I sold a few Russian optics in a past life.
Certainly not very popular..judging by response...
I was thinking of the 7x35 or 10x40
Here is the link:
http://www.binocularsmart.com/binoculars.shtml
Thanks
I was thinking of the 7x35 or 10x40
Here is the link:
http://www.binocularsmart.com/binoculars.shtml
Thanks
Grump
Member
The Fotons had all-aluminum bodies, unless I've been fooled by zinc. They were plenty sturdy (I trashed a pair of plastic-body Bushnels in college 
).
Image quality was GREAT in the middle 2/3 to 3/4. Your cheapos from Wal-Mart at $20 to $50 were then typically sharp & flat-field for only the middle HALF. They're still that bad IME, and are much worse than the Fotons in how far out of focus the edges are as compared to the center.
Edge distortion was pincusion and fairly mild--more acceptable than the slight fuzziness at the edges.
The place importing them was charging too much for them. It really took a discriminating eye to tell the difference between the Fotons and equivalent power/objective roof prisms from Pentax and all those other guys. Leicas and Dr. Optic and Zeiss were more clearly superior.
But I don't remember if they were waterproof.
).Image quality was GREAT in the middle 2/3 to 3/4. Your cheapos from Wal-Mart at $20 to $50 were then typically sharp & flat-field for only the middle HALF. They're still that bad IME, and are much worse than the Fotons in how far out of focus the edges are as compared to the center.
Edge distortion was pincusion and fairly mild--more acceptable than the slight fuzziness at the edges.
The place importing them was charging too much for them. It really took a discriminating eye to tell the difference between the Fotons and equivalent power/objective roof prisms from Pentax and all those other guys. Leicas and Dr. Optic and Zeiss were more clearly superior.
But I don't remember if they were waterproof.
Thanks for the input. Your evaluation sounds more reasonable than the hype. It sounds like these are nice low end binocs. In other words OK for the price, but not Zeiss quality as the folks selling them would like us to believe.
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