Binoculars Guide

Binoculars can be heavy pieces of equipment, especially those providing the higher levels of magnification.

A good pair will generally tip the scales at between 2 and 3 lbs. The job of holding them steady enough for clear viewing, even for relatively short periods of time, can become a feat of muscular endurance.

When you add in low light levels, wind, the cold and excitement, very often the combination of any or all of these variables, can render detailed observation nigh on impossible.

So what’s the answer? Holding the binoculars on a tripod, is one solution. But what if circumstances don’t permit the use of a tripod. Besides, using binoculars on a tripod can, in certain circumstances, be a very real ‘pain in the neck’, particularly when trying to view the night sky at angles greater than 30 or 40 degrees above the horizon.

Observations from moving vehicles of any nature, also tend to rule out the use of a tripod as a means of stabilization. All vehicles suffer from vibration, to some degree or another. So any observation from such a platform, even with a tripod-type solution, will still face image degradation, due to vibration.

The answer is Image Stabilised Binoculars.

Developed initially for high-end video cameras, the application of image stabilization technology has spread to include still photography, and both telescopes and binoculars, as well as more specialised areas, including medical imaging.

By utilising image stabilization in binoculars, it is now possible to hand hold binoculars with magnification powers, well in excess ot the previously accepted upper limit of 10x magnification.

This means that binoculars with magnifications up to 18x can now be hand-held, without the degradation of image quality, previously experienced at magnifications of this order.

The stabilization process is most commonly achieved by the use of small piezo-electric motion detectors, also known as gyroscopic detectors. These detect motion in the horizontal and vertical planes and feed information to tiny motors that move the prisms within the light path to compensate for this motion. This system will compensate for angular movement up to 0.7 of a degree.

Image stabilized binoculars are, as a result, more expensive than their non stabilized counterparts. The improved viewing experience, is, in my opinion, well worth the additional cost.

Related posts:

1. Auto Focus Binoculars
   
   There are currently no manufacturers, of which I am aware, producing ‘true’ auto focus binoculars. The majority of camera manufacturers have auto focus lenses as standard on all their compact cameras and most of their SLR range of lenses. You just turn the camera on and point it in the direction you wish to shoot. The lens will usually identify the object you wish to photograph and focus upon it. There is currently no comparable system available for binoculars. There have been attempts to emulate auto focus camera lenses with binoculars, the most notable being an instrument produced by Minolta, in the 1990′s. It was reported to be bulky and the performance in terms of accuracy of the item upon which the instrument chose to focus, left something to be desired. To be fair, the same can be said, even today, of camera lenses, in low light conditions and where contrast levels are not distinct. So what are auto focus…...