8 January 2001
Dear Stephen
I just read with interest your 'tools of the trade' article on cheap roof-prisms
in the August issue of Birding.
I noted with interest your comment "..., but if you are particularly sensitive
to chromatic aberration, you are going to see it in any of these
glasses.".
This seems to suggest that some people are more sensitive to chromatic aberration
than others and I'd like to know more about this for the
following reason:
I've always seen significant chromatic aberration when I look through the Leica
8x32s (I must have looked through 20+ pairs over the years).
Other friends of mine, some of whom own them can't see it. I use 8x42 Elites,
but when the Leica 8x32s first came out I was taken with their
small size and thought they would make an ideal second/spare pair to take on
tours in case I lost or damaged my Elites (a tour leader can't
function too well without good binoculars as I'm sure you can appreciate). I
bought a pair, despite my reservations about the chromatic
aberration, but every time I looked through them I was immediately distracted
by this aspect. After about a year I gave up trying to get used
to them, sold them and bought a pair of the 'new' style 8x42 Elites instead,
which I now use as my main pair and keep my 'old' Elites as the
back-up.
Just before Christmas we had a Sunbird leaders meeting in Sandy, at which one
of our leaders had her pair of Leica 8x32s which I
happened to look through. I was immediately reminded of the chromatic aberration
which was very apparent to me straight away. Out of
curiosity I mentioned this to the other leaders present and asked them to look
through them and see if they could see it. Now these are all
first-class world birders who all own and use top-of-the range optics so they
are a critical bunch. Most of them (including Will Russell, Killian
Mullarney, Ian Lewington and Steve Rooke) couldn't see any chromatic aberration.
The only one who could and who agreed with me that it
was a serious fault was Paul Holt. I was left extremely puzzled by this and
if it hadn't been for Paul agreeing with me, would have seriously
doubted my sanity (or at least my eye-sight!).
Does this make any sense to you? Is it possible that some people can see chromatic
aberration and others not? Have you heard of anyone
else expressing this concern about Leica 8x32s in the past?
Your thoughts would be much appreciated.
Best wishes,
David
David Fisher - Managing Director
Sunbird, P.O. Box 76, Sandy, Bedfordshire, SG19 1DF, UK.
Tel: 01767-682969 Fax: 01767-692481
