Will an EF-to-Micro Four Thirds speed booster give me more reach for backyard wildlife?
Asked 3/2/2021
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I use a Micro Four Thirds camera and was considering an EF-to-MFT 0.64x speed booster with Canon EF lenses for photographing and recording backyard wildlife. I like MFT because the lenses are smaller and lighter, but I’m trying to understand whether adapting EF glass with a speed booster would help me get more zoom/reach on a budget.
Specifically: does a speed booster increase magnification, or does it do the opposite? How would the field of view compare with using native MFT lenses or with a Canon APS-C camera such as an 80D?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
5y ago
2 Answers
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A speed booster increases aperture at the expense of magnification. “Speed” comes at the expense of magnification. Wider aperture for shorter focal length. 0.64 times the given focal length in this case.
A teleconverter provides magnification at the expense of aperture. At a constant distance a 1.4x teleconverter doubles the number of pixels of the subject at the cost of one stop of light. A 2x teleconverter quadruples the number of pixels at the expense of two stops of light.
A 300mm f4 lens with a 2x teleconverter becomes a 600mm f8 “lens.”
Originally by user95237. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user95237
5y ago
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Generated from our catalog & community — verify before relying on it.
No—if your goal is more reach, a speed booster is the opposite of what you want.
A 0.64x speed booster reduces the lens’s effective focal length by 0.64x while making the lens brighter. So you gain light, but lose magnification. Example: a 300mm lens becomes effectively 192mm on the MFT body before crop is considered, giving a wider view than the bare lens would.
For comparison, to match the angle of view of a 300mm lens on a Canon 80D (1.6x APS-C), you need about a 240mm lens on Micro Four Thirds. So native MFT already gives you relatively strong reach for size.
If you want more subject magnification, look at longer focal lengths or a teleconverter, not a speed booster. A teleconverter increases magnification but costs light: a 1.4x loses one stop, and a 2x loses two stops.
So for backyard wildlife, an EF lens plus speed booster generally makes less sense than using a longer native MFT lens, unless your main priority is a brighter lens and wider field of view rather than maximum reach.
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