absolut_beethoven
Well-known member
First off, let me start this review by stating that this is my second attempt to buy a good quality pocket sized pair of binos in the 8x20 to 8x25 range. My first attempt was a brand new Nikon 8x20 Premier LXL. Optically, the LXL exceeded all of my expectations as I was very impressed with its sharpness, clarity and its vibrant and realistic colors. All that plus very little pin cushion distortion and virtually zero CA to boot.
Unfortunately the Nikon didn’t work out for me as I found eye placement just that little bit too finicky. So I boxed them up and exchanged them for the outstanding Pentax 8x32 DCF ED. But human nature being what it is, I’m still convinced that there has to be a decent pocket size bino out there that will work for me.
On my second visit to Cabela’s, a different store than the first one I visited a few weeks ago mainly to get a second look at the 10x42 Euro HD’s which impressed me so much the last time, I did get a chance to briefly try out the Zeiss Victory 8x20. While I loved the single uneven bridge design and found it extremely comfortable to hold firmly for such a small and light bino, I hated the tiny focusing knob and found it way too small to be really useful even for my small hands. But that wasn’t the main reason for my very brief stint with them, nor was any pressure from a most helpful and patient sales clerk. The main reason that I didn’t spend much time with them is that eye placement seemed to be even more finicky with the Zeiss than with the Nikon LXL’s I had returned earlier. I just couldn’t get a comfortable enough view to make it worthwhile spending any time evaluating their optical quality.
Enter the diminutive Leica 8x20 Ultravid which has received numerous and enthusiastic recommendations from our forum members on here. I was fortunate enough to find a factory demo pair at an excellent price and couldn’t resist the temptation even although I had never even held a pair, let alone looked through them.
At about 92mm long and approximately 66mm wide at its widest point when folded, the Ultravids are small enough to easily fit into most medium sized pockets. They weigh in at only 236 grams on my wife’s very accurate food scale. Light enough to be carried around all day every day without any trouble.
The two main issues for me would be to see how the Ultravids compare to the outstandingly excellent Nikon Premier LXL, and hopefully eye placement would also be a little less finicky too.
The factory demo binos that I received looked absolutely flawless and brand new. If not for the warranty card labeling them as factory demo I would have assumed that these were 100% brand new and not even a shop display, let alone shop or factory demo unit.
While I have been trying them out in a variety of conditions over the past few weeks, last Thursday was a bright sunny Texas scorcher to put all those hi-tech coatings and internal baffling to a really severe test of their capabilities. I spent almost an hour outside checking for CA, sharpness, pin cushion distortion etc. I was done about two hours before sunset which is an excellent time to check for flare, unwanted reflections and veiling flare etc.
I’m not a big fan of the double bridge design that Nikon, Leica, Swarovski and many others use for their pocket sized roof binos, but the upside is that it allows them to be folded up into a smaller package. Eye placement with the Leica was a lot less finicky than the small Nikons and this made adjusting the IPD quicker and easier too. The eye cups snap out into position for those like me who don’t wear eye glasses. Unfortunately they only have two positions, either fully in or fully out. This will obviously reduce their usefulness for some people. Resting the eye cups just under my eyebrows afforded me a full and easy view with no blackouts.
The focus knob is quite large for such a tiny bino, and turns smoothly in both directions with only a tiny bit of sticktion as it starts moving. Diopter focusing is achieved with the same focusing knob while depressing a small button under the central support bridge. This adjusts the focus of the right tube but adds a bit more tension making the focusing knob harder to turn, thereby making perfect focus more difficult to achieve. Fortunately it stays put once adjusted, and one can easily make a note of its position to reset it if you allow others to use and adjust your binos.
Pin cushion distortion starts very mildly around the 35% to 40% mark and gradually gets worse until the edges. Right at the edge of the FOV where its worst, it’s still low enough that I’d classify it as mild. In other words most people probably wouldn’t even be aware of it when using these binos in the field unless they were studying buildings and architecture.
CA is non-existent only in the small central spot, and like the pin cushion distortion gradually deteriorates from about the same point (i.e. about one third into the FOV) until the edges. Getting only slightly worse in amount (the width of the colored halo) but more noticeable too because of its increased intensity towards the edges. Even at its worst it’s still quite mild and only optics nuts like me who deliberately look for it under the right conditions will notice it. I’m sure that most people wouldn’t even be aware of any CA under most viewing conditions.
Like the Nikon LXL, sharpness is very good and extends at least to 90% of the FOV. Sharpness and resolution seem much better than what one would expect from such a tiny 20mm objective, and are obviously aided greatly by its outstanding contrast, color fidelity and reduced CA.
The excellent color rendition and contrast is easily confirmed with the whiteness test. This test is done by looking at a brightly lit bright white sheet or board (preferably matte and not glossy) with nothing in front of one eye while looking at the same sheet through the bino of the other eye. Of all the binos that I have tested, this tiny Leica Ultravid changed the pure white color of the sheet the least. Most impressive indeed IMHO.
Depth of field – that is how much is in focus with the binos focused to infinity and NOT its 3D effect – is also very impressive for such a tiny bino. I only needed to adjust the focus when viewing anything closer than 100 meters. Objects at 100 meters were only marginally less sharp, and everything from about 150 meters to the limit of visibility was razor sharp. Focus past infinity is slightly less than ¼ of a turn.
Even although these are not usually anyone’s first choice for star gazing, stars are decently sharp pin points out to about 80% to 85% of the FOV. So these are certainly usable for star gazing in a pinch, or for hikers who want to keep their backpacks as light as possible.
Weaknesses? Only two things bothered me, neither of which is a major issue IMHO.
First is the aforementioned diopter adjustment. I don’t have any issues with the method that Leica chose to employ with this model. My only issue is with the large increase in friction and drag on the focusing knob once the diopter button is engaged. Fortunately once it’s adjusted it stays put so it’s not something that needs to be done often.
My other issue is the same one that seems to affect all of these diminutive pocket binos, and that is slight veiling flare under certain conditions due to the fact that the objective lens is virtually flush with the front end of the tube.
Please note that while testing for the above about two hours before sunset under a very bright and intense Texas summer sun, I wasn’t able to induce any ghosting flare under any circumstances while bringing the binos as close to the sun as was safely possible. Even with this slight veiling flare I had no problems following a brown hawk a few hundred meters high lazily drifting in the plentiful upward draft while looking for a quick meal. Extending my hand slightly over the front of the binos eliminated the veiling flare completely, so I could easily see the slight loss of contrast and definition induced by it. Wearing a baseball cap would probably achieve the same results by shading the objective lens.
I found that the two main causes of veiling flare were pointing the binos up towards the bright sun, and also with the sun shining diagonally across but slightly into the objective lens. This usually isn’t an issue for most binos as the objective lens is set slightly back from the front of the tube which acts a lens hood to shade it. See the link below for self explanatory pics.
http://www.diglloyd.com/articles/UnderstandingOptics/understanding-flare.html
My very personal conclusion is that the Nikon LXL is optically slightly superior to the Leica Ultravid mostly due to its virtually complete absence of CA and pin cushion distortion. But the Leica is more useful to me due to its easier eye placement, larger and more user friendly focusing knob and slightly better contrast. Highly and enthusiastically recommended if you’re willing to accept the comprises inherent in all pocket sized binos regardless of cost.
Unfortunately the Nikon didn’t work out for me as I found eye placement just that little bit too finicky. So I boxed them up and exchanged them for the outstanding Pentax 8x32 DCF ED. But human nature being what it is, I’m still convinced that there has to be a decent pocket size bino out there that will work for me.
On my second visit to Cabela’s, a different store than the first one I visited a few weeks ago mainly to get a second look at the 10x42 Euro HD’s which impressed me so much the last time, I did get a chance to briefly try out the Zeiss Victory 8x20. While I loved the single uneven bridge design and found it extremely comfortable to hold firmly for such a small and light bino, I hated the tiny focusing knob and found it way too small to be really useful even for my small hands. But that wasn’t the main reason for my very brief stint with them, nor was any pressure from a most helpful and patient sales clerk. The main reason that I didn’t spend much time with them is that eye placement seemed to be even more finicky with the Zeiss than with the Nikon LXL’s I had returned earlier. I just couldn’t get a comfortable enough view to make it worthwhile spending any time evaluating their optical quality.
Enter the diminutive Leica 8x20 Ultravid which has received numerous and enthusiastic recommendations from our forum members on here. I was fortunate enough to find a factory demo pair at an excellent price and couldn’t resist the temptation even although I had never even held a pair, let alone looked through them.
At about 92mm long and approximately 66mm wide at its widest point when folded, the Ultravids are small enough to easily fit into most medium sized pockets. They weigh in at only 236 grams on my wife’s very accurate food scale. Light enough to be carried around all day every day without any trouble.
The two main issues for me would be to see how the Ultravids compare to the outstandingly excellent Nikon Premier LXL, and hopefully eye placement would also be a little less finicky too.
The factory demo binos that I received looked absolutely flawless and brand new. If not for the warranty card labeling them as factory demo I would have assumed that these were 100% brand new and not even a shop display, let alone shop or factory demo unit.
While I have been trying them out in a variety of conditions over the past few weeks, last Thursday was a bright sunny Texas scorcher to put all those hi-tech coatings and internal baffling to a really severe test of their capabilities. I spent almost an hour outside checking for CA, sharpness, pin cushion distortion etc. I was done about two hours before sunset which is an excellent time to check for flare, unwanted reflections and veiling flare etc.
I’m not a big fan of the double bridge design that Nikon, Leica, Swarovski and many others use for their pocket sized roof binos, but the upside is that it allows them to be folded up into a smaller package. Eye placement with the Leica was a lot less finicky than the small Nikons and this made adjusting the IPD quicker and easier too. The eye cups snap out into position for those like me who don’t wear eye glasses. Unfortunately they only have two positions, either fully in or fully out. This will obviously reduce their usefulness for some people. Resting the eye cups just under my eyebrows afforded me a full and easy view with no blackouts.
The focus knob is quite large for such a tiny bino, and turns smoothly in both directions with only a tiny bit of sticktion as it starts moving. Diopter focusing is achieved with the same focusing knob while depressing a small button under the central support bridge. This adjusts the focus of the right tube but adds a bit more tension making the focusing knob harder to turn, thereby making perfect focus more difficult to achieve. Fortunately it stays put once adjusted, and one can easily make a note of its position to reset it if you allow others to use and adjust your binos.
Pin cushion distortion starts very mildly around the 35% to 40% mark and gradually gets worse until the edges. Right at the edge of the FOV where its worst, it’s still low enough that I’d classify it as mild. In other words most people probably wouldn’t even be aware of it when using these binos in the field unless they were studying buildings and architecture.
CA is non-existent only in the small central spot, and like the pin cushion distortion gradually deteriorates from about the same point (i.e. about one third into the FOV) until the edges. Getting only slightly worse in amount (the width of the colored halo) but more noticeable too because of its increased intensity towards the edges. Even at its worst it’s still quite mild and only optics nuts like me who deliberately look for it under the right conditions will notice it. I’m sure that most people wouldn’t even be aware of any CA under most viewing conditions.
Like the Nikon LXL, sharpness is very good and extends at least to 90% of the FOV. Sharpness and resolution seem much better than what one would expect from such a tiny 20mm objective, and are obviously aided greatly by its outstanding contrast, color fidelity and reduced CA.
The excellent color rendition and contrast is easily confirmed with the whiteness test. This test is done by looking at a brightly lit bright white sheet or board (preferably matte and not glossy) with nothing in front of one eye while looking at the same sheet through the bino of the other eye. Of all the binos that I have tested, this tiny Leica Ultravid changed the pure white color of the sheet the least. Most impressive indeed IMHO.
Depth of field – that is how much is in focus with the binos focused to infinity and NOT its 3D effect – is also very impressive for such a tiny bino. I only needed to adjust the focus when viewing anything closer than 100 meters. Objects at 100 meters were only marginally less sharp, and everything from about 150 meters to the limit of visibility was razor sharp. Focus past infinity is slightly less than ¼ of a turn.
Even although these are not usually anyone’s first choice for star gazing, stars are decently sharp pin points out to about 80% to 85% of the FOV. So these are certainly usable for star gazing in a pinch, or for hikers who want to keep their backpacks as light as possible.
Weaknesses? Only two things bothered me, neither of which is a major issue IMHO.
First is the aforementioned diopter adjustment. I don’t have any issues with the method that Leica chose to employ with this model. My only issue is with the large increase in friction and drag on the focusing knob once the diopter button is engaged. Fortunately once it’s adjusted it stays put so it’s not something that needs to be done often.
My other issue is the same one that seems to affect all of these diminutive pocket binos, and that is slight veiling flare under certain conditions due to the fact that the objective lens is virtually flush with the front end of the tube.
Please note that while testing for the above about two hours before sunset under a very bright and intense Texas summer sun, I wasn’t able to induce any ghosting flare under any circumstances while bringing the binos as close to the sun as was safely possible. Even with this slight veiling flare I had no problems following a brown hawk a few hundred meters high lazily drifting in the plentiful upward draft while looking for a quick meal. Extending my hand slightly over the front of the binos eliminated the veiling flare completely, so I could easily see the slight loss of contrast and definition induced by it. Wearing a baseball cap would probably achieve the same results by shading the objective lens.
I found that the two main causes of veiling flare were pointing the binos up towards the bright sun, and also with the sun shining diagonally across but slightly into the objective lens. This usually isn’t an issue for most binos as the objective lens is set slightly back from the front of the tube which acts a lens hood to shade it. See the link below for self explanatory pics.
http://www.diglloyd.com/articles/UnderstandingOptics/understanding-flare.html
My very personal conclusion is that the Nikon LXL is optically slightly superior to the Leica Ultravid mostly due to its virtually complete absence of CA and pin cushion distortion. But the Leica is more useful to me due to its easier eye placement, larger and more user friendly focusing knob and slightly better contrast. Highly and enthusiastically recommended if you’re willing to accept the comprises inherent in all pocket sized binos regardless of cost.
