Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 50-200mm 1:2.8-3.5 SWD

Olympus Zuiko Digital ED 50-200mm 1:2.8-3.5 SWD: Performance

Shooting at 50mm, at maximum aperture, sharpness across the frame is already very good, and remarkably consistent from edge to edge. Peak quality for this focal length is achieved at f/4, where the quality approaches excellent levels across the frame.

Zooming to 100mm results in a slight reduction in resolution recorded at maximum aperture, but still the quality is very good across the frame here. Peak quality for this focal length is achieved at f/5.6, where again, the sharpness approaches excellent levels across the frame.

Finally at 200mm, sharpness in the centre of the image area is good at maximum aperture, and fairly good towards the edges. Stopping the lens down to f/5.6 results in very good sharpness in the centre and good sharpness towards the edges of the frame.

Resolution at 50mm	Resolution at 100mm
Resolution at 200mm	How to read our graphs The blue column represents readings from the centre of the picture frame at the various apertures and the green is from the edges. Averaging them out gives the red weighted column. The scale on the left side is an indication of actual image resolution. The taller the column, the better the lens performance. Simple. For this review, the lens was tested on an Olympus E-3 using Imatest.

Chromatic aberrations are remarkably well controlled, especially as this is an area where super-telephoto lenses like this generally suffer. Imatest was only able to detect fringing of 0.3 pixel widths at 400mm and f/22, which is the worst you can expect to see. This level should be invisible in normal images, even at very large print sizes and from very harsh crops.

Chromatic Aberrations at 50mm	Chromatic Aberrations at 100mm
Chromatic Aberrations at 200mm	How to read our charts Chromatic aberration is the lens' inability to focus on the sensor or film all colours of visible light at the same point. Severe chromatic aberration gives a noticeable fringing or a halo effect around sharp edges within the picture. It can be cured in software. Apochromatic lenses have special lens elements (aspheric, extra-low dispersion etc) to minimize the problem, hence they usually cost more. For this review, the lens was tested on an Olympus E3 using Imatest.

Falloff of illumination towards the corners is very well controlled. At 50mm the corners are only 0.432 stops darker than the image centre, which is barely noticeable in normal images. At 200mm falloff is a little stronger, but the corners are still only 0.899 stops darker than the image centre. Stopping the lens down to f/4 results in images with visually uniform illumination.

Levels of distortion are mild at either end of the zoom range. At 500 Imatest detected barrelling of 1.19% and 0.712% pincushion distortion at 200mm. The distortion pattern is uniform across the frame at both ends of the range, which should make it simple to correct in image editing software afterwards.

A deep circular hood comes supplied with the lens which can be reversed for storage. Light sources outside of the frame can cause flare and loss of contrast so it is a good idea to use the hood wherever possible. Shooting into the light also causes a slight loss of contrast.

Maximum magnification – ISO100, 1/125, f/8, 200mm		Wildlife – ISO200, 1/320, f/4, 200mm
Wide-angle – ISO100, 1/250, f/3.5, 50mm		Bokeh – ISO100, 1/200, f/4, 200mm

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