TCE 20 converter and Zeiss glass - ever tried anybody?

<p>I see that if you remove what is called the "marketing nose" of the AF-S converters such as the TC 20E III, they go with non-AF-S lenses as well.<br>

Is there anybody out there who ever tried this converter with the Zeiss ZF 100 macro? Together, they could be a nice 1:1 200 macro lens.</p>

 

<p><em>"marketing nose"</em></p>

<p>The reason the tab is there is that the teleconverters and lenses are designed to work together (optically) from an early stage and if you mount the TC on another lens you can either damage the lens and converter, or simply get poor results. Good results are rarely a result of random combination of optical components but being carefully designed together (of course, even so not all allowed combinations give what I would call good results; for example mounting a TC-E on the 105 VR Micro is just asking for soft images IMO).</p>

<p>I find the Zeiss 100mm ZF works quite well with PK-13 giving you about 1:1.3 maximum magnification in a quite convenient package. You can use greater extensions with this lens (e.g. PN-11), but I prefer to use lighter weight lenses with bellows, for the most part, when reaching for higher magnifications. The large aperture of the 100mm ZF does lend itself to bellows use as it remains brighter and easier to focus, but from a balance and handling point of view I prefer to use smaller lenses (e.g. 75mm or 120mm Apo-Rodagon-D). The Zeiss is razor sharp, of course, but I find the images from the Apo-Rodagons to be "cleaner".</p>

<p>I use the TC-20E III with the 200mm f/2G VR and the combination gives very beautiful results. It's the only combination of lens and teleconverter that I've found that I really like. Perhaps someone has hacked the TC-20E III but I would find it a peculiar coincidence if it led to good results with a third party lens.</p>

<p>I don't know the Zeiss ZF 100mm/f2 macro has sufficient clearance to mount a TC-20e III with the extra tab removed. However, if you want a 200mm/f4 macro lens, you are much better off with Nikon's 200mm/f4 AF-D. Being a native 200mm macro lens, that Nikon lens has a built-in tripod collar that is going to make a big difference in terms of convenience (easy to go back and forth for horizontal and vertical compositions) and image quality.</p>

<p>Michael, I waited others to give an answer, as I have the same question. I did just a moment ago some measurements based only on pictures, in scale tough. My estimate is that TC-20E III does not go with ZF 100/2, even when the E-tab is removed.<br>

I tested my old TC-201 and it seems that this combination works very well together. Depending on your camera you may lose only automatic lens info with TC-201. Select it form the manual lens menu and you are fine.<br>

I am surely going to use this combination over my Ais 180/2.8ED + PN-11 for butterflies and such in the next summer.</p>