On Mon, 29 Sep 2003 18:45:14 -0500, Pete Rasmussen
wrote:

As update on the BSA 10x50...

The seller has emailed a very interesting remark in opinion to bolster
their prowess. His _is_ unbiased and to the point in this particular
case:

"Pete: You don't want the [another label brand bino available].
They're not even close to the quality of the BSA's."

BSA 10x50 used briefly at night:

I took my pair out under clouded (yet transparent in gaps) sky
conditions for a few minutes. The binoculars snap impressively to a
seriously tight focus. Very sharp optics. The field is approx. 66%
sharp toward edge and then the brighter stars begin to extend evenly
and become less apparent toward the edges. This vs. them elongating
and remaining distractively bright on the perifery. This is a good
thing and I did not anticipate exceptional edge sharpness for these
low end binos since having an extra-wide apparent field angle by
design.

The field is flat and undistorted and sweeps of available star fields
were satisfactorily breathtaking with very nice sky contrast.
Brightness is good for these. There was a bit of field edge
vignetting shown to evenly remove field stops visability. That
happens sometimes and was not the case by day. I've experienced
similar with Ultima 7x50, Orion Mini Giant 11x70 and others before,
too.

The crescent phase moon was partly veiled by semi-transluscent clouds
and was low in the western sky just above tree line. This is where a
wide-angle bino can be nice since all is viewed together to create a
panorama in perspective. The focus on the moon was acheived instantly
and was razor sharp and clear. A very fine view especially with
earthshine to add additional effect.

Bright areas of the moon itself seen between clouds looked very white
and closely the same as was seen naked eye. However, there was a hint
of orange tint detected when viewing naked eye. This due dust in our
atmosphere. So that rubesque coating worked to my favor to remove it!

Last up my nemesis streetlight showed there was significant ghosting.
Most binoculars show some or even a lot under this tough as nails
test. However, when the powerful light was placed anywhere just
outside of field, there was no real glare at all and faint terrestrial
objects in the background were easy to see.

These are keepers for $23! When indoors looking at the ruby type
coating again at narrow 25° incident from direct, they disappear and
the inside of the binos then easy to see transparently just like
multicoatings do.

That was fun I hope you had fun too!

I would have really enjoyed getting the BSA with green coatings just
to do a decent direct comparo on deep sky FOR THE RECORD and to
DISPELL that RED MYTH! Too bad they're gone, oh well.

The $38.88 sale priced Whitetail 10x50 I also announced is probably an
even better buy than this BSA due long 19mm eye relief and indicated
better edge sharpness. Would be swell if someone getting some in
would report to us soon.

Take care, clear skies and ruby red eyes!

Pete