Fotodiox Excell+1 And Metabones Speedboosters Compared; Lead Is Pretty Obvious

July 14, 2014 by Udi Tirosh 6 Comments

A few days ago we featured a new speedbooster adapter from Fotodiox, the Excell+1. The idea behind the booster is that is remaps the image crated by a full frame lens into a smaller sensor, thus both un-cropping the image and gaining a full stop of light.

Now, this is not the first speedbooster that has gone to the market, about one year ago Metabones introduced a similar series of speedboosters, but the pricing on the two products varies significantly. An Excell+1 would set you back about $160 where as a Meatabones adapter will cost between $490-$590.

Videographer Max Yuryev took the two adapters for a ride and the results seem pretty conclusive to me. You can watch the video above and make your mind alone.

The test used three lenses shooting a piece of printed journal: A Sigma 18-35 1.8, Rokinon 85mm 1.4 and Tamron 17-50 2.8. Max puts all the lenses at their widest aperture and then adds a stop using one of the speedboosters. One option is that Max got a lemon copy of the Excell+1 but if not, Fotodiox should probably go back to the drawing board.

I grabbed on image from the video to give you a general idea, but I recommend watching the entire thing to make your own mind.

[Fotodiox Excell+1 VS Metabones Speedbooster – Review & Problems | Max Yuryev]

About Udi Tirosh

Udi Tirosh is the Founder and Editor in Chief of DIYPhotography, he is also a photographer, a relentless entrepreneur, a prolific inventor and a dad, not necessarily in that order

« Humor: Using A Drone For Better BBQ

Woman Who Assaulted Boy With a Quadcopter Gets Probation »

william ricker

with all the great Pentax K mount lenses out there, one would think ONE of the two would offer K-to-m43 booster too !
Cédric Hauteville

I guess it’s a case of #yougetwhatyoupayfor
MIke

I keep hearing rumors that Olympus is planning an OM -> m43 adapter with a .75x speed booster. As someone that shoots a lot of m43 and has a ton of old OM lenses, this makes me quite excited. I wonder if the thing will always be rumor, and by the time it comes out I will have replaced my entire OM collection with the m43 equivalents.
Gan

Pretty lame to compare a $150 adapter with a $450 adapter?? Why not do a comparison with one of the chinese ones???
- david
  
  its not lame because now i know that its worth spending the extra money.
Rev

There new video, “A Closer Look: Fotodiox Excell +1 Focal Reducer & the Metabones Speed Booster”, is nothing more than a well-crafted attempt at manipulating people into thinking that the Excell+1 is anything, other than a cheaply made SpeedBooster knockoff. Hats off to you Bohus.

Bohus comments:

-“not a competitor [to the SpeedBooster] and never built to be that”

-“do a lot of the same things [as a SpeedBooster], but at a much more manageable price”

Customer reply:

the features listed are EXACTLY what the SpeedBooster does, and that is EXACTLY what consumers bought it for.

They are further attempting to mislead consumers by separating the Excell+1 from the SpeedBooster by stating that the “Excell+1 spec is f/2.0, f/2.8 or above”, whereas the SpeedBooster can operate at a wider f-stop. I want to point something out to you that most consumers already know: the Excell+1’s inability to operate at wider f-stops is nothing more than a serious build quality and optical issue. Nothing more… Otherwise, the adapter wouldn’t have been built to operate at these apertures.

We don’t spend money on quality lenses, only to have our image quality degraded by putting a bad lens in between our lens and our sensors.

The tests Fotodiox and Bohus showed comparing the two adapters that are “not competitors” (LOL) proved to us, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the adapter is nothing more than a cheaply made device that no one in their right mind should stick on their high resolution camera and expect a good image out of it. The adapter will seriously degrade the image coming from a camera. Period. Bohus stated that your “Excell+1 spec” is f/2.0, f/2.8 or above, yet in that video comparison, even at f/8 and higher, the image on the left was dingy’er, blurry’er, and had color distortion/purple fringing. Anyone who knows lenses will tell you that this is indicative of bad optics.

Below is a link to an image showing that their own video PROVES the Excell+1 adapter is garbage. Consumers spend a lot of money on quality lenses and cameras with good sensors, and they shouldn’t GIVE this adapter away because it makes photos and videos look terrible.

https://lh5.googleusercontent.com/YIkoTL5wNiNA38Ukyg5pvcFsx8MYZMrj36vFO4dEGx21=w662-h414-p-no

Downloadable HQ image:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/w5ip3yj7wbb8nqs/Excell%20comparison%20image.png

The simple fact that I am using their own video to prove to you that the product is garbage is further proof that Fotodiox and Bohus are not to be trusted with manufacturing and/or selling optics to consumers. Period.