Welcome to OpticsThoughts!
The website you are looking at is sort of a “OpticsThoughts 2.0”, although as far as look at feel goes, it should not be a major difference from the original site. We did change the backend for the site and, hopefully, it will be a bit easier to maintain.
Most of the material here is on the subject of sporting optics: riflescopes, binoculars and spotters. We will occasionally add some general musing on the firearms, knives and whatever else occupies my mind at that particular time. Since my day job is in electro-optics and digital imaging, I will also add some camera gear recommendation here and there.
I started out this site primarily to have a venue for my thoughts on sporting optics, but it has expanded some. Aside from writing about things that interest me, I also serve as an editor for others whose work appears here.
If you want to know more about how this site came to be and who are the people behind it, look into “About OpticsThoughts” on your right.
If all you are looking for is a quick product recommendation here is a shortcut to some of my favourites, by price: Riflescopes, Binoculars, Spotters.
Also, as I go along, I record my impressions on video and upload them to YouTube here. Alternatively, you can simply search for DLO Reviews.
If you would like to comment on any of the articles you need to create an account here. Contact me if you need help with that.
Lastly, I keep advertising very light and only insert a few Google Ads here and there. I do not have any control of what is actually in the ad, as it reflects whoever is browsing. If you click on the ads every once in a while, maintaining this site will be easier for me.
With that out of the way, I hope you find something useful here and if there is something you think I should add to the site, do not hesitate to let me know.
Thanks for visiting!
ILya Koshkin
Copyright Notice:
Unless otherwise noted, copyright on all information on this website is owned by ILya Koshkin.
Please do not copy it anywhere without my permission.
I looked at Leupold’s LCO and D-EVO quite some time ago and talked about them here and there. However, I never did a formal write-up and given my schedule, I won’t for a bit. So, I talked into the camera for a few minutes and I will add some commentary to this post later. Here […]
I have long been a devotee of mirrorless cameras and I have sort of gone on the record saying that unless you do sports where high end DSLR autofocus is important, there is little reason to get a DSLR. I still hold that view, by and large, but now that my daughter does gymnastics, my […]
Written by ILya Koshkin in August, 2017 General disclaimer: you will see a lot of links to Adorama. I have an affiliate program with them. I do not use it a whole lot, but if you decide to follow one of my recommendations and Adorama price is competitive, I would appreciate it if you could […]
As most of you are probably aware, I live in California. California is special in many ways, some good and some not so good. The state is beautiful and the weather is spectacular. The people here do not have a particularly good reputation for friendliness, but I suspect it is the same thing as we […]
written by ILya Koshkin, July, 2017 Docter V6 2-12×50 Riflescope Up until recently I mostly regarded Docter as one of those obscure German brands that predominantly play in Europe and do not do much in the US. In principle, that is still accurate. Docter does not have a very large presence in the US and, […]
As a general disclaimer, I have more or less stopped reading optics articles in various gun magazines since they run the gamut from ignorant to fraudulent and virtually all are fluff pieces for whoever spends the most on advertising at any given time. Every once in a while you stumble onto something accurate, but that is […]
Written by ILya Koshkin, May, 2015 This was originally written for a product blog of a now defunct company called TechEyes. Their website seems to be down, so I figured I’ll post it here. I thought of this because of an article I just saw on Trijicon’s IR Hunter thermal sight. As thermal sight get […]
written by ILya Koshkin I have been waiting for the 1.5-8×32 ER5 to hit the stores for a little while now, but since it is not quite here and I wanted to take a look at the ER5, I asked Leica if I could borrow whichever model is available. The available model turned out to […]
This should be listed in Trip Advisor warnings: “When going to Canada…” Canada: Moose Escapes from Zoo and Goes on Cow-Raping Rampage I am going to go ahead and scan the news for a sheep shagging elk in Edmonton or something along those lines.
Written by ILya Koshkin, April 2017 I witnessed something interesting last night that is not related to guns or optics and wanted to offer some thoughts on the subject. This is an interesting example of how real world throws in quirks here and there. I am currently in Las Vegas for the NAB show. I […]