Focal reducer on m4/3 - any experience?

[goinggreynow]

Anyone with any first hand experience of using a focal reducer ("Lens turbo") with their adapted/manual lenses?
I have recently acquired a copy of the excellent Minolta MD 35-70 which I would very much like to use as my day to day walkabout lens. No surprise I suppose that I'm finding the wide end too "long". I also heave several other MD lenses.
I've come across numerous articles on other forums - if I'm going to have issues they will apparently be related either to the length of the aperture pin on Minolta lenses or the distance travelled by the rear lens element when focussing.
Should just mention that I'm using m4/3 not APS-C.
Grateful for any guidance from anyone who has actually owned a reducer.
PS - I originally posted this in the recent"adapting old lenses" thread but feared it might get lost, so hope no-one minds me posting as a dedicated thread.

 

[HarveyM]

I have the Zhongi Lens Turbo ll, which is EOS to M43, to which I added I added an OM to EOS adapter as I use my old OM lenses. I haven't used it enough so far, but was happy with the results on my trial runs. Care is needed as to which OM lenses can be safely fitted, as a general rule the wider the lens, the higher the risk of a collision between the lens rear element and the element in the Lens Turbo. A Google search will show some lists of lens known to be safe and those not safe to be fitted, for lenses in general, not just OM. I also tried a Tamron 90mm F2.5 Macro Adaptall with OM fitting and the Lens Turbo, a stellar lens but rather heavy, it's necessary to hand support the lens as well as the camera. As far as I can recall, all the Adaptall lens are safe and one or two are very good indeed. I don't know anything about Minolta lenses but again compatible lenses should be listed on the web somewhere.

The Lens Turbo was available as a Mk1, which had optical issues and often resulted in a blue spot spoiling the images, it's best avoided and seek out the Mk ll instead. The Mk ll arrived with no instructions at all, the only issue is the non intuitive lens release, which is pushed back towards the camera body to release. So far, I'm happy with mine, the build quality is probably somewhat below the Metabones equivalent, but optically looks to be really good and it's a fraction of the Metabones price.

This shot was taken with a Lumix G7 and my Tamron 90mm Macro lens fitted to the Reducer, using the focus peaking on the camera body. Shot at F2.5 and obviously just a test shot!

 

[goinggreynow]

I have the Zhongi Lens Turbo ll, which is EOS to M43, to which I added I added an OM to EOS adapter as I use my old OM lenses. I haven't used it enough so far, but was happy with the results on my trial runs. Care is needed as to which OM lenses can be safely fitted, as a general rule the wider the lens, the higher the risk of a collision between the lens rear element and the element in the Lens Turbo. A Google search will show some lists of lens known to be safe and those not safe to be fitted, for lenses in general, not just OM. I also tried a Tamron 90mm F2.5 Macro Adaptall with OM fitting and the Lens Turbo, a stellar lens but rather heavy, it's necessary to hand support the lens as well as the camera. As far as I can recall, all the Adaptall lens are safe and one or two are very good indeed. I don't know anything about Minolta lenses but again compatible lenses should be listed on the web somewhere.

The Lens Turbo was available as a Mk1, which had optical issues and often resulted in a blue spot spoiling the images, it's best avoided and seek out the Mk ll instead. The Mk ll arrived with no instructions at all, the only issue is the non intuitive lens release, which is pushed back towards the camera body to release. So far, I'm happy with mine, the build quality is probably somewhat below the Metabones equivalent, but optically looks to be really good and it's a fraction of the Metabones price.

This shot was taken with a Lumix G7 and my Tamron 90mm Macro lens fitted to the Reducer, using the focus peaking on the camera body. Shot at F2.5 and obviously just a test shot!

View attachment 114666

Thank you so much for such a comprehensive and helpful reply.
Although I have a wide selection of manual lenses in different mounts (including OM), I think it would make sense for me to go the MD/m43 route knowing that I can also use an M42/MD adapter to extend its use to my Helios 44 and Pentacon 135. That would give me a total of 6 lenses, inlcluding my MD 50mm f1.4.
What I am really struggling with is knowing what to do for the best, My currentl lenses are not wide enough on m43 and I have 3 options. The most sensible is probably to go out and buy a native m43 lens around the 17/20mm mark. Second option is this one - go the focal reducer route with my 35-70 or 28mm. Final option is to buy a 24mm manual lens in OM, FD or MD mount and forget using a reducer all together.
What I don't know - and won't until/unless I buy a reducer - is quite how the overall image quality (not just sharpness) would compare if/when a focal reduced lens is put up against its nearest native equivalent.
Incidentally, I presume that you purchased your lens turbo from overseas as I can't see any UK sellers.
Once again, many thanks for taking the time to reply.

 

[HarveyM]

Delighted to be of use.

My Lens Turbo ll order was fulfilled by Amazon, I can't remember the precise seller, but it arrived quickly from Amazon Sarl and not shipped from China at time of order, I think I paid about £130 for it. I also have dumb adapters, OM to M4/3 and M42 to M4/3. For wide angle, I use native M4/3 lenses, the widest allows a 35mm equivalent of 24mm. If I need to go wider than this, I revert back to my Canon 5D2 and a Sigma 12-24mm lens. Nothing touches the Sigma lens for ultra wide non fish eye use on a reasonable budget. Therefore I tend to use my adopted lenses for normal to telephoto shots, or for macro, I don't own a native M4/3 macro lens. Sellers of 21mm or 24mm legacy lenses seem to be asking serious money these days and even a 21mm lens with a focal reducer (assuming it can safely fit), will result in a 35mm lens equivalent of circa 30mm, not very wide at all. I personally would stick to native M4/3 lenses for wide angle use rather than try to adopt a lens.

I use my adopted lenses because I already mostly owned them or they were my fathers M42 lenses. From what I've seen, these lenses can produce pleasing and sometimes striking images compared to perhaps a clinically accurate image with a modern lens. I gain at the telephoto end and my OM 200mm F4 becomes an effective 35mm equivalent of a circa 280mm F2.8 lens when used with the Focal Reducer. I've had no concerns with sharpness but the images need more contrast with certain OM lenses. I have some very sharp images indeed taken with an adopted OM 50mm F1.8 on a dumb adapter at the Mold Food Festival. My copy of the Tamron 90mm F2.5 is superb, beautiful out of focus areas, a delight to use. I don't own one, but the Helios 44 is similarly said to be a superb adapted lens, for portrait work or video work for the almost cinematic rendition, all subject to the lens condition, lack of haze or fungus and not dropped/damaged. I've also had some failures, a Clubman 35mm OM fit lens was very poor and a Soligor 400mm M42 lens bought for peanuts was totally useless, both tried with the dumb adapters. Old lens are much more prone to flare and had either had no coatings or primitive coatings compared to modern lenses.

Lastly, the focal reducer will use a larger image circle from an adapted lens compared to a dumb adapter. 1 stop more light is claimed, it might be less in reality but the extra light gathering is noticable compared to the dumb adapter. Opinions seem to differ with regard to theoretical sharpness, some think using the smaller image circle uses the best area of the native lens, others think it better to utilise the larger image circle. Early days but I suspect the latter to be true for my lenses.

 

[HarveyM]

Amazon Link:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Zhongyi-Re...pID=41Baay62QuL&preST=_SY300_QL70_&dpSrc=srch

 

[woof woof]

The problem with legacy 24mm f2.8 lenses on MFT is that the native 25mm f1.7/f1.8 lenses are really good and can be found at very reasonable prices and of course they're f1.8 v the legacy lenses at f2.8 and the native lenses will be sharper. I'm a bit of a fan of old lenses but legacy 24mm lenses on MFT just don't make a lot of sense to me unless you really must have the old manual lens experience.

 

[goinggreynow]

Delighted to be of use.

My Lens Turbo ll order was fulfilled by Amazon, I can't remember the precise seller, but it arrived quickly from Amazon Sarl and not shipped from China at time of order, I think I paid about £130 for it. I also have dumb adapters, OM to M4/3 and M42 to M4/3. For wide angle, I use native M4/3 lenses, the widest allows a 35mm equivalent of 24mm. If I need to go wider than this, I revert back to my Canon 5D2 and a Sigma 12-24mm lens. Nothing touches the Sigma lens for ultra wide non fish eye use on a reasonable budget. Therefore I tend to use my adopted lenses for normal to telephoto shots, or for macro, I don't own a native M4/3 macro lens. Sellers of 21mm or 24mm legacy lenses seem to be asking serious money these days and even a 21mm lens with a focal reducer (assuming it can safely fit), will result in a 35mm lens equivalent of circa 30mm, not very wide at all. I personally would stick to native M4/3 lenses for wide angle use rather than try to adopt a lens.

I use my adopted lenses because I already mostly owned them or they were my fathers M42 lenses. From what I've seen, these lenses can produce pleasing and sometimes striking images compared to perhaps a clinically accurate image with a modern lens. I gain at the telephoto end and my OM 200mm F4 becomes an effective 35mm equivalent of a circa 280mm F2.8 lens when used with the Focal Reducer. I've had no concerns with sharpness but the images need more contrast with certain OM lenses. I have some very sharp images indeed taken with an adopted OM 50mm F1.8 on a dumb adapter at the Mold Food Festival. My copy of the Tamron 90mm F2.5 is superb, beautiful out of focus areas, a delight to use. I don't own one, but the Helios 44 is similarly said to be a superb adapted lens, for portrait work or video work for the almost cinematic rendition, all subject to the lens condition, lack of haze or fungus and not dropped/damaged. I've also had some failures, a Clubman 35mm OM fit lens was very poor and a Soligor 400mm M42 lens bought for peanuts was totally useless, both tried with the dumb adapters. Old lens are much more prone to flare and had either had no coatings or primitive coatings compared to modern lenses.

Lastly, the focal reducer will use a larger image circle from an adapted lens compared to a dumb adapter. 1 stop more light is claimed, it might be less in reality but the extra light gathering is noticable compared to the dumb adapter. Opinions seem to differ with regard to theoretical sharpness, some think using the smaller image circle uses the best area of the native lens, others think it better to utilise the larger image circle. Early days but I suspect the latter to be true for my lenses.

Thank you once again for such a helpful reply. You are not the first person to tell me that I should stick to native m43 lenses for the wider angles. I think the time has now arrived for me to give up on this "quest" although I still can see some benefit to purchasing a focal reducer for my existing lenses.

 

[goinggreynow]

The problem with legacy 24mm f2.8 lenses on MFT is that the native 25mm f1.7/f1.8 lenses are really good and can be found at very reasonable prices and of course they're f1.8 v the legacy lenses at f2.8 and the native lenses will be sharper. I'm a bit of a fan of old lenses but legacy 24mm lenses on MFT just don't make a lot of sense to me unless you really must have the old manual lens experience.

Thanks Alan. i know you're right with your advice but the comment right at the end of your reply sums me up very well - "unless you really must have the old manual lens experience". That is me exactly!!
I already have a Panasonic 25mm F1.7. For its money (I paid only £100 for mine including a discount), it produces excellent results. My problem is that it's light to the point that sometimes you even forget you've got a lens attached.
I think that I would have sorted all this out a long time ago and bought a Panasonic 20mm had I not read about issues with AF in video.
Thanks once again.

 

[woof woof]

I've used my Minolta Rokkor and Olympus Zuiko 24mm f2.8's on MFT and I found them mildly disappointing. The MFT lenses are better for image quality but I do understand the joy of using old lenses.

I can recommend the Oly 17mm f1.8 although that lens is a 35mm equivalent rather than 50 but if you can live with the 35mm FoV you might be happy as it's a lovely metal lens and it has a push/pull clutch thingy which switches it to manual focus and you then have end stops and lens markings and it's like using a tiny old manual lens

Another thing to consider would be a used Sony A7 mk1. This is a FF camera and your old lenses will get a new lease of life on one. They'll be sharper and just... better than they'll be on MFT. An A7 is IMO the way to go if you like old manual lenses. I use mine a lot on my A7 and I've taken some of my favorites picture with my Rokkor, Zuiko and FD lenses.

 

[Cagey75]

The problem with legacy 24mm f2.8 lenses on MFT is that the native 25mm f1.7/f1.8 lenses are really good and can be found at very reasonable prices and of course they're f1.8 v the legacy lenses at f2.8 and the native lenses will be sharper. I'm a bit of a fan of old lenses but legacy 24mm lenses on MFT just don't make a lot of sense to me unless you really must have the old manual lens experience.

I find this with old 35mm lenses for Fuji, I try exclude them from searches, and 25 for M43 is very similar. I got a brand new 25 1.7 last week for M43 that barely costs more than some 50mm F2 M42 lenses.

 

[woof woof]

A legacy 24mm f2.8 from Minolta, Olympus or Canon could cost £100 or more but I have seen third party ones for much less. Legacy 35mm f1.8 and f2.8 lenses can be expensive too and all of these lenses face tough competition from the native lenses that are often readily available on the used market at reasonable prices.

There's still the experience of using old lenses and another advantage is that they're portable and can be use on just about any mirrorless camera whereas the native lenses can't.

 

[goinggreynow]

Another thing to consider would be a used Sony A7 mk1. This is a FF camera and your old lenses will get a new lease of life on one. They'll be sharper and just... better than they'll be on MFT. An A7 is IMO the way to go if you like old manual lenses. I use mine a lot on my A7 and I've taken some of my favorites picture with my Rokkor, Zuiko and FD lenses.

Thanks Alan. I must confess that I've thought about going this route and also the Sony A6300/6500 (giving the 1.5 crop instead of the 2x on the m43). My main issue is justifying the expense of buying another camera body just to use old lenses.

 

[woof woof]

Thanks Alan. I must confess that I've thought about going this route and also the Sony A6300/6500 (giving the 1.5 crop instead of the 2x on the m43). My main issue is justifying the expense of buying another camera body just to use old lenses.

Yes, photography usually isn't exactly cheap

I don't know how much used A7's go for but Sony are always bringing out new bodies and I assume some people will be selling their old bodies before buying the new ones so a bargain may crop up if you're patient and keep looking.

I do enjoy using my old lenses on my A7 and I'm quietly confident that you would too