Long focal length fast prime - advice on options please

The Widget

The Widget

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Ben
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Hi all

I'm looking at adding a long focal length fast prime to my lens roster and I've found a few options but none are jumping out as the obvious choice. I welcome some advice to help my decision!

I've an Olympus m43 body and want something with more reach than my 45mm f/1.8. Bright apeture is essential as low light situations (rather than a desire for thinner DOF) are the main reason for considering the purchase; I've already got these focal lengths covered by my zoom for outdoor daylight work.

Lenses I'm ruling out:
  • Olympus 75mm f/1.8 (m43) - the only lens I was originally considering, while a useful improvement in reach, the £600 cost is making me consider other options
  • Sigma 60mm f/2.8 (m43) - bargain price of £125 but focal length is not enough of an improvement over the 45mm to justify it, even given the small expense
  • Olympus 150mm f/2.0 (43) - reach perhaps getting too long for indoor use; also it's getting big, really heavy, and costs two bloody grand!
The contenders:
  • Sigma 105mm f/2.8 macro (43) - focal length is spot on and macro features a bonus, currently spotted for £370 (still a little more than I'd like to spend)
  • Sigma 150mm f/2.8 macro (43) - getting long and heavy again, but there's one for £300
  • Olympus 85mm f/2.0 (OM) - would seem ideal but it's an older lens for 35mm film and thus manual focus only (I think I can learn to cope with that) but I really worry how sharp it will be if I'm only using a quarter of the image circle on a thirty year old lens design (crucially; would it be any better than simply cropping images down from my 45mm?), spotted for just £150
  • Olympus 100mm f/2.8 (OM) - the same sharpness concern as the 85mm, but another bargain at £160

This all feels like a compromise. Help appeciated!
 
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The Widget said:
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The contenders:
  • Olympus 85mm f/2.0 (OM) - would seem ideal but it's an older lens for 35mm film and thus manual focus only (I think I can learn to cope with that) but I really worry how sharp it will be if I'm only using a quarter of the image circle on a thirty year old lens design (crucially; would it be any better than simply cropping images down from my 45mm?), spotted for just £150
Click to expand...
I have one of these and I occasionally use it on my Panasonic MFT. It's a nice compact lens and sharp enough when stopped down a little and I wouldn't say that sharpness is really an issue in a whole image although it's not going to be as sharp wide open as a modern lens. The main problem for me is purple fringing and in this respect it's much worse than the Canon FD 85mm f1.8 and Minolta Rokkor 85mm f2. Of these three lenses I'd say that the Rokkor is easily the best and if you are considering a legacy lens I'd consider it rather than the Zuiko.
 
If looking at OM lenses, the 135mm might be worth experimenting with, it's readily available and goes for far less money than either the 85mm or the 100mm. It's in two versions, F2.8 and F3.5, I have the latter for my M4/3 bodies which I bought on Ebay for circa £30, the F2.8 is harder to find. Plenty of the F3.5 on Ebay at the moment for £25-35. Reviews for the lenses on M4/3 bodies suggest that the F3.5 is actually sharper but may not meet your low light requirements.
 
I have the Zuiko 135mm f3.5 too. The Rokkor is again better :D There's not as much between them as there is between the 50mm f1.4 and 85mm f2, but the Rokkors are each better to varying degrees.
 
Hi fellas

Thanks for your advice, it's given me plenty more to look up and research; now have a plan in place.

I think getting both a 85mm and a 135mm would give me the most flexibility. Not sure how much use the latter would get but cheap enough to find out!

At 135mm, I've got down to a choice of two options (dictated by current eBay availability):
  • Tamron Adaptall-2 135mm f/2.5 - £30 to £70
  • Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 135mm f/2.8 - £135
The Tamron seems well reviewed and is a bargin price. It's also that tiny third of a stop brighter. The Sonnar is still affordable though and reviews seem to praise how sharp it remains wide open. Do you think it's worth the extra?

------------------------------------

At 85mm there are no shortage of options. I've watched two Nikon Nikkor f/2.0 lenses go for £160, there are two left at £200 to £250. Rokkors going for about the same price. They have the edge over the Olympus but what about Nikkors?

There is also a Nikkor 85mm f/1.4 that looks a bit battered (cosmetically) at £300 which I'm unsure if is a wise buy. The only alternatives at f/1.4 are another Nikkor in good condition for £400 or Zeiss Planar T* which are £500+, which brings me back into Oly 75 territory which started this off (and I'd get autofocus with that!), so maybe f/1.4 is just a dream I should forget.

And yet, as I've been typing this, I've just realised the Nikon Nikkor 85mm f/1.8D can be used fully manually (unlike the newer G model), and is the same price ase the older(?) f/2.0 model, so did I just find myself a winner?

Sorry for so much text but I feel I've been getting my head around thirty years of portrait lenses these past few days. :D
 
The Widget said:
I'm looking at adding a long focal length fast prime

  • Olympus 75mm f/1.8 (m43) - the only lens I was originally considering, while a useful improvement in reach, the £600 cost is making me consider other options
  • Sigma 60mm f/2.8 (m43) - bargain price of £125 but focal length is not enough of an improvement over the 45mm to justify it, even given the small expense
  • Olympus 150mm f/2.0 (43) - reach perhaps getting too long for indoor use; also it's getting big, really heavy, and costs two bloody grand!
  • Sigma 105mm f/2.8 macro (43) - focal length is spot on and macro features a bonus, currently spotted for £370 (still a little more than I'd like to spend)
  • Sigma 150mm f/2.8 macro (43) - getting long and heavy again, but there's one for £300
  • Olympus 85mm f/2.0 (OM) - would seem ideal but it's an older lens for 35mm film and thus manual focus only (I think I can learn to cope with that) but I really worry how sharp it will be if I'm only using a quarter of the image circle on a thirty year old lens design (crucially; would it be any better than simply cropping images down from my 45mm?), spotted for just £150
  • Olympus 100mm f/2.8 (OM) - the same sharpness concern as the 85mm, but another bargain at £160
Click to expand...

haha a LONG focul fast prime.. the longest Lens you list is 150mm ... Sorry not trying to be cocky but how is this thread anything to do with the word ..LONG ?
 
I've currently 9mm, 14mm, 20mm and 45mm primes, so relatively speaking a 150mm would be a lot longer! The longest prime natively available for m43 is only 75mm (due to crop factor of 2.0 here compared to 35mm film). Most lenses I've seen exceeding 200mm tend to be zooms, or so expensive they aren't the money saving route I was looking for.
 
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Just thought I'd give you guys an update on what I eventually bought, given that your advice got me thinking.

I was going to mix and match brands until I read about focal reducers (aka speed boosters), and then it began to make sense to get lenses that all had the same fitting so I only need one adapter. I went for all Nikon lenses in the end, getting the 135mm f/2.8, the 85mm f/2.0, and the 50mm f/1.4 (as it fills the large gap between the 20mm and 45mm lenses I have, when fitted with the speed booster). Lenses are effectively 95mm f/2.0, 60mm f/1.4 and 35mm f/1.0 as fitted (2x crop factor still applies when compared to FF).

In the end I've spent the same as the Olympus 75mm would have cost, but have three lenses to show for the lightness of my wallet rather than one. Photo attached.

Hopefully now I can just put to enough use to justify all the extra weight in my kit bag!

Cheers
 
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