Thinking of playing with older manual lenses, but what body - A7?

JohnN

JohnN

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Hi,

The idea of using older manual lenses has been playing on my mind, but I want to make it relatively easy, so something with focus peaking and so on would be a must.

I know I can use the little green dot on the D750 but if I'm looking to older 1.4 or similar lenses then I doubt the dot would be good enough.

Any suggestions?

Ta.
 
I'd say that the A7 is pretty much ideal for this.

I've used old lenses quite a bit on mine, mostly Minolta Rokkor's but I've also used Olympus Zuiko and Canon FD. If you have the time to focus manually good accuracy is possible and peaking can get you good shots too especially if you look at whole images and can resist the urge to pixel peep and look for focus errors.
 
Cheers Alan - I'll do a bit more reading but I thought the A7 would be the system of choice, especially as I'm a bit of a full frame addict it pretty much ruled out everything else.
 
If you can wade through the A7 owners thread there are plenty of manual lens shots from me and others.

This first one was one of the first I took, with a Zuiko 50mm f1.8 which cost £15. The others are just random shots I like :D











 
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I use mainly old manual focus lenses on my Nex 5N and the combo works really well. The Focus Peaking is a great help as a general indicator but it only shows edges of contrast so I usually use MF Assist to magnify an area and fine tune the focus - especially for macro shots.

The main problem you encounter is the aperture control on some lenses - make sure that the adapter will enable this or alternatively ensure that the lens can be adapted. For example some Fujinon lenses have a little pin that needs to be depressed in order for the mechanical aperture selector to work - so a little superglue solves the problem without recourse to a special adapter.
 
Thanks guys - quite looking forward to it, I even broached the idea with SWMBO and she just said "You;ve a birthday coming up" - result :D Actually I'll sell my Tamron 150-600 to fund but still nice to see clear sailing ahead.

I'll take a squiz through at the A7 thread, although I'm sure I did at some point and found @rookies in there ;)
 
JohnN said:
Thanks guys - quite looking forward to it, I even broached the idea with SWMBO and she just said "You;ve a birthday coming up" - result :D Actually I'll sell my Tamron 150-600 to fund but still nice to see clear sailing ahead.

I'll take a squiz through at the A7 thread, although I'm sure I did at some point and found @rookies in there ;)
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I'm a relative newbie to photography but I soon learnt that you need to be very careful with the quality of the optics on these old manual lenses. Dust and fungus are relatively easy to spot but I found that scratches from poor cleaning over very many years was a lot harder to pick up.
 
Thats a great point I hadn't considered - no idea how I'd spot them and I believe the coatings got better over the years, not that it'd matter with some of the items I'm considering as they'd be ancient!
 
AFAIK the only way is to hold the lens up to the light at an angle and look up from the bottom of the lens - the faint scratches catch the light.

I bought a nice Meyer lens off ebay which was described and looked perfect but produced cloudy results in bright light - a check showed that cleaning of the lens had caused a host of swirls in the glass.
 
I'd pick up a used A7 if I were you. I done that about 18 months ago from a 5D2 and not looked back. I have loads of manual glass with just the FE35 2.8 with autofocus. Some nice lenses can be picked up for reasonable money if you look about and a lot of these old manual prime lenses can be stripped and the glass elements cleaned anyway ;)
 
Thats the plan :)

I've my D750 for AF stuff - I'm hoping this will be a little fun.

Anyway Tamron 150-600 up for sale now to fund.
 
Just a quick word on adapters if going for an A7.

I use cheap adapters (£10 or there abouts) on my micro four thirds cameras and they seem ok so I bought one for my A7 and it seemed to work fine but it was an APS-C adapter for a Nex and it caused strong vignetting with my 24mm lens but was ok with 28mm and longer. Might be worth noting if adapters are APS-C or FF if you may be going for wider lenses.

The old lenses are ok on MFT but they're sharper on my A7. Don't expect these old lenses to match the technical excellence of modern lenses though. My old lenses are sharp enough in the centre of the frame but they don't have the across the frame excellence of modern lenses and they do suffer more optical nasties but these nasties may be features rather than faults :D

I now have Novoflex adapters for my Minolta, Olympus and Canon lenses and they're were all in the £90-100 range. The Novoflex adapters are well made and metal and nice enough but if I'm being honest I don't see any real advantage over the £10 evil bay specials even if they do look cheap.

Sorry, can't post without pictures :D











 
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FWIW I'm happy using a manual Samyang 85 1.4 with my D610, using the spot + arrows to confirm focus. Not at all an old lens, but one with a wafer thin DoF wide open. I also use a manual 80-200 f4.5 wide open, and again confirmation is good.
 
Aye, but its just not as fun as peaking and magnification (I used to own an E-M1 which had both).

If the old E-M1 could defy physics and produce the full frame look while keeping its size and techie whistles I'd still be with that despite the D750 being as good as it is - which is way better than the 5D3 BTW ;)
 
John, don't rule out the Fuji's, especially the XT1 due to the excellent EVF with old manual lenses. I probably owned over 60 legacy lenses when using Fuji and it was great fun, although the prices for some of these lenses have increased over the last couple of years. I went back to Nikon for the AF, as I started taking more interest in wildlife and due to my dodgy shoulders I was struggling with MF.

I found that legacy lenses could work better on APSC rather than FF due to using the center of the lens and were better for edge to edge performance. YMMV but it was a principle I used when using Nikon DX cameras, always bought FF lenses.

When I was using Fuji I tried to keep to Canon FD and M42 mounts as to not have too many adapters. Also, it's worth keeping and eye on Ffordes website, as they have in the past, sourced old un-used legacy lens stock, mainly Canon FD, so no issue with scratches etc.........

Have fun which ever route you take.:)
 
Thanks Simon - now I had ruled out Fuji due to the ASPC, but I've seen so many advocates of the system, but to my shame have done very little research.

I tell you what, I'm out today but will take a real look later - a flickr scan and look for pics that "pop", if I find some I like (which to be honest I did with the right glass on M43) I'll have a real dig about - perhaps I can get something more from this than the A7.

Also thanks for the ffords link, plenty in there to start with, still all that will have to wait until I sell the 150-600.
 
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Swanseajack said:
I found that legacy lenses could work better on APSC rather than FF due to using the center of the lens and were better for edge to edge performance. YMMV but it was a principle I used when using Nikon DX cameras, always bought FF lenses
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Whilst it's true that on smaller formats any image quality issues towards the edges are cropped away and you're left with the better central area that central area will be magnified more and this will affect image quality. I can see the appeal of the Fuji system but for me it starts and stops with the manual dials. After that you've got pretty much the bulk of an A7 series body but not the image quality and the lens will be the same (when going for legacy lenses) so there'll be no saving in bulk if going for the APS-C option but you still take the image quality hit and of course if you are interested in the wider lenses things get difficult with the Fuji and its x1.5 crop factor as legacy lenses wider than 24mm start to get rare and expensive.

A7 files are gorgeous and personally I was amazed at the difference in the performance of these lenses when used on a FF camera rather than MFT. When looking at the smaller format pictures in isolation they may look perfectly good but they may/will suffer when comparing them to FF pictures. Besides any quality issues I think that part of the point and fun is to use these lenses at their intended field of view and for that you need a FF camera.











Sorry about all the pictures :D I'll stop now :D
 
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More than happy to see pics - after all in the end thats what matters - well and the experience in taking them.
 
I've just thought of something else... the choice of lenses :D

I went for Minolta Rokkor, Olympus Zuiko and Canon FD because they're mass market stuff, relatively cheap and relatively easy to find but there are a lot of choices out there and I think it's worth thinking carefully about the look you want from your pictures and the whole handling and enjoyment side of it too.

The lenses I have are pretty mainstream and they mostly give a pretty mainstream look but as can be seen in the Russian lens thread there are lenses out there that can get you a very distinctive look and your may like that. The nearest I get to a distinctive look is with my Minolta 50mm f1.2 which I initially thought was a piece of junk when compared to my Minolta 50mm f1.4 but over time I began to like the look it gives and now I wouldn't say it's worse than the f1.4, just different :D

Of the lenses I have where there's a difference in the image quality the Minolta's are the best and for me this is true at 50 and 85mm but at 24 and 28mm I'd say there's nothing in it. I think that the Zuiko lenses look lovely and of the lenses I have they're the most compact and in fact the 24 and 28mm f2.8's and the 50mm f1.8 are tiny.

I went for sets of lenses but there's no reason why you can't pick and choose and get whatever you like from different makers at each focal point especially if you go for the cheaper adapters and there's also the modern MF lenses, for example I keep looking at the Voigtlanders and I think they're lovely but for the price of one of them you could buy a whole set of 35mm film era lenses :D

Yet more pictures :D





The more out there look :D





Good luck choosing :D
 
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That's interesting, considering I'm not looking to expensive (at least to start with) is there some sort of list out there showing the looks? Or a few you would suggest so I can see what sort of looks are out there?
 
Well at Flickr first glance - my basic test, to my eye I think the A7 came out on top.

Its a very basic test, I look for the largest Flickr group for each camera and look at the size (not so important) but also the first page of the images, so I took these two - the Fuji X-T1 (link) and the Sony A7 (link), I would have been happier if the A7 waters weren't muddied by including variants, but hey.
 
JohnN said:
Well at Flickr first glance - my basic test, to my eye I think the A7 came out on top.

Its a very basic test, I look for the largest Flickr group for each camera and look at the size (not so important) but also the first page of the images, so I took these two - the Fuji X-T1 (link) and the Sony A7 (link), I would have been happier if the A7 waters weren't muddied by including variants, but hey.
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It may help to have a look at the specifications of the various models and see which way you'd like to go. I'm happy enough with my first generation 24mp A7, they're a touch smaller than the MK2 models and I suspect that a MK1 will be the cheapest way to go but of course the MK2's offer more bells and whistles. For example, do you want in body image stabilisation?

Good luck choosing.
 
Yeah, IBIS is all that would draw me, but for a play it seems an expensive choice as with any luck I can pick up an A7 here for around £470, whereas the mk2 would be a lot more.
 
the a mount sonys slt's have the same mf features, so do the nex style models

you could try a range finder too, if u want a different focus experience :)
 
IIRC the conclusion was that FF is the way to go with older lenses, and I'd probably agree with that most of the time.
 
I'm sure you're right, but it would be remiss of me to not have another look at Fuji as I've seen so many recommendations on here for them and know so little, after all I don't even know which model is which yet.
 
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The main problem is that a lot of old lenses have character but only a few have real star quality and they cost a fortune - so it's best to splash the cash on lenses rather than the camera.

I've just been outside with my Meyer Trioplan 100mm - it's a bit windy for a good shot but get a bit of sun and colour 20' behind the subject at f2.8 and you get some wonderful soap-bubble bokeh.


DSC08209 by John Pond, on Flickr
 
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Alternatively you could spend £20 on a 35mm 1.7 cctv lens and get similar character;

ImageUploadedByTalk Photography Forums1467660739.795316.jpg

ImageUploadedByTalk Photography Forums1467660749.245614.jpg
 
Jason Crest said:
The main problem is that a lot of old lenses have character but only a few have real star quality and they cost a fortune - so it's best to splash the cash on lenses rather than the camera.
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That's just daft, IMO. All gotta make our own minds up though but having compared lenses on FF and MFT all I can say is that if you want the best results you need a decent camera not just any old junk to mount your star lens on as if you do it that way chances are your star lens wont be any more.
 
Lol, might well be the Fuji again now after a wee chat with someone and the more I see the more I like, in a big part because they've done a lot with the firmware and I like the look too
 
JohnN said:
Lol, might well be the Fuji again now after a wee chat with someone and the more I see the more I like, in a big part because they've done a lot with the firmware and I like the look too
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As long as you're going into this well informed and with your eyes open...

These old lenses were designed to use on a 35mm camera and to me a FF digital camera therefore makes a better tool to use them on. When using a smaller sensor you'll not get the best out of old lenses and the field of view will not be as intended plus if you are interested in the wider end things older lenses wider than something like 24mm start to get rare and expensive.

But it's your money and your decision and I'm sure you'll get a lot of enjoyment out of whatever you choose :D I've used an old 50mm on MFT giving an equiv FoV of 100mm and I must have taken a ton of shots with that combination, but the fact is that the same lens produces better results on my FF A7.
 
JohnN said:
Lol, might well be the Fuji again now after a wee chat with someone and the more I see the more I like, in a big part because they've done a lot with the firmware and I like the look too
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John,

Take a look at my Flickr site.

The snooker shot is Fuji (but AF lens) but the following "shots from bedroom window" are with an AF lens and some MF PK lenses.

I love the look and feel of Fuji (I swapped from Nikon FF last week).

I have a PK to Fuji X adapter from SRB, not the cheapest at £30 but they are very good machinists and make them in house.

Terry.
 
Cheers all.

Well the deed is done - got a nice new looking XT-1 on its way tomorrow bought on here, along with two adopters, one for Nikon to Fuji (so I can use my current lenses) and another from M42 screw mount to Fuji, for these a twin set I picked up from eBay - BeLomo 1975 HELIOS 44-2 f2/58 USSR & Prinz Galaxy f=135mm Lens, fingers crossed they're not bad lenses, but at under £40 for the pair it shouldn't be too bad (I hope!)
 
I've had the A7 for a while now and all I can say it is great for manual focus with the live view focus highlight, I have used few Canon lenses with a rather useless AF adapter so it was all MF with them and I can say it was painless and quite enjoyable.
 
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