Would you like to use your old film SLR as digital?

[Steve Smith]

I'd just continue shooting normal film.

Seems to work very well in these cameras!


Steve.

 

[joxby]

Personally I wouldn't expect this to be as good as a modern top end DSLR as for one thing if looking at old film SLR's the lenses wont be up to the standard of modern digital lenses....

A **** sharp lens with drop dead bokeh is still a **** sharp lens with drop dead bokeh, however old it is.
There are an awful lot of old lenses that are the optical equivalent of modern lenses, and in some cases, better.
But you could reverse that and it would be equally true.
Whilst tech has moved on, materials/coatings/manufacturing, you still can't generalise about "old" lenses, what is "old", Carl Zeiss has been dead for 130 years..

 

[Steve]

Seems to be a solution to a problem which doesn't exist.

Steve.

Isn't that what was said about the ipad?

True though...it's not really a solution to a problem but a 'like to have' thing.

I seem to be the only here who would actually like one of these, but only if:

1. the larger sensor was implemented, even a 1.6x crop like on my old Nikon D300 would be fine.

2. Absolutely no modifications to the film camera. No way am I mucking about removing things or sticking bits on.

If these were satisfied, I'd love one to play with...think it would be a lot of fun to use old film cameras digitally.

 

[Steve Smith]

2. Absolutely no modifications to the film camera. No way am I mucking about removing things or sticking bits on.

That's not going to be an option unless someone develops a sensor which is no thicker than a piece of film.


Steve.

 

[woof woof]

If you actually read it carefully,

You'll see that it says...

"Now for the technical bit, the sensor we have budgeted for in the costs at the trigger of 1000 sponsors is the 2/3, that gives an 8.8 x 6.6 millimetre image capture area, we will be supplying a mirror and view finder mask within the packages to match the sensor in the DigiPod.

But as we all know, order quantity dictates cost of raw materails, so we have some added some stretch goals, which if we achieve will see all backers being upgraded to a larger sensor than the one we budgeted for at our minimum backer activation of 1000 units.

•2000 backers will allow us to upgrade the Cmos sensor to a 1” that’s 12.8 to 9.6 millimetre.

•5000 backers will see the digiPod use a 4/3rds which is 18.0 x 13.5 millimetre."

Maybe you stopped reading?

 

[woof woof]

YES... most people do, but in cameras that have lenses with focal lengths designed to 'match' the sensor size...

I guess you're out then

Anyone shooting with a MFT sensor or even APS-C will be familiar with crop factors and the lack of wide angle but 24, 28, 35, 50, 85 and 135mm lenses are available at reasonable cost and are quite useable even at x2 IMVHO.

 

[HMansfield]

Something which needs to be considered is the space for this to fit.

It has to have a sensor with its sensitive surface at the film plane and if no modification of the back is to be done, it needs to be as thin as a piece of film - about 0.175mm

If the pressure plate is removed that might increase it to about 5mm but who wants to do that?

Steve.

This is the bit that I was going to point out.

I would love to be able to digitise my XA2 or my Trip35 (and my le clic disc cameras), but not only would the sensor need to match the full frame design, it also needs to be where the film plane is or it just won't be in focus.

While it would limit the cameras it would be available on, a more sensible idea would be to create or modify the backs to include the sensor where it needs to be. 3D printing technology means that copies of the cameras back can be created without the need to modify the original or source another one.

Some of my other cameras can detect when there's no film in them, and so won't cock the shutter. The only way past this is to open the back after each shot so it cocks when it does its auto-wind-loading thing.

Assuming this first generation gets built, how long before there's an upgrade and this becomes obsolete?

 

[woof woof]

A **** sharp lens with drop dead bokeh is still a **** sharp lens with drop dead bokeh, however old it is.
There are an awful lot of old lenses that are the optical equivalent of modern lenses, and in some cases, better.
But you could reverse that and it would be equally true.
Whilst tech has moved on, materials/coatings/manufacturing, you still can't generalise about "old" lenses, what is "old", Carl Zeiss has been dead for 130 years..

I don't quite agree but I will say sorry for generalising There are quite a few SLR lenses that seemed perfectly fine on film that may well look a lot less good these days. At normal image sizes they'd probably still look good but these days we can pixel peep and see every fault so whilst a "film" lens might well have looked very good in 1970 once you put it on your 5D and pixel peep at 100% you may prefer the results you get from more recent lenses.

 

[Teflon-Mike]

I guess you're out then

Anyone shooting with a MFT sensor or even APS-C will be familiar with crop factors and the lack of wide angle but 24, 28, 35, 50, 85 and 135mm lenses are available at reasonable cost and are quite useable even at x2 IMVHO.

Yeah, I'm conversant with crop factors, and I shoot APS-C digital, and use legacy 35mm lenses on it... but we are talking a crop factor of 1.5. That makes my 12mm fish an 18mm wide angle; my 28mm wide angle a 42mm 'almost' standard, and my 50mm a 75mm short tele.

BUT, and significantly, what I see through the view-finder or on the screen, is what I'm getting in the sensor. The image isn't cropped in the view-finder.

4/3rds.... Cop factor of about 2.... my 12mm fish would become equivalent of a 24mm wide angle, 28mm wide a 58 'almost' standard, my 50 a 100 short tele. Harder to find lenses that give wider angle views, but, could still get down to reasonably wide lenses with old 35mm legacy kit.

And on a 4/3 camera, again, what I would see through the view-finder or on screen would be the crop seen by the sensor.

And, what the heck... these are currently supported cameras; if I want wide lenses, I can stump up and buy one to suit the camera.

1" Bridge Sensor has a crop factor around 2.7.... 12mm fish would now be up to the equivilent of 27mm wide angle.... the range is dropping off the edge... 28mm wide becomes the equivilent of a 75mm short telephoto; so you would struggle to get wide angles with legacy lenses; BUT currently supported format; could use contemprary lenses designed FOR the camera. AND again, you would get full crop view in the cameras view-finder or on screen.

But this widget isn't talking of those yet; at the moment he's prototyping around a 9x7 Camera-Phone sensor, and talking about productionising on a 10x8 compact sensor.

Prototype has a crop factor of about 4, predicted productionised model, a crop factor of around 3.5.... And we are down to the range where fish-eye wide angles multiply out to give fields of view the equivilent of a standard lens.... and you have no 'legacy' lenses that give you traditional wide angles... rather defeating the entire object of being able to use an old film SLR body, to get wide angle lenses you would have to look to buying adapters to mount modern crop sensor lenses.... with a few added technical issues surrounding elecronically controlled apertures.... and STILL with a view-finder trying to show you what you would get on a full 35mm frame!

You might not find lack of wide angle on crop cameras that much of an impediment, and might not see the point in going much wider than, the coverage of an old 35mm/35mm compact, you get from a camera phone or wide end of a zoom compact; but I didn't buy a fish eye and twenty something mm lenses for my 35mm SLR's to take telephoto photos! And I suspect the folk buying 10mm fishes and 10-20mm wide angle zooms for APS-C DSLR's don't either!

But even if it were tolerable... the fact that the view-finder image would be just 1/4 the size, wouldn't!

 

[Stumpy]

How much and can I try before I buy?




Yea, thought so to both questions. Oh well...........

 

[Teflon-Mike]

I don't quite agree but I will say sorry for generalising There are quite a few SLR lenses that seemed perfectly fine on film that may well look a lot less good these days. At normal image sizes they'd probably still look good but these days we can pixel peep and see every fault so whilst a "film" lens might well have looked very good in 1970 once you put it on your 5D and pixel peep at 100% you may prefer the results you get from more recent lenses.

Like we couldn't enlarge a 35mm Halide neg to, ooooh... the size of a cinema screen or more! to study the image resolution and lens abhoration in fine detail! (Almost directly... without any secondary aberration from translation processing of the digital image, by computer, micro-processor or graphics card, or influence of monitor, monitor resolution or calibration....)

Like pixel peeping is something that has only recently let us see how 'dire' our photo's were before digital came along.... sorry... I think not! Saw how bad my snaps were peering at a 20x20 base-board with the enlarger head cranked to the top of the pillar and my eye screwed to a lupe MANY years ago!

Yeah, there's a lot of not so great lenses for old 35mm cameras out there; but then there's just as many not so great lenses for Digital SLR's.

Real world? What gives 'nicer' results? The kit 18-55 that came with my crop Nikon, or the M42 Ziess 50 from my Sigma film camera? I like the results from the Ziess. In fact I get remarkeably acceptable results with a pretty chitty Prinzgalax 300mm prime, against the 'Kit' 55-300. Difference? Well the M42 300mm cost me £15... actually that was for the box of old photographic paraphernalia that contained it... including an M42 Practika and some other assorted lenses...... against £170, for the Nikon 55-300... I would have to go a long way up market in 'modern' lenses, and spend an awful lot of money on them, to start challenging the ultimate pixel peeping IQ you can get from many, incredibly 'cheap' old 35mm legacy lenses. We are talking approx 10x the cost for comparable quality.

Yeah...If I tried a Nikon AF-S 50.... sure, I 'might' appreciate the difference in IQ against the kit 18-55, and maybe, if there was any, the clarity it offered over the Ziess.... but I sure as heck wouldn't appreciate having to pay £300 for it instead of £30!

 

[Steve Smith]

^^^ What he said!

The average kit lens sold with a 35mm SLR in the 1970s and 1980s (usually 50mm) is most likely a lot better than most of today's kit lenses.

And at the top of the range, I doubt that today's lenses are better.


Steve.

 

[MartynK]

There was a lot of talk about this - and some interest - years ago. I think it more or less died out when Canon broke the price barrier for entry level DSLRs with the 300D

It's an interesting concept but too little, far too late. Most people who still use film cameras seem to prefer film as a medium, rather than just as a means to enjoy older cameras, and it's still available. Good digital cameras are pretty affordable, and a whole generation has grown up with no knowledge of film cameras, or any desire to learn about them.

What's the point of this? I'm happy to run my F2 and FM on film, and I rather spend money on another MF Nikkor from that era than a digital 'conversion' for the cameras. I have a 30D and a couple of compacts for digital, and they're just fine for this.

 

[MartynK]

^^^ What he said!

The average kit lens sold with a 35mm SLR in the 1970s and 1980s (usually 50mm) is most likely a lot better than most of today's kit lenses.

And at the top of the range, I doubt that today's lenses are better.


Steve.

Yip. My film gear is Nikon, and my DSLR is Canon. That wasn't a preference, just the way things worked out, but I'll take my Nikkor f1.4 50mm AI lens over Canon's current f1.4 50mm prime any day, let alone over the kit lenses.

 

[HoppyUK]

^^^ What he said!

The average kit lens sold with a 35mm SLR in the 1970s and 1980s (usually 50mm) is most likely a lot better than most of today's kit lenses.

And at the top of the range, I doubt that today's lenses are better.


Steve.

It's possible to choose particular examples from both film and digital eras to prove the case either way, but overall most modern lenses are sharper than older equivalents.

What is certainly in no doubt is the sharpness advantage of lenses designed specifically for smaller digital formats, such as M4/3rds and Nikon 1 series, both relevant to this thread. They have to be sharper to make good use their sensors' very high pixel density.

 

[Steve Smith]

What is certainly in no doubt is the sharpness advantage of lenses designed specifically for smaller digital formats, such as M4/3rds and Nikon 1 series, both relevant to this thread. They have to be sharper to make good use their sensors' very high pixel density.

It's more that they have to be sharper to compensate for the sensors smaller area.

In the same way that large format lenses don't have to be as sharp as lenses for 35mm cameras.

I know we are basically saying the same thing - I'm just putting it a slightly different way.


Steve.

 

[HoppyUK]

It's more that they have to be sharper to compensate for the sensors smaller area.

In the same way that large format lenses don't have to be as sharp as lenses for 35mm cameras.

I know we are basically saying the same thing - I'm just putting it a slightly different way.


Steve.

 

[Steve]

That's not going to be an option unless someone develops a sensor which is no thicker than a piece of film.


Steve.

Just checked my Leica III and there is no back pressure plate and the gap for film is a couple of mm wide. Cant check the M2 at the moment as there is a film in it.

So maybe wouldnt have to be as thin as a piece of film, but still probably too thin to fit.

Shame...would love to try these old rangefinders as a cut down cheaper M9

 

[andya700]

Why on earth would you want to mangle your leica to take this thing!

Its like taking the engine out of an aston marton db5 and replacing it with a Prius engine.

If you want a small sensor digital then go buy one. They're cheap enough these days. I think that crippling your FF film cameras would be a backward step.

To pinch someone else's quote, You have 24-36 brand new FF sensors every time you wind the film on for a few quid. This sort of idea just befuddles me.

We may not be too far away from the time, that performance car manufacturers have to rethink their entire strategy concerning the standard internal combustion engine.
The Prius is a good example along with the Lexus hybrids, and the electric cars such as the Teslar.
I think that this idea of converting a 35mm SLR to digital use, is in a way blindingly obvious, particularly at a time when many people are into recycling and renewables.
I hope that he gets it off the ground.
I knew that I had kept the Spotmatics, Nikkormats and Minolta SLR's for a good reason

 

[joxby]

I don't quite agree but I will say sorry for generalising There are quite a few SLR lenses that seemed perfectly fine on film that may well look a lot less good these days. At normal image sizes they'd probably still look good but these days we can pixel peep and see every fault so whilst a "film" lens might well have looked very good in 1970 once you put it on your 5D and pixel peep at 100% you may prefer the results you get from more recent lenses.

This is still the particularly poorly worded reply today, that it was last night, except today I've been to work and had all the animosity kicked out of me, so I'll let you off, I still love you cos Marcel says I do, an what he says goes...

 

[Steve Smith]

Like pixel peeping is something that has only recently let us see how 'dire' our photo's were before digital came along.... sorry... I think not! Saw how bad my snaps were peering at a 20x20 base-board with the enlarger head cranked to the top of the pillar and my eye screwed to a lupe MANY years ago

If you really wanted to see how bad they were you could use slide film and project them onto a screen.

Often what looked like a well taken, sharp image when holding a slide up to the light turned out to be a a hand held with camera shake, fuzzy mess of a picture.


Steve.

 

[s162216]

I think the whole discussion is moot to be honest as he only gets the money if he can raise the full amount (£199,000) and seeing as he's raised barely 10% of that with 18 days to go (and its been going since the 8th of August) I think it highly unlikely that he will raise it.

A good idea perhaps, but to get it going he needs some serious funding which I sadly think he will be hard pressed to find.

 

[Teflon-Mike]

If you really wanted to see how bad they were you could use slide film and project them onto a screen.

I did... could never get it ripple free.
Preferred to pop them into the enlarger; base-board is much flatter.

 

[Nod]

Having an assortment of FF and crop DSLRS as well as a few film bodies kicking around, I'll pass on the film/digital adaptor, thanks! IF I get the hankering to play with the film bodies, I'll pop in a roll of the necessary and shoot the 37 or so frames it holds (about the same as a 128MB card in my D70!) to scratch the itch.

 

[Deleted member 49549]

plug and play full frame, yep, id be interested. if it could be used in any 35mm camera, i might even pay a decent sum of money for it. off to read the links that hoppy posted, they may put me off!

 

[swanseamale47]

Not for me I'm afraid. While I like the idea, the small sensor will make some shooting difficult with the lens most common to 35mm cameras (28-200 sort of range for most users) you'd be pretty much limited to telephoto type stuff, I'm also not impressed by having to press buttons in the back of the camera. Now if it was a full frame sensor that used the cameras own shutter.... different story for me.

 

[s162216]

Well with only 67 hours to go, and only £15,180 raised out of the £199,000 target theres sadly no way that he is going to get any of the money unless someone really rich (and stupid?) steps in and contributes the remainder.

I will be honest and say that I am not surprised as the small sensor would put me off (if it had been a full frame sensor etc then it would have been a lot more interesting), and to be honest its too little too late as had this had come about 5 - 8 years ago I could have seen it taking off, but not today.