I used to buy "obsolete" film camera lenses and convert them to Canon EF mount to use on my 5D. My wife preferred to stick with autofocus.
By far my favourite lens to use on full frame digital is the Minolta Rokkor 58mm f1.2.
Here is one (of many I bought) mounted on my 5D after conversion:
The conversion process was quite involved. Remove old mount, sand down the mount spacer to ensure infinity focus, then file off the edge of the rear element retaining ring, paint it, then drill holes in the new EF mount and install it.
Filing the rear element retaining ring was a sobering endeavor:
The new EF mount going on:
This works without issue on most crop sensor bodies, but to use it on the 5D the camera mirror needs to be shaved down to avoid collisions when the lens is focused at infinity. Another sobering endeavor:
By far my favourite lens to use on full frame digital is the Minolta Rokkor 58mm f1.2.
Here is one (of many I bought) mounted on my 5D after conversion:
The conversion process was quite involved. Remove old mount, sand down the mount spacer to ensure infinity focus, then file off the edge of the rear element retaining ring, paint it, then drill holes in the new EF mount and install it.
Filing the rear element retaining ring was a sobering endeavor:
The new EF mount going on:
This works without issue on most crop sensor bodies, but to use it on the 5D the camera mirror needs to be shaved down to avoid collisions when the lens is focused at infinity. Another sobering endeavor:
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Hey Gimp, if you have some nice old Contax Zeiss lenses you can easily stick them on your T5 and use them, with one of these adapters (or any one of the dozens available from anywhere else).
Just stick the camera in Av mode and roll. You might need to use a bit of exposure compensation, but just chimp the histogram and adjust accordingly.
If you want to go full frame, EOS 5D are available on the market for peanuts now. They were $3500 when new, and are still more than good enough to shooting weddings (we still do) and we have made 20"x30" prints from our cameras that would knock your socks off.
BTW my 2nd favourite lens to use on my 5D is the Contax Zeiss 21mm f2.8 Distagon. My GOD that thing is amazingly sharp and contrasty from corner to corner. The colour rendering and flare resistance is just unreal as well. All that with barely any chromatic aberration.
Just stick the camera in Av mode and roll. You might need to use a bit of exposure compensation, but just chimp the histogram and adjust accordingly.
If you want to go full frame, EOS 5D are available on the market for peanuts now. They were $3500 when new, and are still more than good enough to shooting weddings (we still do) and we have made 20"x30" prints from our cameras that would knock your socks off.
BTW my 2nd favourite lens to use on my 5D is the Contax Zeiss 21mm f2.8 Distagon. My GOD that thing is amazingly sharp and contrasty from corner to corner. The colour rendering and flare resistance is just unreal as well. All that with barely any chromatic aberration.
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We had one of those at work. It squeezed 12 or 13 1024 X 768 pixel images onto a single 1.44 Megabyte floppy disk.....see included pictures
We had a management change in Chicago and the new regime did not know any of us in Florida, so we each had to prepare "justify your job" presentations.....layoffs to follow. While most of the big boys were making slick PowerPoint presentations, I simply stuffed a fresh floppy into the Mavica and ripped off a whole "roll" of pictures of my latest prototype. I added a short story listing my contributions to the 3 man project.
When winter came the "Suits from Schamburg" visited Florida, as they did nearly every year. Of course a "justify your job" presentation in person would be needed, probably on short notice. Panic struck the lab, most of the people started dressing like IBM (20 miles North) engineers. I was still a flip flops and t shirt kinda guy. The printer buzzed with PowerPoint slides. I did nothing.
When THE meeting came people were sweating, PANIC ruled the week. When I got called I simply grabbed this prototype radio and gave a 30 second presentation.....I designed the RF circuitry for this 100 watt data radio and the test fixture to test that circuitry without a controller board. I laid out the PC board, got them made, then got them populated in the SMD assembly lab. I tested all 10 boards and took data. I worked with a mechanical engineer to get this chassis designed and machined from a single block of aluminum, then built one prototype using the controller board from the digital guy, and the software load from the software guy......as far as I know Motorola sells radios, not fancy PowerPoint slides, someone needs to be the guy who makes a radio out of all of those slides, and I'm the only one in this department that does that. With that comment the 10 pound radio seen in these pictures hits the table and wakes all the suits up! I stayed in that department for the last 14 years of my career and actually liked my job.
The first 4 pictures are the actual images taken with that old Sony Mavica about 20 years ago.
The last picture shows me hard at work much later in my career (2011) testing an LTE transmitter. It was taken with a "unauthorized" picture taking device, a Samsung Galaxy S-1 phone.....remember where I worked
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I did get quite the reaction on the photography forum after I shaved my 5D mirror. This was a $3500 camera that I had to finance over 2 years. So yes, there was some risk involved.
The fact that I used the word "sobering" is appropriate on many levels, since it took me about 3 gin gimlets to work up the courage to do it.
Gimp,
I should elaborate on my post about lens adapters. All of the following can be used easily with a simple ring adapter on any Canon EOS (EF) body:
All Contax/Yashica mount lenses
All Olympus OM mount lenses
All M42 screw-mount lenses (which includes a tonne of Asahi-Pentax Super-Taks and SMC-Taks)
All Leica R mount lenses
All Nikon F (AI Ai-s) mount lenses
All Rollei QBM mount lenses
...perhaps more that I am forgetting.
Caveats: manual focus, manual aperture, stop-down metering.
I should elaborate on my post about lens adapters. All of the following can be used easily with a simple ring adapter on any Canon EOS (EF) body:
All Contax/Yashica mount lenses
All Olympus OM mount lenses
All M42 screw-mount lenses (which includes a tonne of Asahi-Pentax Super-Taks and SMC-Taks)
All Leica R mount lenses
All Nikon F (AI Ai-s) mount lenses
All Rollei QBM mount lenses
...perhaps more that I am forgetting.
Caveats: manual focus, manual aperture, stop-down metering.
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Indeed that is impressive cogitech. I thought I was a renegade using an AI-converted macro lens and a T-mount zoom on my D300, but that's not even an appetizer compared to your entree. I went lens crazy on eBay for a while when I was a bachelor, but don't have the patience anymore, I just want every acronym I can get on new lenses.
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There's a lot to be said for modern lenses, for sure.
A few months ago my wife and I shot a wedding for the first time in a long time. Her EF 35mm f2 pooped the bed during that wedding. We managed to do without it, but 35mm is one of her favourite focal lengths. I had some extra money (work bonus) so I surprised her with a Tamron SP 35mm f/1.4 Di USD (talk about acronyms!).
Well, all I can say is holy @#$% that lens is insane! Sharp AF (and I don't mean Auto Focus) even wide open and the bokeh is stupidly smooth. Don't take my word for it. Every single review you can find says the same thing. It's better than the Canon EF 35mm f/1.4 L at half the price (or less).
A few months ago my wife and I shot a wedding for the first time in a long time. Her EF 35mm f2 pooped the bed during that wedding. We managed to do without it, but 35mm is one of her favourite focal lengths. I had some extra money (work bonus) so I surprised her with a Tamron SP 35mm f/1.4 Di USD (talk about acronyms!).
Well, all I can say is holy @#$% that lens is insane! Sharp AF (and I don't mean Auto Focus) even wide open and the bokeh is stupidly smooth. Don't take my word for it. Every single review you can find says the same thing. It's better than the Canon EF 35mm f/1.4 L at half the price (or less).
To have fitted old lenses to other cameras, I prefer the Leitax site:
Leica & Pentax & Nikon | Leitax
With my old Canon D450, I once bought a set for converting a Leica Summicron R/50mm.
I needed a new screen for manual focus, too
In the end, this worked for making some pics, especially some nice macro shots with another adaptor. But it wasn't very successfull for the manual focussing process. I wasn't able to easy focus on middle distances.
That was my start with serious digital DSLR. Some years later I moved forward to an all Leica system which serves me quite satisfactory.
I read alot on the subject of mounting different analog lenses on digital cameras, but in the end it was a revelation that the progress in optics was so huge, that even my Cron 50mm V3 was a lot less sharp than the V5 version I actually use.
There are a lot of people saying that sharpness isn't a usefull criteria for a perfect picture, but for me its one of the main attractors to play with sharpening zones in the process of composing a picture. Don't want to use those old lenses anymore, but some pictures look quite good, even if not that sharp. Especially some old Zeiss lenses would attract my desires, but having two sharp Leica lenses let me forget about them.
I would like to use the Zeiss 21mm/2.8 ZM lens for Leica, because it is so special in its look, but for that, there would be a need for an external viewfinder for my Leica M240.
Those lenses are a wide field of study for every camera lover and serious amateur user, its just fun to play with them.
Leica & Pentax & Nikon | Leitax
With my old Canon D450, I once bought a set for converting a Leica Summicron R/50mm.
I needed a new screen for manual focus, too
In the end, this worked for making some pics, especially some nice macro shots with another adaptor. But it wasn't very successfull for the manual focussing process. I wasn't able to easy focus on middle distances.
That was my start with serious digital DSLR. Some years later I moved forward to an all Leica system which serves me quite satisfactory.
I read alot on the subject of mounting different analog lenses on digital cameras, but in the end it was a revelation that the progress in optics was so huge, that even my Cron 50mm V3 was a lot less sharp than the V5 version I actually use.
There are a lot of people saying that sharpness isn't a usefull criteria for a perfect picture, but for me its one of the main attractors to play with sharpening zones in the process of composing a picture. Don't want to use those old lenses anymore, but some pictures look quite good, even if not that sharp. Especially some old Zeiss lenses would attract my desires, but having two sharp Leica lenses let me forget about them.
I would like to use the Zeiss 21mm/2.8 ZM lens for Leica, because it is so special in its look, but for that, there would be a need for an external viewfinder for my Leica M240.
Those lenses are a wide field of study for every camera lover and serious amateur user, its just fun to play with them.
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Schmitz77,
I was always curious about Leica rangefinders, but never took the plunge. Maybe some day...
I agree about any versions of the 21/2.8 Distagon.
Here is one I took with the Contax version:
I am very fond of sharpness and micro-contrast in lenses as well, however the overall rendering of colour and background blur is equally important to me. This is why I love the Rokkor 58mm f/1.2 so much. A couple of samples:
It really shines for weddings, too:
I was always curious about Leica rangefinders, but never took the plunge. Maybe some day...
I agree about any versions of the 21/2.8 Distagon.
Here is one I took with the Contax version:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
I am very fond of sharpness and micro-contrast in lenses as well, however the overall rendering of colour and background blur is equally important to me. This is why I love the Rokkor 58mm f/1.2 so much. A couple of samples:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
It really shines for weddings, too:
An externally hosted image should be here but it was not working when we last tested it.
Just wonder wouldn't it have been easier to just use an adapter like the one in the link below or is there some kind of a caveat?
Minolta MD/MC/SR SLR Lens to Canon EOS Mount SLR Camera Body Adapter – Fotodiox, Inc. USA
Btw, I had a Nikon FF in the past, and paired with the larger 70-200m f2.8 it wasn't a light travel buddy, let alone all the stairs hauling around on a big camera is somewhat annoying, sold off the gears after a few years and am settled now with a smaller Canon M series crop camera, plenty of adapters for all kinds of camera lens combos, sensors have become so good these days even mobile phone cameras are good enough for lots of private photography, pro job is another matter though.
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Nice shots, cogitech. I like your style, its not much different to my shots.
Nothing beats the actual Cron 50 in resolution until the Cron 50 apo hit the scene. Too much for me, but I like my ordinary Cron 50 a lot. It gives that full frame quality, the colors are like Kodachrome (they tuned the sensor to give that look) and when increasing ISO, it becomes grainy like it;-)
Nothing beats the actual Cron 50 in resolution until the Cron 50 apo hit the scene. Too much for me, but I like my ordinary Cron 50 a lot. It gives that full frame quality, the colors are like Kodachrome (they tuned the sensor to give that look) and when increasing ISO, it becomes grainy like it;-)
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Cogitech what do you mean with the forum SW renders the pictures differently, If I upload and then download the same pictures onto my own computer there's no difference, I tried looking at your wedding pic in a picture viewer and Gimp but can't see any difference in colour rendering.
One thing though is that the pictures doesn't have any EXIF or colour profile data, it seems like the forum is stripping the metadata away which wasn't the case in the past, it was kind of fun looking at pictures people are uploading on this forum with GPS coordinates still intact, just throw in the coordinates in Google Maps and tadaa we know where the pic was taken...
edit: ps. Depending on the browser, Firefox, Chrome etc, there are some difference how pictures are rendered.
JPEG differently rendered in MS Edge browser and Firefox / Chrome: PC Talk Forum: Digital Photography Review
One thing though is that the pictures doesn't have any EXIF or colour profile data, it seems like the forum is stripping the metadata away which wasn't the case in the past, it was kind of fun looking at pictures people are uploading on this forum with GPS coordinates still intact, just throw in the coordinates in Google Maps and tadaa we know where the pic was taken...
edit: ps. Depending on the browser, Firefox, Chrome etc, there are some difference how pictures are rendered.
JPEG differently rendered in MS Edge browser and Firefox / Chrome: PC Talk Forum: Digital Photography Review
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The forum software only accepts small JPG formats, but I shot in raw and that looks different in Gimp, and its not data reduced for uploading, too.
Next thing is a 4K, 27 inch monitor for me. 24 Meg pics would benefit and the new Leica M10R has even doubled those pixels. So the future is beyond HD resolution.
Next thing is a 4K, 27 inch monitor for me. 24 Meg pics would benefit and the new Leica M10R has even doubled those pixels. So the future is beyond HD resolution.
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leadbelly, I thought changing from my D80 to my D750 would only result in the capability to crop more, and maybe better resolution at higher ISO's but I got a real surprise.
It was significantly better. A D300 is a better camera than the D80, so maybe the difference wouldn't be so great, but I'd say it is definitely worth looking at something with a full frame sensor. Lucky for me all of my lenses were already full frame from my film days, I didn't have any DX lenses.
Cogitech, on the Tamron lens. I got a Tamron 90mm F2.8 Macro and I love it too. It made me think my Nikkor 20mm f2.8 and nikkor 50mm F1.4's left a little to be desired sharpness wise!
I've always liked my old tamron 28-200 zoom. It's slow and terrible wide open, but provided you have good light and shoot at f8 it is a nice lens.
Tubelab, you are right about digital turning you into a picture taker, if it doesn't turn out well just snap another one. When I was shooting film I spent a lot more time making sure what I was taking was going to be half decent. Digital does tend to make you lazy.
Tony.
It was significantly better. A D300 is a better camera than the D80, so maybe the difference wouldn't be so great, but I'd say it is definitely worth looking at something with a full frame sensor. Lucky for me all of my lenses were already full frame from my film days, I didn't have any DX lenses.
Cogitech, on the Tamron lens. I got a Tamron 90mm F2.8 Macro and I love it too. It made me think my Nikkor 20mm f2.8 and nikkor 50mm F1.4's left a little to be desired sharpness wise!
I've always liked my old tamron 28-200 zoom. It's slow and terrible wide open, but provided you have good light and shoot at f8 it is a nice lens.
Tubelab, you are right about digital turning you into a picture taker, if it doesn't turn out well just snap another one. When I was shooting film I spent a lot more time making sure what I was taking was going to be half decent. Digital does tend to make you lazy.
Tony.
The reason I love My Nikon FG20 so much is its weight, my previous SLR and first such camera was a Praktica MTL5B which is probably the most solid camera I have held, basic, but took good shots.
But I am in love the the FG20. I really need to get some more lenses, the used 70-200mm zoom len I bought at the same time, causes shutter jam issues.
But I am in love the the FG20. I really need to get some more lenses, the used 70-200mm zoom len I bought at the same time, causes shutter jam issues.
What did I buy today? Two batteries for my long forgotten Sony DSC-F828 camera and a 100 foot long ethernet cable all from Amazon.
This thread got me looking through my old stuff. Though all the film stuff including a couple view cameras was given to a collector long ago, I still have all the digital cameras except for the phones and a pocket Nikon that sucked so bad that I haven't bought a Nikon since.
My first real digital camera was a Sony DSC-F828. It cost nearly $1000 in 2003. I loved the "Sony color" oversaturated pictures that it took, reminded me a lot of Kodachrome printed on Cibachrome. I dug it out of the box it has been sleeping in and was pleasantly surprised to find 11 Compact Flash cards, 4 batteries, and a Hitachi MicroDrive, a 4 GB 1 inch hard drive that fits in a Compact Flash card slot. The old Sony was capable of 640 X 480 video, but only with the hard drive because flash memory wasn't fast enough in 2003. The SanDisk 4 GB Ultra II card (newest in the find) was bragging about 15 MB/S speed. 100 is average today.
Many pictures from that era were lost when I dropped my computer down the basement stairs during a house move. I spent the morning copying the card contents to my PC. The 15+ year old Microdrive wouldn't fit in a modern card reader, and my old reader won't show up in W10, but putting the drive in the camera and connecting it to the PC via USB 0.nuthin resulted in a connection and a nearly 1 hour copy time. Most of the videos are from drag races at the National Trail Raceway in Ohio, but there are several videos of me playing with automatic rifles at a club sanctioned range event.
So far 2 out of 4 batteries are useless, and the other two are probably also dead, but Amazon had "compatible" batteries for cheap. Two batteries and a charger were $22.
The Canon DSLR is a EOS Rebel XS. It's battery took a charge and the camera works fine. The last picture on the card in it was from 2016. I really don't remember why I stopped using it since I didn't get the Lumix DMC-FZ1000 until late in 2017.
The Lumix has 400,000 pictures on it. It has been dropped, rained on and frozen to the point where it's lithium battery died, yet it keeps on going. I have powered it from a phone charger power bank and left it taking 1 picture a second overnight twice......don't try that with a DSLR unless you can lock the mirror up.
This thread got me looking through my old stuff. Though all the film stuff including a couple view cameras was given to a collector long ago, I still have all the digital cameras except for the phones and a pocket Nikon that sucked so bad that I haven't bought a Nikon since.
My first real digital camera was a Sony DSC-F828. It cost nearly $1000 in 2003. I loved the "Sony color" oversaturated pictures that it took, reminded me a lot of Kodachrome printed on Cibachrome. I dug it out of the box it has been sleeping in and was pleasantly surprised to find 11 Compact Flash cards, 4 batteries, and a Hitachi MicroDrive, a 4 GB 1 inch hard drive that fits in a Compact Flash card slot. The old Sony was capable of 640 X 480 video, but only with the hard drive because flash memory wasn't fast enough in 2003. The SanDisk 4 GB Ultra II card (newest in the find) was bragging about 15 MB/S speed. 100 is average today.
Many pictures from that era were lost when I dropped my computer down the basement stairs during a house move. I spent the morning copying the card contents to my PC. The 15+ year old Microdrive wouldn't fit in a modern card reader, and my old reader won't show up in W10, but putting the drive in the camera and connecting it to the PC via USB 0.nuthin resulted in a connection and a nearly 1 hour copy time. Most of the videos are from drag races at the National Trail Raceway in Ohio, but there are several videos of me playing with automatic rifles at a club sanctioned range event.
So far 2 out of 4 batteries are useless, and the other two are probably also dead, but Amazon had "compatible" batteries for cheap. Two batteries and a charger were $22.
The Canon DSLR is a EOS Rebel XS. It's battery took a charge and the camera works fine. The last picture on the card in it was from 2016. I really don't remember why I stopped using it since I didn't get the Lumix DMC-FZ1000 until late in 2017.
The Lumix has 400,000 pictures on it. It has been dropped, rained on and frozen to the point where it's lithium battery died, yet it keeps on going. I have powered it from a phone charger power bank and left it taking 1 picture a second overnight twice......don't try that with a DSLR unless you can lock the mirror up.
