The Vintage Lens Thread

PerroneFord said:
Good idea, I bought two more lenses today (Nikkor-S 50mm 1.4 and a Fujinon 55mm 1.8). When they come in I'll add some things. I need to find something cool to shoot this weekend on my Nikkor H-C 300mm.
Click to expand...

Try focus pulling on this...

I 1st ACed a feature on a ARRI IIc with the 35mm Mickey lenses... no marks, no tap, just a distance marker, and nerves....

every shot but one was tack sharp. Gotta love that german lenses hold true to their markings....

They look amazing. im trying so hard to find a set of these....

arri35iic.jpg
 
ok guys...in an attempt NOT to be a sufferer of LBA and not to drive myself broke...this is what i have decided and need your advice on.

Currently i have :
50mm 1.4 supertakumar
tamron 17-50 2.8 (VC)

On the way i have :
yashica 28 2.8 (i have a feeling it will be a nice lens)
Vivitar series one (tokina version) 70-210 3.5

to round off my primes I will get the :
Helious 40-2 1.5

then i'd need a wide prime( 19 -21) ...I see a couple decent afforadable($200) ones. I was gonna go witht the zenitar 16 but I saw some testing and it really sucked unless stopped down alot (http://www.kenrockwell.com/zenit/zenitar-16mm.htm) ...but that was for STILLS so i dont know if its that bad for video. Mark's Video with it is pretty good though :) and i luv that it is decently fast at 2.8. The other options i;ve seen while good they are slow...at 3.5

So my question is...how do u guys feel about getting a slow prime lens ...wud u get 3.5 ? I guess i have the tamron if i need low light. All the 2.8 wide lenses i have seen are pretty expensive. you guys know any more fast affordable ones?

So thats 4 primes and 2 zooms.

After i aquire these i'm going for broke and go for A leica summicron set next year (appr $2500)and chill after that :) So these are supposed to hold me over till i can get the Leicas. I will not suffer from LBA....
 
Last edited:
The kit zoom from the T2i (18-55) is a 3.5 at 18mm. That's probably the cheapest way to get there. You can pick that lens up for CHEAP and it has IS. The only time you'd want to be that wide is if you have an establishing shot in a VERY big space inside or outside, or for special effect. Well, that would be so on full frame. On the crop sensor, that's just a good wide I guess.

There is nothing wrong with having a couple slowish zoom lenses. Just understand their limitations and work accordingly. I have 3 of them. An 18-55, a 28-80, and a 70-300. So essentially I have complete coverage from 18-300mm if necessary. As long as I don't need to use a follow focus, the 18-55 can live on the camera most of the time if I have the light.

Primes are just nicer to use with the follow focus, or when you really want some quality without spending a boatload of money. I'd try to do ANY 2-shots or 1-shots with a prime if possible. Save the zooms for your traveling shots where no one is going to be too critical of the frame.
 
58mm Rokkor said:
Minolta Rokkor 58mm/1.2
paid $100
Click to expand...

Must... not... fap...

jambredz said:
I have a question...alot of these lenses seem pretty short in length ...case in point my supertakumar 50mm. Is it possible to use a mattbox with these lenses. I've never used one so i duno...but it seems to me from pics i have seen theres a donut ring thing that attaches to the lens to prevent light from entering. It seems it would interfere with the focus ring on these small lenses. Again....i dont know.
Click to expand...

Depends what you have. I've spent a lot of hours trying to figure out how to get a very short distance between rails, baseplate and the lens. But them i'm having all custom parts. A professional baseplate/rails/mattebox kit should allow up-close to the lens. Otherwise it's a pretty bad product :P

Or maybe you mean the distance between the focus ring and distance to front glass. Shouldn't be a problem. Usually not the end of the world if it's not 100% light proof around the sides. If not a peice of cloth works, i always have a black t-shirt in my camera bag, excellent to put your head under to see the screen if nothing else :2vrolijk_08:
 
Last edited:
Hey I just got into the drugstore (decentattempt) and something funny happened!

I placed a bid... some guy outbid me, I bid again, some STORE with many points outbids me... then I didn't big higher. 20 minutes later I receive a "taken back" eBay mail. The store cancelled the bid. Is this fishy? Hmmm... I can totally picture partner stores bidding each other to get prices up. And now another 200+ points guy outbids me... is this normal? How much should I pay for this?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130426610801

Ahhhhh the Nikkons are actually quite spicy as soon as you look for something other than a 50mm... a 35 1.4 just ended at 300 bucks, and the 85 1.4 looks like it ends around 600... can vintage lenses be found for less? It still sums up to quite a lot of money...

I checked stores here and it's too expensive. My father's going to Miami soon, he said he knows an area downtown Miami that sell vintage lenses, is this true? Will the price by better than ebay?
 
I checked the guy's bid history and he seems to be buying a lot of lenses from different sellers... why buy so much stuff!

Leave some to us the one time buyers...

:(
 
Iudex said:
Ahhhhh the Nikkons are actually quite spicy as soon as you look for something other than a 50mm... a 35 1.4 just ended at 300 bucks, and the 85 1.4 looks like it ends around 600... can vintage lenses be found for less? It still sums up to quite a lot of money...
Click to expand...

Yes, vintage lenses can be had for a lot less money. But you are looking at lenses that were the best in the world in their day. And they WILL be expensive. And guys who need them to make their living from them WILL outbid you for them.

But if you expand your knowledge of vintage lenses to other good Japanese and German brands, you'll be able to find better deals. And maybe entertain the idea of F1.8 or F2.0 glass.
 
Iudex said:
Hey I just got into the drugstore (decentattempt) and something funny happened!

I placed a bid... some guy outbid me, I bid again, some STORE with many points outbids me... then I didn't big higher. 20 minutes later I receive a "taken back" eBay mail. The store cancelled the bid. Is this fishy? Hmmm... I can totally picture partner stores bidding each other to get prices up. And now another 200+ points guy outbids me... is this normal? How much should I pay for this?

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=130426610801

Ahhhhh the Nikkons are actually quite spicy as soon as you look for something other than a 50mm... a 35 1.4 just ended at 300 bucks, and the 85 1.4 looks like it ends around 600... can vintage lenses be found for less? It still sums up to quite a lot of money...

I checked stores here and it's too expensive. My father's going to Miami soon, he said he knows an area downtown Miami that sell vintage lenses, is this true? Will the price by better than ebay?
Click to expand...

You really have to be creative in your searches. I usually try and search for the still cameras and hope a couple of lenses I want are thrown in the sweeten the pot. Another strategy is to type in "lot of lenses" in an Ebay search. Most times, they are grouped together for a reason (i.e. they suck!) but every once in a while something slips through the cracks.

As far as fast 85mm lenses go, best of luck trying to find one of those cheap! You're better off just getting the Rokinon 85mm 1.4 for $250 than waiting for a Takumar 85mm 1.9 to go below $300. Those old portrait lenses keep their value like nobody's business.
 
Wow. Didn't even know that Rokinon existed, B&H isn't selling it...

Is there anything i'm not considering? Besides that it is a manual lens (no worries for video dudes). What's the deal? It looks exactly like a Bower, but it says Rokinon and it's 100 dollars cheaper... ??? And I've been reading very good stuff about it on the web, is it really that good?

So I have 50mm 1.4 already, if that Rokinon gets confirmed it looks nice for 85mm and I need my wide... at least as wide as possible.

I could go for a Nikkon 20mm 2.8, there are three ending soon for around 250 bucks (good deal?). But one is AI-S, the other is AF and the third one is AF with a D added after the 2.8 aperture. What's the difference?

Check the AI-S one...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=270629368406

The guy answers a question saying... " I'm not aware of an item number. Here is the serial number: 222534. This is an older AI-S manual focus lens. If you're trying to mount it to a contemporary body (i.e. digital) you may have compatibility issues. ..." ???

Do we have to be picky with the different variations of what we see when selecting "F-MOUNT" or everything will be good to go with an adaptor on the T2i?

THANK YOU!!
 
Perrone do you have anything to say regarding consistency between the Nikons and the Rokinon? I read on the web that the bokeh is softer on the latter... but... ???
 
Iudex said:
Perrone do you have anything to say regarding consistency between the Nikons and the Rokinon? I read on the web that the bokeh is softer on the latter... but... ???
Click to expand...


Sorry, don't know anything about them.

Thre brands I've settled on are:

Nikon
Pentax
Fujinon
Yashica

There is a LOT of good glass out there besides these. But I have no need for it, nor do I have enough time to research it all and cherry pick the winners. Glass is a tool to me to accomplish my mission. The brands that I have chosen will allow me to do that to my satisfaction.

There are numerous collectors out there or guys who have a lot of time and money and know a ton about the German brands, Russian brands, and more esoteric Japanese brands too.

Search the internet. MFLenses.com. Photo.net, plenty of places out there with information and actual phoots taken with these lenses. That's how I got started in looking for what I wanted.
 
So I just got my yashica 28 f2.8. The lens seems to be in very good condition...the glass is VERY clean. Not bad for $27 :) I'm quite exited to see what it will produce...but still waiting on the adapter for it. Will post footage when it comes.
 
jambredz said:
So I just got my yashica 28 f2.8. The lens seems to be in very good condition...the glass is VERY clean. Not bad for $27 :) I'm quite exited to see what it will produce...but still waiting on the adapter for it. Will post footage when it comes.
Click to expand...

awesome. Yaschica makes great lenses.
 
I have a question..being a lens retard :) I was fooling around with my supertak 50 1.4 and the yashica 28 2.8 I just got and at 2.8 on both lenses the aperature opening was way wider on the supertak (yashica obviously being wide open). arent apperature sizes standard across lenses?
 
jambredz said:
I have a question..being a lens retard :) I was fooling around with my supertak 50 1.4 and the yashica 28 2.8 I just got and at 2.8 on both lenses the aperature opening was way wider on the supertak (yashica obviously being wide open). arent apperature sizes standard across lenses?
Click to expand...

The F-Stop is a mathematical ratio. It varies with focal length. So the size of the hole you see will not be the same, unless the focal length of the lenses you are comparing is the same.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top