Converted Glass - Worth a punt or not ?

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Converted Glass - Worth a punt or not ?

I've seen some glass on eBay, old glass professionally converted to a canon ef-s fitting

Is it worth a shot or not ?

Very reasonably priced , obviously manual focus

Has anyone got any experience with it ?






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Some of the older lenses still produce excellent results but it pays to choose wisely and more so if ultimate sharpness is your thing. If aiming for a different "look" to your shots (bokeh, rendering etc) then there's a whole host of options and many just need a simple, cheap adapter.
Bear in mind that the aperture will usually be manual as well as the focus and it's also beneficial to fit a different focusing screen to assist you.

Bob
 
I've seen it done, very effectively with some of the older quality Canon FD lenses - I actually had a while using an old FD85mm f/1.2L which was absolutely beautiful... lots of the conversions are actually done for use as Video lenses - older lenses in a lot of cases will have continuous apertures controlled on the lens with a rotating ring, rather than in 1/3 or 1/2 stop increments via the "dials", which film-makers love having the flexibilty of.
 
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Foreign lenses mainly

Japanese glass

Tomioka , takumar

Stuff I've not heard of

Seen a couple of very reasonably priced

28mm, 2.8 Fixed aperture prime lenses


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Tomioka lenses are massively over hyped and sell for way more than their worth.

Takumar lenses are wonderful - they're beautifully made and render lovely images, but won't give you sharp corners for landscapes.

Nikkors vary but are generally very good (especially 28/2.8 and 24/2.8). Olympus OM lenses are really small but not particularly special in the main.

Contax/Yashica Carl Zeiss lenses are generally amazing, even by today's standards. Yashica ML lenses are very good too.

One lens definitely to get is the Pentacon 135/2.8 preset (not auto or electric) which renders beautiful portraits with smooth bokeh.
 
manualfocus-g said:
Tomioka lenses are massively over hyped and sell for way more than their worth.

Takumar lenses are wonderful - they're beautifully made and render lovely images, but won't give you sharp corners for landscapes.

Nikkors vary but are generally very good (especially 28/2.8 and 24/2.8). Olympus OM lenses are really small but not particularly special in the main.

Contax/Yashica Carl Zeiss lenses are generally amazing, even by today's standards. Yashica ML lenses are very good too.

One lens definitely to get is the Pentacon 135/2.8 preset (not auto or electric) which renders beautiful portraits with smooth bokeh.
Click to expand...

I'm after something for sharp portraits, though bokeh / art style could work too.....

And mainly low light usage, such as gig photography.

I was recommended a faster lens (2.8) and a fixed aperture one at that

So I thought a 28mm prime , 2.8 fixed aperture, for about £40 shipped seems a very good deal if the glass is worth a go

Will be interesting as I've never had to manual focus before so that will be a trial, but a worthy obstacle, something worth learning :)


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It depends on the conversion process, "professional" just means that someone is buying, converting and then selling lenses - it's not necessarily a guarantee of quality of workmanship. It can reduce the value of the lens, because it reduces the originality and restricts how it can be used in the future, thus affecting desirability. It's only worth having a permanent conversion if you're looking at a mount that can't readily be used with a temporary adapter or if it's a lens that needs a permanent modification to avoid fouling the mirror (for example).
 
Basically I'm after something smaller than 50mm (40,35,28 etc) and a fixed aperture 2.8 or faster

I've got a canon 40d , I want to shoot low light mostly

I'd prefer something that would autofocus , but am happy to give a manual lens a go


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No adapted glass will autofocus on a 40D. The best you can hope for is that you'll get focus confirm - the selected focus square(s) go green when focus is achieved manually.

All opinions on vintage glass are subjective, but I find this thread to have a decent summary of a few, varied manual focus lenses - http://www.amateurphotographer.co.u...1-The-quot-Nick-s-lens-comparison-quot-thread - it certainly gives a few different options at each focal length grouping.

If you just want to test the water, I have a bunch of m42-EOS adapters I'm no longer using (I traded in my 40D last year) and I'm sure I can spare my Pentacon 50/1.8 for a month or two if you cover the postage. It's the second-widest m42 lens I have, but the Flektagon 35/2.8 (bargain find for £5 at a local charity shop) is a little stiff to focus when cold and it's very easy to spin it right off the mount adapter!
 
Alastair said:
No adapted glass will autofocus on a 40D. The best you can hope for is that you'll get focus confirm - the selected focus square(s) go green when focus is achieved manually.

All opinions on vintage glass are subjective, but I find this thread to have a decent summary of a few, varied manual focus lenses - http://www.amateurphotographer.co.u...1-The-quot-Nick-s-lens-comparison-quot-thread - it certainly gives a few different options at each focal length grouping.

If you just want to test the water, I have a bunch of m42-EOS adapters I'm no longer using (I traded in my 40D last year) and I'm sure I can spare my Pentacon 50/1.8 for a month or two if you cover the postage. It's the second-widest m42 lens I have, but the Flektagon 35/2.8 (bargain find for £5 at a local charity shop) is a little stiff to focus when cold and it's very easy to spin it right off the mount adapter!
Click to expand...

Thank you so much for the offer, but I wouldn't like to risk using someone else's kit for gig photography , as this is what I'm wanting to use it for, in case it got damaged or stolen, but I'm very grateful for the offer

if you think it's worth it, rather than go the converted lens route I'll go with an Adaptor and get some old glass, I've seen some very fast lenses go for pennies on the fleabay because they're old fittings , for the £10 and less I've seen them go for, got to be worth a go with an adaptor

And lol at the spinning it off the mount, that's the sort of thing id do

I've been into photography for years and it's only in the last few months I realised that you line to coloured dots up on the lens when attaching it to the body to get it on straight away :-/


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A lot of fast primes go for pennies on eBay for a variety of reasons - most commonly:
  • Poor condition - it's never worth buying a lens with fungus, or with cracked or separating elements
  • Poor quality - some lenses were just built cheap and nasty from new, and they won't have improved with age
  • Obscure mount - some lenses won't mount easily on any camera

My advice is to pick a common mount to start with (m42 is ideal), pick up a couple of adapters and spend a little time reading user reviews and blogs before picking up a cheap and reliable lens to start out with. Even if you don't want the loan of a lens (honestly, it's only worth £10 max if you did trash it) I have sent people an m42:EOS adapter for a donation to RNLI before and I'm more than happy to do so again. It will be chipped for focus confirm, but I can't guarantee it will be programmable or what focal length/max aperture it will be programmed to if it is!

If you do test things with m42, stick to the well known makes e.g. Pentacon, Meyer, Carl Zeiss, Carl Zeiss Jena until you get to know things better.


(nb, the best lens I used for gigs with the 40D was the Sigma 30/1.4 EX)
 
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Let's just say f/2.8 is not really fast. Only f/3.5 used to be even slower.... In fact how are you going to focus faster lens than f/2.8 on your 40D? VF only shows the view as at f/2.8; LCD is very blurry on that model. It is hopeless. Let's just say you could buy some f/2.8 AF zoom around £200 or less, or look for some modern primes.
 
I think for sub 50mm you will need to look at reviews, a lot of them where soft wide open which is where you want to be

I've picked up lenses for a few quid that have issues ,ive got a halinx or something 135mm that's very very sharp despite balm failure

Adapt all lenses had nice rich colour to them in my experience
 
MOD EDIT: REMOVED, CHECK YOUR PM'S

Anyway, I don't think you'll really find wide & fast in cheap manual glass. Some 50's go down to f/1.4 but 28mm & the like seem to average out at f/2.8 - Otherwise you are looking at something like the Canon EF 28/1.8 which is around the £300 mark.....
 
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28mm........for sharp portraits ???

Buy an M42 adapter, then you can have a WA and something for portraits for not much money.
 
Seriously this needs to be answered on a lens-by-lens basis.

Some lenses are worth it, some are not, and then again there is the cost to be considered.

For example, the Takumar 85mm f1.9 is such a great lens. Legendary at what it does. I own one. I compared it against the Canon 85mm f1.8 USM. I thought they performed exactly the same except for the 0.1 stop which is below negligible. They are sometimes priced the same too. One is manual focus/aperture; one has AF and the aperture is only electronically controlled by an EOS body. Which one to get?

Every lens is different.
 
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