petermcwerner
Member
I don't..., but I suggest we leave this discussion at this point, I am not sure everybody is interested in our way of appreciating art...I completely understand why some like a Picasso, and some not...
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E
emory
Guest
Re: Heavy Zoom lens on g1?
The only place to add a DIY tripod mount ring on the Tamron would be on the breech mount ring itself, and that appears to be a precarious solution at best.
I guess I'll have to make tests with the G-1 (or GH-1) when I finally get one, but I always found the Tamron SP to be quite sharp. At any rate, the thought of having a de facto 140-420 zoom with a constant maximum aperture of 3.5 is intriguing, isn't it?
Have a great weekend.
emory
Thanks for your answer, Peter.
The only place to add a DIY tripod mount ring on the Tamron would be on the breech mount ring itself, and that appears to be a precarious solution at best.
I guess I'll have to make tests with the G-1 (or GH-1) when I finally get one, but I always found the Tamron SP to be quite sharp. At any rate, the thought of having a de facto 140-420 zoom with a constant maximum aperture of 3.5 is intriguing, isn't it?
Have a great weekend.
emory
Mine seems to work fine. There are no threads past the bottom of the adapter, there is a black inner ring that is well less than a mm beyond the bottom, but it does not seem to touch anything in the camera.
I have taken a few shots at infinity, and without a great deal of analysis at this point, I would say it has infinity focus. Take that with a grain of salt as I have not finished looking at it.
Dave
R
Ranger 9
Guest
Results of my C-mount lens expedition
Are we still posting C-mount lens pictures in this thread? I'll assume we are; having received notice that my RJ Camera adapter was on the way (we probably should stop calling it the 'jinfinance' adapter, since he has gone to the trouble of having 'RJ Camera' engraved on them!) I made an expedition to a used-camera sale last weekend.
One vendor who attends these sales regularly has tables and tables of old video gear, old projectors, and other old stuff that I generally had classified as "junk" until I was in the position to start playing the C-mount game!
I went through his tables looking for candidate lenses, keeping in mind three criteria: (1) the lens had to be "interesting" somehow (wide maximum aperture, focal length not close to something I had already, etc.); (2) the base diameter couldn't exceed 37mm, to avoid mounting issues (I actually carried a caliper with me and measured them); and (3) it had to be cheap. How cheap is cheap? Read on...
Most of the lenses I found were either bulky video-camera zooms that didn't pass the 37mm-base-diameter test, or cine lenses that didn't meet the "cheap" criterion. So I only came home with two:
12.5mm f/1.9 Cosmicar: There's already an f/1.4 Cosmicar on the C-mount spreadsheet, but the f/1.9 version caught my eye because, unlike the f/1.4, its base diameter is well under 37mm so it doesn't require machining to mount on my G1 adapter. I suspected that it wouldn't cover the full format, since the f/1.4 version doesn't either, but I thought it still might be useful enough to be worth the asking price of $15.
36mm f/1.1 GE: I presume "GE" stands for "General Electric," and that this battered optic had spent its working life on the front of surveillance camera. Its focal length and aperture were similar to the 35mm f/1.2 Voigtlander Nokton I already own, but I picked it up anyway for two reasons: it's very compact, which the Nokton certainly isn't, and at a price of $7, I figured it was worth trying.
I didn't have a chance to try out either one until this evening, when I took them to the ISCA "World of Wheels" hot-rod show. Sample pics and a brief writeup on each lens follow.
Are we still posting C-mount lens pictures in this thread? I'll assume we are; having received notice that my RJ Camera adapter was on the way (we probably should stop calling it the 'jinfinance' adapter, since he has gone to the trouble of having 'RJ Camera' engraved on them!) I made an expedition to a used-camera sale last weekend.
One vendor who attends these sales regularly has tables and tables of old video gear, old projectors, and other old stuff that I generally had classified as "junk" until I was in the position to start playing the C-mount game!
I went through his tables looking for candidate lenses, keeping in mind three criteria: (1) the lens had to be "interesting" somehow (wide maximum aperture, focal length not close to something I had already, etc.); (2) the base diameter couldn't exceed 37mm, to avoid mounting issues (I actually carried a caliper with me and measured them); and (3) it had to be cheap. How cheap is cheap? Read on...
Most of the lenses I found were either bulky video-camera zooms that didn't pass the 37mm-base-diameter test, or cine lenses that didn't meet the "cheap" criterion. So I only came home with two:
12.5mm f/1.9 Cosmicar: There's already an f/1.4 Cosmicar on the C-mount spreadsheet, but the f/1.9 version caught my eye because, unlike the f/1.4, its base diameter is well under 37mm so it doesn't require machining to mount on my G1 adapter. I suspected that it wouldn't cover the full format, since the f/1.4 version doesn't either, but I thought it still might be useful enough to be worth the asking price of $15.
36mm f/1.1 GE: I presume "GE" stands for "General Electric," and that this battered optic had spent its working life on the front of surveillance camera. Its focal length and aperture were similar to the 35mm f/1.2 Voigtlander Nokton I already own, but I picked it up anyway for two reasons: it's very compact, which the Nokton certainly isn't, and at a price of $7, I figured it was worth trying.
I didn't have a chance to try out either one until this evening, when I took them to the ISCA "World of Wheels" hot-rod show. Sample pics and a brief writeup on each lens follow.
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R
Ranger 9
Guest
Cosmicar 12.5mm f/1.9
I figured the Cosmicar wouldn't cover the full format, and it doesn't, but I bought it with the idea that it might make an interesting "point-of-view" lens. With its relatively small but protruding front element, its 10-inch minimum focusing distance, and its nearly-90-degree angle of view (if you use the full round image) I thought it would be good for sticking into confined spaces to see what they might look like from a bug's-eye view.
I wound up not using it that way at World of Wheels... instead I just used it as a conventional if peculiar wide-angle. I apologize that the caliber of sample pictures that follows isn't up the the standard set by butterdada and some of our other C-mount buffs, but still...
I decided to rationalize that the eccentric round view field was appropriate for shooting in the "trad-rod" section, since these are somewhat eccentric cars. Their builders go to tremendous effort to research and reproduce the worn, beat-up look of early hot rods; some trad-rod builders take pains to keep everything absolutely period-correct, while others incorporate state-of-the-art components that are completely hidden from view! The Cosmicar seems to have low linear distortion, and sharpness (at least in the center) seems good considering that I was shooting at f/1.9, as I was for all the pictures in this post.
Even cooler than the trad rods was this collection of bizarrely artistic trophies. The Rebels rod club, whose members were responsible for the most fascinatingly over-the-top trad rods, was having its own show-within-a-show and would award the trophies to members whose cars were judged best (however they decide that!)
Whoever thinks up these trophies has an amazing sense of humor, along with fabulous craft skills. It would just about be worth the effort of building a trad rod just to have the chance to win one of these...
Although all these images are pretty blurry once you get out to the edge of the circle, the central sections seem quite usably sharp. Contrast looks good and it seems reasonably resistant to specular flare, as in this pointy Cadillac grille:
Conclusion: All in all, seems like a good $15 worth as long as a round image is acceptable. Of course I could crop out the edges to get a rectangle, but then the angle of view is considerably less than that of the 14-45 kit lens. I suspect I'll reserve it for situations in which an oddball look is appropriate -- trad-rod shows, for instance!
I figured the Cosmicar wouldn't cover the full format, and it doesn't, but I bought it with the idea that it might make an interesting "point-of-view" lens. With its relatively small but protruding front element, its 10-inch minimum focusing distance, and its nearly-90-degree angle of view (if you use the full round image) I thought it would be good for sticking into confined spaces to see what they might look like from a bug's-eye view.
I wound up not using it that way at World of Wheels... instead I just used it as a conventional if peculiar wide-angle. I apologize that the caliber of sample pictures that follows isn't up the the standard set by butterdada and some of our other C-mount buffs, but still...
I decided to rationalize that the eccentric round view field was appropriate for shooting in the "trad-rod" section, since these are somewhat eccentric cars. Their builders go to tremendous effort to research and reproduce the worn, beat-up look of early hot rods; some trad-rod builders take pains to keep everything absolutely period-correct, while others incorporate state-of-the-art components that are completely hidden from view! The Cosmicar seems to have low linear distortion, and sharpness (at least in the center) seems good considering that I was shooting at f/1.9, as I was for all the pictures in this post.
Even cooler than the trad rods was this collection of bizarrely artistic trophies. The Rebels rod club, whose members were responsible for the most fascinatingly over-the-top trad rods, was having its own show-within-a-show and would award the trophies to members whose cars were judged best (however they decide that!)
Whoever thinks up these trophies has an amazing sense of humor, along with fabulous craft skills. It would just about be worth the effort of building a trad rod just to have the chance to win one of these...
Although all these images are pretty blurry once you get out to the edge of the circle, the central sections seem quite usably sharp. Contrast looks good and it seems reasonably resistant to specular flare, as in this pointy Cadillac grille:
Conclusion: All in all, seems like a good $15 worth as long as a round image is acceptable. Of course I could crop out the edges to get a rectangle, but then the angle of view is considerably less than that of the 14-45 kit lens. I suspect I'll reserve it for situations in which an oddball look is appropriate -- trad-rod shows, for instance!
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R
Ranger 9
Guest
GE 36mm f/1.1
This lens turned out to be a pleasant surprise: it seems well-made, operates smoothly, and covers pretty much the full G1 frame. Its performance isn't bad, either, for an f/1.1 lens; I didn't try it at any smaller apertures, but imagine it might clean up quite well.
Its biggest limitation is that its minimum focusing distance is only about 8 feet; that seemed to blow my ambitions of using it as a compact portrait lens, although it turned out there's a somewhat dodgy workaround for that which I'll cover shortly.
Here's the nose of the P-32, Chip Foose's new show car. The edges of the image go noticeably soft, but the center section (such as the grille) seems quite crisp even at f/1.1. I'll try to get some 1:1 crops up later for any pixel-peepin' papas who might be interested...
This classic decal, on one of the trad rods, was shot from about 5 feet. That's considerably closer than the GE's mount will focus -- but I realized that since its C-mount threads are of ample length, I could simply unscrew it slightly from the adapter to get closer. Of course I had to keep hold of it to make sure it didn't fall off! But if I did want to shoot head-and-shoulder portraits with this lens -- the image quality looks as if it might be quite pretty -- I could put a shim between the lens and the adapter to hold it more tightly.
Here's another view of the Rebels' fascinating trophy shelf. Barrel distortion is evident in this view, as is the fact that sharpness falls off considerably toward the corners.
But for subjects that don't have a lot of straight lines, center detail and contrast seem respectable.
This is about as close as the lens will focus without unscrewing it from its mount. Obviously the shallow DOF at f/1.1 makes focusing touchy, so I had to use the G1's focus assist for all these closer photos. In this case my focus point was the numerals on the speedometer, and a 1:1 view would show that they're quite sharp.
Everyone likes pictures of... bokeh! So here's one; the fact that it includes Mandi Hanquist, "Miss I-80 Speedway," is just an unavoidable accident of fate. Avid bokologists know that for reasons of geometric optics, you can only have desirably soft bokeh either in front of or behind the main subject, not both. Usually it's considered more desirable to have the smooth bokeh behind the focus plane, but on the GE lens it's the opposite: notice how out-of-focus details behind Mandi and her friend look rather "edgy," while objects in front of them have a nice, smooth blur.
One typical use for wide-aperture lenses is taking pictures in low light, so on the way out I stopped at the sculpture court in front of the arena and made this picture. The barrel distortion noted earlier is evident, but highlight flare seems reasonably controlled -- highlights spread slightly (which should give the lens a nice pearly glow for pretty-girl pictures) but it doesn't seem prone to generate the vivid flare spots that some ultra-speed lenses produce when there's a light source within the picture.
Conclusion: Not only can I say confidently that this is the best $7 f/1.1 lens I own, it looks as if it may be good enough to be of actual practical use!
This lens turned out to be a pleasant surprise: it seems well-made, operates smoothly, and covers pretty much the full G1 frame. Its performance isn't bad, either, for an f/1.1 lens; I didn't try it at any smaller apertures, but imagine it might clean up quite well.
Its biggest limitation is that its minimum focusing distance is only about 8 feet; that seemed to blow my ambitions of using it as a compact portrait lens, although it turned out there's a somewhat dodgy workaround for that which I'll cover shortly.
Here's the nose of the P-32, Chip Foose's new show car. The edges of the image go noticeably soft, but the center section (such as the grille) seems quite crisp even at f/1.1. I'll try to get some 1:1 crops up later for any pixel-peepin' papas who might be interested...
This classic decal, on one of the trad rods, was shot from about 5 feet. That's considerably closer than the GE's mount will focus -- but I realized that since its C-mount threads are of ample length, I could simply unscrew it slightly from the adapter to get closer. Of course I had to keep hold of it to make sure it didn't fall off! But if I did want to shoot head-and-shoulder portraits with this lens -- the image quality looks as if it might be quite pretty -- I could put a shim between the lens and the adapter to hold it more tightly.
Here's another view of the Rebels' fascinating trophy shelf. Barrel distortion is evident in this view, as is the fact that sharpness falls off considerably toward the corners.
But for subjects that don't have a lot of straight lines, center detail and contrast seem respectable.
This is about as close as the lens will focus without unscrewing it from its mount. Obviously the shallow DOF at f/1.1 makes focusing touchy, so I had to use the G1's focus assist for all these closer photos. In this case my focus point was the numerals on the speedometer, and a 1:1 view would show that they're quite sharp.
Everyone likes pictures of... bokeh! So here's one; the fact that it includes Mandi Hanquist, "Miss I-80 Speedway," is just an unavoidable accident of fate. Avid bokologists know that for reasons of geometric optics, you can only have desirably soft bokeh either in front of or behind the main subject, not both. Usually it's considered more desirable to have the smooth bokeh behind the focus plane, but on the GE lens it's the opposite: notice how out-of-focus details behind Mandi and her friend look rather "edgy," while objects in front of them have a nice, smooth blur.
One typical use for wide-aperture lenses is taking pictures in low light, so on the way out I stopped at the sculpture court in front of the arena and made this picture. The barrel distortion noted earlier is evident, but highlight flare seems reasonably controlled -- highlights spread slightly (which should give the lens a nice pearly glow for pretty-girl pictures) but it doesn't seem prone to generate the vivid flare spots that some ultra-speed lenses produce when there's a light source within the picture.
Conclusion: Not only can I say confidently that this is the best $7 f/1.1 lens I own, it looks as if it may be good enough to be of actual practical use!
Ranger, the 36/1.1 certainly is worth $7, maybe even 8 or 10. Vivek has this lens in the database, recording full sensor coverage, he reports it 'glows' wide open, and is soft, but your example might simply be better. I'm curious; if you unscrew the lens for closer focus, can it still reach infinity?
Vivek has this lens in the database, recording full sensor coverage, he reports it 'glows' wide open, and is soft, but your example might simply be better. I'm curious; if you unscrew the lens for closer focus, can it still reach infinity?
petermcwerner
Member
Re: GE 36mm f/1.1
Cheers
Peter
I think this 36mm is quite usable and the slight unsharpness on the edges is not disagreable; thank you for sharing
Cheers
Peter
R
Ranger 9
Guest
Or I may just not be as critical as Vivek! I'll have to try it stopped down sometime and see what it can do.Ranger, the 36/1.1 certainly is worth $7, maybe even 8 or 10.
A little "glow" is often nice in a portrait lens, and I suspect this may be the way I'll use it the most.
If I unscrew it for closer focus, I have to screw it back in all the way to get it to focus to infinity. The C-mount thread just acts like an "extension tube"; it has to be de-extended to get back to infinity position.
B
butterdada
Guest
Canon FD 24mm F1.4 L wide-open
B
butterdada
Guest
D.O. Industries Navitron TV 75mm F1.3 wide-open
B
butterdada
Guest
Voigtlander Macro APO-Lanthar 125mm F2.5 M42 mount wide-open
B
butterdada
Guest
Voigtlander Macro APO-Lanthar 125mm F2.5 M42 mount wide-open
Thank you, cool posts with samples making me salivate a little...
Thank you for all the images,
--
Jonas
...well, not this one. The bright rings around background OOF highlights never appealed to me. I know some like that stuff but it is not for me.
Very nice. That is a lens I would love to try. Is it very big? Do you have any details about the mount?
The grand macro, one of the best. Too long and heavy for me but maybe it even is worth the hassle of some workout.
Thank you for all the images,
--
Jonas
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butterdada
Guest
http://cgi.ebay.com.hk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&item=130292061386
Kodak Anastimat 25mm F1.9 wide-open
B
butterdada
Guest
Canon FD 85mm F1.2 L wide-open + iso 1600
B
butterdada
Guest
Canon FD 135mm F2 wide-open
B
butterdada
Guest
Elgeet Rochester 1 inch F1.9 wide-open
I have a thread of Navitron 75mm F1.3 as below:
http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6941
Be careful, it can't go to infinity because the rear part is a little bit too big
that is blocked in front of the sensor. Some mod should be done but quite difficult I think.
But as long as you use it as a portrait or close up lens, it is quite usable. Closet focus distance is 1m, extension tube may prefer.
http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6941
Be careful, it can't go to infinity because the rear part is a little bit too big
that is blocked in front of the sensor. Some mod should be done but quite difficult I think.
But as long as you use it as a portrait or close up lens, it is quite usable. Closet focus distance is 1m, extension tube may prefer.