NEX5 + fast Canon FD glass

[dnhkng]

I've migrated from the Pany G1 to the NEX-5, and I'm very happy with the results, especially for narrow DOF shooting

Here are some of the lenses I have collected from the FD mount; I will soon add some sample shots from each lens to show their performance.

The Canon FD 24mm F1.4, which I find handy for available-light work. There quite a bit of CA on the edges, even on a 1.5 crop. Although the are reports of the FD 24/2.0 being sharper on the 'net, I have owned both, and I sold the F2.0 as this is better in all respects.

55mm F1.2 Aspherical. This lens is pretty good; not quite as sharp as the standard 55/1.2, but it cuts out the spherical abberations.

The FD 85mm F1.2 Chrome breech is awesome! Super sharp wide open, and the 9-bladed aperture yields a better bokeh than the modern EF version. One of my favorite lenses!

Demo shots coming soon!

 

[AGeoJO]

No wonder the prices of FD lenses and all other classic manual focus lenses have gone up . Acutally, even the prices of mirror reflex lenses, underwater lenses, etc. that used to sell a dime a dozen have gone up. I had several excellent FD lense and I sold every single one of them when I switched to EOS. That was easily 15 years ago...

I bought an NEX-5 with two Sony lenses last week and have been enjoying its image quality but my extension to alternative lenses on it has been limited to just my existing Leica-M lenses, at least, so far .

 

[dnhkng]

I find the Leica a little expensive, so a nice alternative set is the:

Contax 21/2.8

Contax 28/2.8

Contax 45/2.0

and the 90/2.8

They are much easier to carry around, although at the wide-end, the FD glass can match the quality of the Zeiss, due to smearing, vignetting and color shift from the biogon design.

 

[AGeoJO]

Well, I do have those Leica lenses already and by limiting to Leica-M only I don't have to carry another set of alternative lenses. Those SLR lenses are on the bulky side and heavy side, too, even without AF. Yeah, Zeiss RF lenses, such as the those of the ZM lines and I understood that selected Contax G lenses performs nicely on the NEX. BTW, I just sold 6 Contax-G lenses . Let's see some pictures then.

 

[mach330]

I have the contax 45 myself for my e-pl2. Still experimenting. Definitely my easier to carry around than my 50mm fd ssc which I truly love so far.

 

[dnhkng]

I will be posting pictures lens-by-lens, followed up by samples from the Contax gear.

 

[dnhkng]

OK, here are some samples from the FD's. These were taken facing the center of Munich.

Firstly, the 24/1.4:

Center at F1.4 and 8.0:

and corners:

 

[Amatieris]

Nice set of lenses! It is admittedly very similar to my own setup , only I have the newer versions of 50L and 85L. I know you value yours higher! Now I am awaiting an adapter to use the old classic Rokkor MC lenses on NEX. I do not expect mindblowing sharpness, but the rendering should be interesting.

 

[ken_vs_ryu]

very nice set of lenses. I know contax g around my area started disappearing when the nex adapter was born.