So, what is a good manual normal lens now?

[Jonas]

Ok so we're still looking for a good manual normal (and hopefully cheap and fast) lens, right?

Any suggestions? Also if it wasn't 35mm sized that would be great. (I want it all apparently, and I guess I wont' get it until th 20mm 1.7 comes out.)

Or did someone find the holy grail and I missed it?

Cheap, fast and good isn't easy.
I fear the elusive G 20/1.7 also won't be cheap, fast and good at the same time. Well, that may depend on what you mean with good and how much money you have to spend... We'll see what Panasonic manages to make.

Right now I use a Canon FDn 24/2. It isn't exactly razor sharp wide open but fully usable.

regards, /Jonas

 

[Jonas]

Jonas, that's pretty much sums it up. It does have some barrel distortion but not as much as the Tevidon. Easy to correct in PS.

Have you tried 16:9? I'm wondering if the smearing is not the Leica-style RF lens smearing, but just "I'm really trying to cover all the sensor but I can't quite do it" smearing.

Ah, I forgot to mention the distortion. Well, it also has surprisingly little CA, and it is really cute with a hood attached to it.

No, I think the smearing is the real thing. At least I think it should be as I don't think telecentricity was a priority when the lens was designed. I have no good sample online right now. 16:9... well, the smearing isn't just a corner problem. But many of my images end up close to 1:1 anyway.

Your dog image made me buy the lens and I don't regret it. Oh, there is also quite some coma...

 

[wjlapier]

Ok so we're still looking for a good manual normal (and hopefully cheap and fast) lens, right?

Any suggestions? Also if it wasn't 35mm sized that would be great. (I want it all apparently, and I guess I wont' get it until th 20mm 1.7 comes out.)

Or did someone find the holy grail and I missed it?

the Kern Switar 25/1.4 is sharp wide open, easy to focus ( ergonomics friendly ), but not cheap--relatively speaking. The two Wollensak 1" I have were cheap, not super fast--one is 1.9 and the other is 2.5, and are very good lenses to shoot wided open, but a ergonomics nightmare. Tiny, tiny, tiny lenses. The Som Lytar 1"/1.9 is affordable compared to slr normal lenses and is sharp wide open. I like this one for shooting. So far so good. I don't have my Tevidon YET--taking foever to get here from Europe--but it was another cheapy, and hopefully a good peformer.

 

[Ranger 9]

Ok so we're still looking for a good manual normal (and hopefully cheap and fast) lens, right?

Has anybody tried the 28/2 Voigtlander?

Okay, $579 isn't my idea of "cheap," but I realize there are a lot of people on this forum who are more prosperous than I am.

I've got the older 28/1.9 screwmount Voigtlander, which I've used on my G1 with pretty good results (contrast is a bit low at full aperture but it seems to clean up nicely with a curve adjustment. No, I haven't pixel-peeped pictures of brick walls to evaluate the corners...)

The 28/1.9 is $444 silver/$499 black from CameraQuest, but assuming you're using an M>µ4/3 adapter on your G1, you then need to budget for a screw-to-M adapter, so the cost difference vs. the 28/2 isn't all that persuasive.

Yes, it's "35mm size" rather than C-mount size, but that means it's less likely to get lost in the bottom of your camera bag

 

[monza]

Cindy Flood reports good results with the 28/1.9, says it is her most used lens on the G1 with no smearing problem.

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showpost.php?p=1008051&postcount=27

 

[Jonas]

Has anybody tried the 28/2 Voigtlander?

Have a look at the first post...
I also posted some samples (a nice book shelf) earlier:
http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showpost.php?p=76783&postcount=65

 

[pix2pixels]

1" format is a 25.4mm image circle; 22mm is the m4/3 image circle.

Actually the 1" format image circle is only 16mm:

http://www.siliconimaging.com/Lens Image formats.htm

 

[petermcwerner]

the Kern Switar 25/1.4 is sharp wide open, easy to focus ( ergonomics friendly ), but not cheap--relatively speaking. The two Wollensak 1" I have were cheap, not super fast--one is 1.9 and the other is 2.5, and are very good lenses to shoot wided open, but a ergonomics nightmare. Tiny, tiny, tiny lenses. The Som Lytar 1"/1.9 is affordable compared to slr normal lenses and is sharp wide open. I like this one for shooting. So far so good. I don't have my Tevidon YET--taking foever to get here from Europe--but it was another cheapy, and hopefully a good peformer.

The 25mm/1.4 Xenon might be a good answer, and it covers a 25mm image circle:

http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5728

It is quite pricey, though, a good one usually fetches over $200. I just bought a second, newer one, while the old bango that has such wonderful bokeh and color rendition is getting TLC and a new adapter.

 

[Jonas]

The 25mm/1.4 Xenon might be a good answer, and it covers a 25mm image circle:

http://forum.getdpi.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5728

It is quite pricey, though, a good one usually fetches over $200. I just bought a second, newer one, while the old bango that has such wonderful bokeh and color rendition is getting TLC and a new adapter.

Thank you Peter for the suggestion. The images in the thread you linked to look good to me. It's wonderful with that soft bokeh.

The only ones I found was at USD300+... Who is it having a bunch of them for USD200 each? I think the lens was made in C-mount as well, btw.

 

[petermcwerner]

Thank you Peter for the suggestion. The images in the thread you linked to look good to me. It's wonderful with that soft bokeh.

The only ones I found was at USD300+... Who is it having a bunch of them for USD200 each? I think the lens was made in C-mount as well, btw.

The one I bought reached $232 on ebay and was in C-mount. You have to be patient, there are not many around (unless you want to order a new one from Schneider Kreuznach - if I am not wrong it lists at around $2,000)

 

[Jonas]

The one I bought reached $232 on ebay and was in C-mount. You have to be patient, there are not many around (unless you want to order a new one from Schneider Kreuznach - if I am not wrong it lists at around $2,000)

USD2.000... Nah, I've always believed patience is a virtue.

 

[daggerlee]

Has anybody tried any of the OM Zuiko wide angles? John over at Biofos has some test pictures with a whole range of Zuikos. Surprisingly, the 24mm f/2 seems to be sharper wide open than the 24mm f/2.8.

 

[Riley]

I dont have one, hell i dont even have a 'normal' lens anymore, but you should have a look at Contax 28/2 'Hollywood' which is slightly stretching the normal zone.

The lens is very highly regarded on FF and even for Zeiss standards its said to be one of the best, the last one I saw on ebay rolled out for $800+

Not certain prefixes apply for 28/2, but there are two types in Contax lenses, prefixed AE and MM, MM are later types and are thought to have more digital friendly coatings. FF fans chase AE b/se they are an easier fit to 5D.

CZ are a different design to Contax, but there is is this 28/2 CZ on SLRGear
http://www.slrgear.com/reviews/showproduct.php/product/1146/cat/98
note the difference between FF and APS results

Failing that, look at the 25/2.8, of merely high Contax standards, four walls and a ceiling above most anything else.

 

[pellicle]

Hi

My conclusion: Right now we simply don't know of any good manual normal lens for the G1...

perhaps ... I'm waiting to get an adaptor for my Pentax 110 lenses. They seem quite promising and my 24mm is quite more compact than my C mounts.

if you can gloss over the kana in this link, it shows some possibilities and sample images.

The adaptor in that is bodged from a pentax 110 body, but I know that one maker of adaptors is making one .. now if more people expressed interest to him he might make it with more urgency

PS I paid less than $50 for my 18mm Pentax lens, they do not have an aperture adjustment (wide open only) but if you can live with that then its all cool. Plus at least one user on this group (Hi vivek) has a bodged c-mount conversion to his lens to enable it to be mounted on a cmount adaptor.

 

[Vivek]

The pentax-110 18mm and 24mm (tiniest!) do cover the frame fully without any problems and both are sharp. Only drawback is the fixed aperture. They do need to be accurately focused to get sharp images.

The best normal for me is the Computar-TV 25/1.3. No SLR or RF lens comes close to it.

A recent shot.

 

[Riley]

those 110 lenses arent of bad quality,
the 20-40 zoom and 70mm are kinda nice
problem is they dont have an aperture

the 18mm (34 (dia) x 21mm) and especially the 24mm (28 (dia) x 15mm) are tiny, the 50 somewhere near lens size. There are filters and caps floating around the net, its common for them to be sold without caps. There was even a 1.7x tele adapter sold by Soligor, I have one of those too. I forget now but the register is 28mm i think, i can measure a body if nobody knows

the adapter you can see in that link its actually the mount from a Pentax Auto 110 camera, complete with the mount shroud, probably affixed to a mFT body cap with a hole cut into it.

 

[jKK]

The pentax-110 18mm and 24mm (tiniest!) do cover the frame fully without any problems and both are sharp. Only drawback is the fixed aperture. They do need to be accurately focused to get sharp images.

The best normal for me is the Computar-TV 25/1.3. No SLR or RF lens comes close to it.

A recent shot.

Hello

Looks good Mr Vivek

Do you mean the Megapixel 1inch version:-

Also, although a bit slow, but what about the PenF 25mm/2.8 ?
It is a nice size and ergonomic.

-jKK

 

[monza]

I tried the 25/2.8 Pen, but it wasn't as nice as I was hoping, there are many c-mount lenses that are much better in that focal length, my favorite is the 25/1.9 Xenoplan, although the f/1.3 Computar looks fantastic.

 

[woodmancy]

Hi



perhaps ... I'm waiting to get an adaptor for my Pentax 110 lenses. They seem quite promising and my 24mm is quite more compact than my C mounts.


The adaptor in that is bodged from a pentax 110 body, but I know that one maker of adaptors is making one .. now if more people expressed interest to him he might make it with more urgency

Hi Pellicle:

I need an adapter - who is the supplier?

Keith

 

[Vivek]

JKK, What Robert (monza) said. The Computar-TV 25/1.3 is a garden variety (discontinued) version and not the megapixel one. Schneider Xenoplan 25/1.9 is a superb lens as well. A bit too small, unfortunately. So, manual (aperture, especially) operation is a bit difficult.