Need Camera - simple to use/carry/maintain

Bumping my old thread.

sabby said:
The best thing about mirror-less is you can virtually use any lens using adapters.
Click to expand...

Need information on these adapters. I checked one sold by Nikon, its FT1 and costs a lot at $237 (I spent $170 for camera). I also checked Fotodiox on Amazon USA going for about $22 but its manual adapter. Any other adapter which is electrical in nature ?

Currently, I am using 11-27.5mm lens (30-75 on 35mm scale) and looking to get either adapter plus zoom lens or a Nikon 1 30-110mm zoom lens (82-301 on scale of 35mm). Right now in HK, I am able to get this pre-owned 30-110mm lens for about US$64/HK$500/₹4150.

Wondering which way I should go ?
 
vyral_143 said:
Bumping my old thread.



Need information on these adapters. I checked one sold by Nikon, its FT1 and costs a lot at $237 (I spent $170 for camera). I also checked Fotodiox on Amazon USA going for about $22 but its manual adapter. Any other adapter which is electrical in nature ?

Currently, I am using 11-27.5mm lens (30-75 on 35mm scale) and looking to get either adapter plus zoom lens or a Nikon 1 30-110mm zoom lens (82-301 on scale of 35mm). Right now in HK, I am able to get this pre-owned 30-110mm lens for about US$64/HK$500/₹4150.

Wondering which way I should go ?
Click to expand...
I'd say get the used lens, seems very cheap. I use manual adapters since I use manual lenses with them plus they are cheap as well. I shoot mostly in Aperture/Shutter mode anyway. With manual lenses, you put the camera in shutter mode and set the appropriate aperture on the lens itself. With focus peeking, manual focus is easy even for the novices :)
 
sabby said:
I'd say get the used lens, seems very cheap. I use manual adapters since I use manual lenses with them plus they are cheap as well. I shoot mostly in Aperture/Shutter mode anyway. With manual lenses, you put the camera in shutter mode and set the appropriate aperture on the lens itself. With focus peeking, manual focus is easy even for the novices :)
Click to expand...

Noted. Another option I have thought upon is to bite bullet and go for something like Canon 500/550/600D. This setup will almost double up the overall cost. But will image/picture quality improve drastically ?
 
vyral_143 said:
Noted. Another option I have thought upon is to bite bullet and go for something like Canon 500/550/600D. This setup will almost double up the overall cost. But will image/picture quality improve drastically ?
Click to expand...

I shifted from a Canon setup to Sony for this one reason, abundance of manual lenses. Any old lens can be used with mirrorless system with a proper adapter and the manual ones work just fine, but might take a little while to get used to . If you go for a DSLR, you'll have to again invest in lenses. You can easily find an old lens and adapter on eBay which combined would not cost you even half of the DSLR's lens.
 
cyn!de said:
Any old lens can be used with mirrorless system with a proper adapter .......... You can easily find an old lens and adapter on eBay which combined would not cost you even half of the DSLR's lens.
Click to expand...

By term old lens, which types of mount are you referring to ? I believe these mounts would have been discontinued and second hand products would be available. Please correct me if needed.
 
vyral_143 said:
By term old lens, which types of mount are you referring to ?
Click to expand...

Any lens of any mount with aperture and focus rings should work.

I believe these mounts would have been discontinued and second hand products would be available. Please correct me if needed.
Click to expand...

Yeah, some of them have been. But these can be very cheap. For a basic prime like 50mm you'll have to pay 20$ and say 10$ for the adapter.
If you want them new with Autofocus and everything, it'd again cost a little more but better than getting a DSLR and again new lenses for it.
 
vyral_143 said:
Noted. Another option I have thought upon is to bite bullet and go for something like Canon 500/550/600D. This setup will almost double up the overall cost. But will image/picture quality improve drastically ?
Click to expand...
Only you can answer that. What is it that you think is lacking in the photographs that you take using your current gear ? Personally, I wound't think the IQ improvement would be that big of a difference considering the price you need to pay. Since we have so many mirror-less options now, this is what I tell my friends who asks me about getting a new camera - if you want blazing fast auto focus and solid telephoto lenses for Bird / Wildlife, get a proper DSLR e.g. D7200 or Canon 7d etc with your choice of lenses. Otherwise, the sony A6xxx series or the Fuji XT/XE series can get you better images due to their better sensors and the option of using virtually any lenses that ave ever been produced. And the mirror-less are much smaller and inconspicuous so you can have them more often with you than having a DSLR kit.
Unless someone is coming form an old film camera setup and short on money, I really don't see the point of getting the entry level DSLRs anymore, even more so considering most people just get the kit zooms plus maybe 1 or 2 normal primes.
 
@sabby @cyn!de Thanks for your inputs!

I have got Sony A5100 along with 16-50mm kit lens. Before investinng in any more lenses, I am interested in reading and watching videos on how to operate/use old manual lens on this camera. I am specifically looking at mode where ISO and Shutter speed is derived by camera; I can control aperture on lens. I am not sure how easy or difficult it will be to focus manually in this scenario. So need some inputs here.

Additionally, I would also like to know how much difficult it could be to operate camera in manual mode without having a view finder ?
 
cyn!de said:
I shifted from a Canon setup to Sony for this one reason, abundance of manual lenses. Any old lens can be used with mirrorless system with a proper adapter and the manual ones work just fine, but might take a little while to get used to . If you go for a DSLR, you'll have to again invest in lenses. You can easily find an old lens and adapter on eBay which combined would not cost you even half of the DSLR's lens.
Click to expand...

Which Sony camera are you using ?
 
vyral_143 said:
Which Sony camera are you using ?
Click to expand...
I'm using a Nex-6.

vyral_143 said:
@sabby @cyn!de Thanks for your inputs!

I have got Sony A5100 along with 16-50mm kit lens. Before investinng in any more lenses, I am interested in reading and watching videos on how to operate/use old manual lens on this camera. I am specifically looking at mode where ISO and Shutter speed is derived by camera; I can control aperture on lens. I am not sure how easy or difficult it will be to focus manually in this scenario. So need some inputs here.

Additionally, I would also like to know how much difficult it could be to operate camera in manual mode without having a view finder ?
Click to expand...

In Aperture mode you'll get those settings and you have the option of setting the ISO to Auto. I'm not sure how well that'd work with a manual lens though, as with these lenses there won't be any feedback to the camera. For manual mode, in settings you can find an option for Focus peaking level which will highlight the subject in focus; makes manual operation fairly easy. And you'll have to enable the option for releasing shutter without lens which needs to be done before using any manual lens. I'd suggest you to try the manual mode with the kit lens provided before you get a lens. Here's a video that should help if you decide to go for one:

 
vyral_143 said:
@sabby @cyn!de Thanks for your inputs!

I have got Sony A5100 along with 16-50mm kit lens. Before investinng in any more lenses, I am interested in reading and watching videos on how to operate/use old manual lens on this camera. I am specifically looking at mode where ISO and Shutter speed is derived by camera; I can control aperture on lens. I am not sure how easy or difficult it will be to focus manually in this scenario. So need some inputs here.

Additionally, I would also like to know how much difficult it could be to operate camera in manual mode without having a view finder ?
Click to expand...
I have a A7ii with bunch of minolta manual lenses. The setup is awesome and works really well if you dont mind using manual focussing. but forget about shooting anything moving fast like birds or sports. Every photo that you would take should be properly framed and takes time. but the lenses are really cheap and you can get amazing results.

The settings I use with manual lenses is to put the camera in aperture priority mode "A" and then use the exposure compensation dial on the camera "A5100" may not have it though. The C2 button for focus peeking and I enable zebras at 70%. The greatest tool with manual lenses is the focus peeking feature.
 
booo said:
I have a A7ii with bunch of minolta manual lenses. The setup is awesome and works really well if you dont mind using manual focussing. but forget about shooting anything moving fast like birds or sports. Every photo that you would take should be properly framed and takes time. but the lenses are really cheap and you can get amazing results.

The settings I use with manual lenses is to put the camera in aperture priority mode "A" and then use the exposure compensation dial on the camera "A5100" may not have it though. The C2 button for focus peeking and I enable zebras at 70%. The greatest tool with manual lenses is the focus peeking feature.
Click to expand...

The only drawback is that you wont be able to use eyeAF focusing which is amazing feature for portraits. and also focusing using your phone as smart remote control which is great for landscape photography.
 
cyn!de said:
I'm using a Nex-6.

In Aperture mode you'll get those settings and you have the option of setting the ISO to Auto. I'm not sure how well that'd work with a manual lens though, as with these lenses there won't be any feedback to the camera. For manual mode, in settings you can find an option for Focus peaking level which will highlight the subject in focus; makes manual operation fairly easy. And you'll have to enable the option for releasing shutter without lens which needs to be done before using any manual lens. I'd suggest you to try the manual mode with the kit lens provided before you get a lens. Here's a video that should help if you decide to go for one:

Click to expand...

Apparently, this video helped me a lot. It gave me confidence of taking, at least, portraits manually. I am going to try out manual mode on kit lens tomorrow. However on kit lens, there are no rings to control aperture and focus.

booo said:
I have a A7ii with bunch of minolta manual lenses. The setup is awesome and works really well if you dont mind using manual focussing. but forget about shooting anything moving fast like birds or sports. Every photo that you would take should be properly framed and takes time. but the lenses are really cheap and you can get amazing results.

The settings I use with manual lenses is to put the camera in aperture priority mode "A" and then use the exposure compensation dial on the camera "A5100" may not have it though. The C2 button for focus peeking and I enable zebras at 70%. The greatest tool with manual lenses is the focus peeking feature.
Click to expand...

Yes, I am aware about not able to photograph moving objects or of situation where time available is very limited while using manual lens. But I think taking portraits using manual lens will be awesome.

Coming to lenses, I would like to know more about which one you guys own. I came across some cheap Chinese lenses which are well received like Meike/Neewer 35mm f/1.7, Fotasy 35mm f/1.7. In second hand market, there are quite few old lenses available like ₹2400 for EMC 80-205mm f/3.8 Macro auto zoom, ₹2400 for Sigma 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6, ₹3250 for Sigma 28-70mm f/3.5-4.5, ₹3000 Pentax 50mm f/2 and so on
 
vyral_143 said:
Apparently, this video helped me a lot. It gave me confidence of taking, at least, portraits manually. I am going to try out manual mode on kit lens tomorrow. However on kit lens, there are no rings to control aperture and focus.
Click to expand...
My bad. What I wanted to say is you can try those modes with the kit lens.
And for Manual lens, for portraits, starting with a 50 mm/ 1.7/1.8 would be good. A lot of options are available if you decide to go for old lenses like Minolta, Pentax, Leica, etc.and even manual Canon and Nikon lenses can be used. Check condition and reviews before you go buy one.
 
vyral_143 said:
Coming to lenses, I would like to know more about which one you guys own. I came across some cheap Chinese lenses which are well received like Meike/Neewer 35mm f/1.7, Fotasy 35mm f/1.7. In second hand market, there are quite few old lenses available like ₹2400 for EMC 80-205mm f/3.8 Macro auto zoom, ₹2400 for Sigma 28-80mm f/3.5-5.6, ₹3250 for Sigma 28-70mm f/3.5-4.5, ₹3000 Pentax 50mm f/2 and so on
Click to expand...
coming to lenses, dont buy shitty lenses. the factor that you would look for in a lens is sharpness at different apertures. you wont be able to use crazy fast apertures below F2 in real life anyways for portraits. I would suggest going for old lenses like carl ziess jenna, minolta rokkor, leica lietz etc... they are really awesome lenses if you can find them. zoom lenses like sony 28-70mm f/3.5-4.5 are really shitty in quality. try to stick to prime lenses. they will be cheap and have really good quality.
 
Get a used Nikon AI 50mm F1.4 - outstanding value/sharpness for manual focus. I have a 200mm Pentacon DDR (CZ Jena), and another Helios 44-2 58mm F2 (outstanding clarity). All of them have their unique quirks, the Pentacon is soft wide open but when you stop down to F4, it's razor sharp, and the bokeh is amazing. The 44-2 is superb wide open, and has lovely swirly bokeh, but flares a lot.

I used to do MF a while ago with these M42 lenses on my Canon 40D/400D with an adapter. It's a great learning experience.
 
Can you point me to a cheap 35mm prime lens for a Sony e-mount. I have the a6000 and lenses are expensive.
I have a Nikon d5100 too and the Nikon lenses are comparatively cheap, but prefer the sony.
 
edge111hussain said:
Can you point me to a cheap 35mm prime lens for a Sony e-mount. I have the a6000 and lenses are expensive.
I have a Nikon d5100 too and the Nikon lenses are comparatively cheap, but prefer the sony.
Click to expand...

35mm f/2.8 Carl Zeiss Jena Flektogon is the only lens that came to my mind and can be had for 8-9k; not really cheap for a manual lens. I saw someone selling a Sigma 30/2.8 on JJMF, you might wanna give it a look.
 
@sabby @cyn!de @booo

Please correct me if I am wrong. Since in olden days with full frame camera, 50mm was golden prime, should not equivalent APS-C focal length be ~35mm? If we buy older 50mm lens, it would be ~75mm, missing sweet point by quite some margin. Is there any way we can make it adjust to 50mm with some adapter or something? I do understand that focal length should be determined by the photos we shoot.
 
Back
Top