Starving Artistry

Old Lenses

// December 2nd, 2009 // Photo

So I found this neat feature on my Canon 7d which lets you remotely control your camera from your computer provided that you use a USB cable. You can even to live reviewing of video footage. The main advantage is I don’t actually have to push the shutter when it’s on a tripod, eliminating any vibrations and whatnot. Here’s what it looked like in my room (shot w/ the iPhone).

Anyway, I bought some old lenses to use with my Jag35 back when I was shooting vids on my Sony Camcorder (see an example). I still have the adapter and stuff to make them fit on my new camera, but the question is, when will I ever use them?

So, just to see how they look, I shot a couple of quick pics in my room, with less than ideal lighting, but I kept all the settings (theoretically) the same between 3 of my lenses. The Canon FD 55mm f/1.2 (old one); Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 (new one, cheaper); and my Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 (new one, expensive). All the shots were at ISO3200, f/4.0, and 1/40 shutter speed. Definitely click on the photos to view the full size…

So first up is the FD f/1.2. With the adapter (to make it work with the new camera), I think it’s more like 68mm? Plus my camera’s sensor crop makes it more like 108mm? I dunno, i think my math might be wrong. Anyway, I zoomed in on the live view to manually focus, and did it to the best of my abilities. You can see the colors are a little more washed out than the next couple of photos. You can also tell that it’s zoomed in a bit farther.

Next we have the EF f/1.8. I think this pic already looks better. You can tell the blacks look blacker and whatnot (higher contrast). The little army dude is sharper too (got it from my Tiberian Sun special edition… too bad it was such a terrible game).

Finally here’s the same shot w/ my zoom lens zoomed all the way out to 55mm. Looks pretty much identical (to my eyes) to the previous one, and again, sharper and richer than the first one (the f/1.2 lens).

So here’s my thinking about the old lens: A) There is no auto focus, which makes things tricky, B) Because it’s old… or because it’s going through the adapter, it softens up the image, C) because of the adapter, you lose a little bit of light (or so the forums say, although i think the pic looks pretty comparable in terms of lighting).

I did find that when I stopped it down to f/1.2, the image looked pretty nice and soft. Kind of an ethereal glow? But that kind of effect can be achieved in after effects nowadays. Obviously, the DoF at f/1.2 will be ridiculously shallow. So maybe there will be a circumstance where I will need that? Once upon a time, that lens was super expensive. To put things in persepctive, here’s the newer version of the same lens.

And it’s not like you can’t get some pretty sweet shots w/ them… but I actually had to tell gretch to stand still so I could focus, and then take the shot:

So what do you guys think? Should I hold on to my old lenses, or try to sell ‘em off?