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Lens converters Film to Digital M42-Canon EFS
#1

Hi, I am a bit of a newbie to the digital world, and would welcome any experiences with M42 lens to EFS.
There seems to be so much information about converters and success stories I just wondered if there was anybody here with any experience.
I tried my 35mm Tamron FD lenses with an adapter but with limited sucsess.
I have three Mamiya lenses with M42 thread, and although I can focus to Infinity and just beyond I find that the pictures are very soft in focus.
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#2

(Feb 27, 2014, 05:20)joe1953x Wrote:  Hi, I am a bit of a newbie to the digital world, and would welcome any experiences with M42 lens to EFS.
There seems to be so much information about converters and success stories I just wondered if there was anybody here with any experience.
I tried my 35mm Tamron FD lenses with an adapter but with limited sucsess.
I have three Mamiya lenses with M42 thread, and although I can focus to Infinity and just beyond I find that the pictures are very soft in focus.

Joe, you seem to have posted your query in the wrong forum here, which is why you are not getting any replies, so I will try to help you. When using "heritage" lenses, originally designed for use with film cameras, on a modern digital camera, the results can be good or bad depending on the design of the lens and the quality of the adapter. I use some M42 lenses on my Canon Eos 7D and get the best results from a Carl Zeiss Jena 35mm f2.5 Flektogon and from some of my Pentax Super Takumars, especially the 135mm f2.8. Other M42 lenses can be a crap-shoot. The quality of manufacture of the mount adapter is also critical, and can make a huge difference to the results. As for using Canon FD lenses with an adapter, because the Canon FD back focus distance or "back focus register" (the distance between the rear flange of the lens mount and the focal plane when the lens is focused at infinity) is shorter than the EOS back focus distance, the adapter has to contain a corrective optical element to allow infinity focus. This can have a detrimental effect on image quality, which is probably what you experienced. It can be fun to use old film lenses on our digital cameras, but obtaining critical image quality is never going to be guaranteed without a lot of trial and error.


GrahamS
Take my advice.  I'm not using it.Wink

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#3

Thread moved to main discussion. Thank you for joining us! Each of you are welcome here in the forums!
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#4

(Mar 1, 2014, 09:06)Barbara G. Wrote:  Thread moved to main discussion. Thank you for joining us! Each of you are welcome here in the forums!
Thank you, Barbara, for the welcome. This seems to be a great community.

GrahamS
Take my advice.  I'm not using it.Wink

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#5

Thanks Graham,
I have a Vivitar (FD) 35-105 beast of a lens and i get super results if I dont zoom any more than about 80mm and is fantastic in Macro mode.
My Mamyia (M42) Lens' are very poor throughout, but I would have thought that they would be nearer the mark. Maybe I have a poor quality adapter.
The other problem with the FD to EOS on my 350D is that I can only selct f1.4 no other options are availabe in arpeture priority.
Joe.

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#6

(Mar 1, 2014, 12:14)joe1953x Wrote:  Thanks Graham,
I have a Vivitar (FD) 35-105 beast of a lens and i get super results if I dont zoom any more than about 80mm and is fantastic in Macro mode.
My Mamyia (M42) Lens' are very poor throughout, but I would have thought that they would be nearer the mark. Maybe I have a poor quality adapter.
The other problem with the FD to EOS on my 350D is that I can only selct f1.4 no other options are availabe in arpeture priority.
Joe.

Joe, I think that you have a very poor quality FD-Eos adapter, but good ones are quite costly. (USD250 to 450). Your Mamiya lenses will be quite soft wide open. If I recall, they do not have a switch to enable manual iris operation like some Takumars and Zeiss lenses do.

GrahamS
Take my advice.  I'm not using it.Wink

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#7

The best way of using older lenses would be to buy a reverse adaptor for macro work. Lens filter thread to camera fitting.
SRBphotographic and Premierink can supply these.
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