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How are off brand fd lenes?


peter_kim2

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I noticed there are a lot of off brand canon fd lenses around. Does

anyone have any positive expereinces with these? Ive seen tamaron,

soligor, sigma and even JC Penny models! Obviously I'd like to get a

genuine canon but I thought I could save a lot. I'm specificlly

looking for a 100mm lens...

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There are excellent off-brand lenses and not so good ones. I like the Tamron lenses with the adaptall mount. In particular, the 90mm/2.5 macro lens is super sharp. Some "off-brand lenses" cost more than Canon FD lenses, so don't look down at those. If you can afford Canon lenses, I would stay with them.
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In the 100mm focal lenght there are very very few third party lenses. If you go to 90mm the Tokina AT-X, Vivitar Series 1, and Tamron 90mm f2.5 and f2.8 Macro lenses are all stellar performers.

 

I own the Tokina 90mm f2.5 AT-X and sold off my Canon 100mm f4.0 FDM when I never took it out as the Tokina was smaller, as sharp, as contrasty (maybe even a bit better) and all around a nicer lens to work with.

 

Kiron made a 105mm macro that has been tested to be one of the sharpest macro's in this focal range. It can be used as a general purpose lens quite well I know a couple of guys who just love theirs.

 

BUT for a 100mm portrait type lens your best bet would be one of the 4 different ones that Canon made in either a f2.0 or f2.8 version. Personally while I have three of these my favorite is the 100mm f2.8 S.S.C. compact sharp and very well built. Although I do almost all of my 100mm work with my 100mm f2.0 nFD as I like that speed.

 

In third party lenses the Vivitar Series 1's and the Tokina AT-X are bothe pretty good lines. Tamron has some real good preformers but I don't have any experiance personally with any Tamron lens so one of the other guys can most likely help you out.

 

OH and for the most part unless you can personally test before purchase I would not recomend any store brand or seldom heard of third party optics. Canons and the good third party lenses are just to affordable to waste time and film on junk.

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I think it's pretty dangerous to generalise. My experience is pretty much the same as the other posts but I have also come accross some real cr@p. Marexar and Kiron are top of my list and I also had a RMC Tokina 80-200 that self destructed but it may have been abused by it's previous owner. The best advise is undoubtably to try before you buy - unless you are only paying a couple of dollars? As far as a fixed 100mm lens is concerned there is nothing (in FD) to beat a SSC Canon - my opinion.
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Wow thanks for all great those observations, especially Mark! I've been looking around and to my surprise there doesnt seem to by a lot of third party fd lenses in the 100mm range that I was looking at but a lot in the 135 range. In particular a Vivitar 135 for really cheap. So even among third party lenses I guess the concensous seems to be that 'name brand' thrid party lenses such as vivtar and tokina etc are better?
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There are many excellent lenses around for the Canon FD cameras. It helps to look at some websites of photographers who use FD lenses. I often rush to buy a lens after reading a photography book by a well-known photographer who uses a specific lens. For example, I bought a Vivitar 90-180 flat field macro zoom for my T90 and F1N after reading reports in modern photography. I don't use 100mm lenses often, but like to use the 85mm/1.2L lens and the Tamron 90/2.5 for its dual purpose (macro lens and portrait lens). Don't buy a very cheap lens just because you can; get the best lens you can afford and then use it for yewars to come without the urge to sell it and buy a better lens.
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Avoid anything that says JC Penny or Albinar on it. If you're looking for a 135mm lens at a good price, there's tons of good Canon f/2.8, f/3.5, or (my favorite) f/2.5 135mm FD lenses out there. I'd recommend looking for a Canon FD 135mm f/2.5 S.C. breechlock (silver locking ring) lens. They run from $50 to $90 in excellent condition, and have wonderful image sharpness, tonality, and bokeh (out of focus areas). It's also ruggedly built - hefty all-metal construction that would beat any third party lens anyday. Try looking at KEH.com or Ebay - this lens comes up often at good prices.

 

JW

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Peter,

 

I have had excellent experiences with a few of the early design (1970s) Vivitar Series 1 lenses. I currently own and use Vivitar's 135mm f2.3 and Vivitar's 35-85mm f2.8. Extremely sharp lenses with good contrast. I was able to pick these up in an auction in mint- condition for around $85 each

 

The only other 3rd party lenses I've had great experiences with is Tokina's 24-40mm f2.8 ($98) and 80-200m f2.8 ($215) bought at very reasonable prices in top condition.

 

People seem to like Kiron's lenses, but I was somewhat dissapointed with their 28mm f2 and a few of their zooms after I went into the darkroom and made prints. Prints didn't seem to have that contrast "snap" in color prints I made.

 

For what I've paid for these lenses, I'm extremely happy with their performance.

 

Check out this link for more information on third party lenses:

http://medfmt.8k.com/third/cult.html

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Bino,

I also did not like the results with a Kiron 28mm/2.0 lens, and I have bene using instead other lenses. You mention the excellent Vivitar 35-80mm zoom lens. I use a Tamron 35-80 lens that is wonderful. It is an extremely sharp zoom lens with good macro capabilities and reasonably fast aperture. Of course, the main advantage of Tamron manual focus lenses is the adaptall mount which allows you to use a lens on almost any existing 35mm system. This can cut down on cost if you like to "collect" different camarea systems. I started out with Canon FD but ended up using many other systems (such as Nikon, Rolleiflex 35mm, Pentax, ... etc). Now I just grab a Tamron lens and change the adapter. This is the main reason for favoring Tamron lenses over the equivalent Vivitar Series I lenses.

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Another good Tamron is the 35-105/2.8 SP ASP. It's a newer design than the great FD 35-105/3.5, was a top flight zoom when it came out, and also has the advantage of being a relatively fast constant aperture lens that is very sharp. The downside is barrel/pincushion distortion at the ends of the range, which is a feature of all wide-tele zooms. I use it for candids of people at events where the distortion is not a big issue.

 

I would not be inclined to purchase the later versions of this lens (28-105, and I forget if the most recent is 24-105 or 28-135), which will show more distortion problems.

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I bought a store brand FD zoom years back. It is Magnicon. What I'm wondering is who made these lenses since Magnicon I dont believe made their own? It was a Blacks Cameras store brand. Blacks took over Kits Cameras years back. I think Blacks may be Western Canada only, but can't be sure. The build quality wasn't bad on the lens I got, but its optics are in question because of the range. It has since been retired, but I can't bare to throw it out either.
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David,

I have always favored excellent fixed focal length lenses over excellent zoom lenses. I have very expensive zoom lenses, such as an Angenieux zoom, for the Canon FD cameras, but a lens like the Canon 50mm/1.2L is shaper to my eys. It could also be that holding a smaller lens is easier, resulting in sharper images.

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I also prefer fixed focal lengths over zooms in general. I've owned a few zooms in the past, but presently I probably have around 40 or so lenses for all my cameras, and the Tamron 35-105/2.8 is the only zoom I've kept, because there are some photographic situations where it really is the right tool for the job. When you don't have time or the physical possibility of changing your subject distance or changing lenses, you can get a better shot by framing precisely with a zoom lens than by cropping with the wrong lens, particularly with a 35mm camera.
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