Photos with old (70's) Cameras

[steve_simons]

I don't know why... but it always seems that photos taken with an

older camera setup with an old lens from the 70's or so always turn

out looking kind of soft and the colors seem off. Is it because of:

 

- Inexperienced Photographers

- Poor Scan Quality

- Poor Metering in Camera

- Focus is Off

- Camera mirror is off resulting in poor focus

- Poor Optics

 

I'm just wondering because I'm considering investing in some slide

film to use with an older Yashica FX-3 I used to use. But when I

look at my old photos and photos of people I know who use older

cameras along with looking at photos taken by people with older

cameras, the photos never seem as sharp and I'm wondering if I

should even bother if the optics of the lens don't give very good

contrast & sharpness.

 

I've seen many incredible photos from older cameras and especially

ones from back when these cameras were new, which means even more

because I doubt the film they used back then was anywhere near the

quality of todays films. Many of those shots could have been taken

with very expensive glass and handheld light meters.

 

 

BTW: I know I'm talking a bit about cameras in here, but it's

mainly about lenses, I know that the camera basically opens & closes

the shutter.

[bruce_garrett]

Way back in the 70s (man) I had a Canon A1 with Canon 70-210mm f4 and 50mm f1.4.

Looking at those pictures now reveals stunning sharpness, contrast and colour balance...

although some of the composition leaves something to be desired.

 

Now I use a Nikon F5 with, among others, Nikkor 28-70mm f2.8 and 85mm f1.4. The

results are still stunning but not that much better than those taken with my old Canon...

the composition still needs work.

[Brian]

There have been good and bad lenses, good and bad cameras, and good and bad photographers for many years. The good 70s gear, wielded by an able photographer, can make images the equal of anything made by today's equipment.

[francois_gauthier]

In the early 70s, the coating was not as good as today resulting in less contrast and more flare. In the late 70s, it was already much better and close to today's.

 

The Yashica FX-3 is still an excellent, light, mechanical body but lacks the depth of field button. It was made around 1980 and was sold mostly with the Yashica ML 50mm F2.0 wich is of acceptable but not great quality.

 

Here are the alternatives in the 50mm Yashica-Contax mount. Worst are the DSB and ML 1.9, those are not worth using. Better is the ML 1.7, even better is the ML 1.4 (but are heavier). All those are Yashica but to improve dramatically, look at the Zeiss Planar 1.7 and heavier 1.4 : both are just equally superb lenses.

 

Upgrading with a used Zeiss 50mm F1.7 would make your camera world class.

[h._p.]

Your premise is faulty, I'm afraid. There were plenty of people turning out sharp prints in the 'seventies or even in the 'fifties, using 35mm equipment. I myself made some six foot enlargements from Tri-X negatives shot in a Nikon F. They were used as decoration in a client's reception area and looked very nice, even if I say so myself.

 

If you mean that you've been looking at old family albums and there are a lot of soft pictures, that's probably because they were shot on cheaper cameras with simple one, two or three element lenses, which were common at the time. The big change since the 'seventies is that people now tend to spend more money on a camera than they did then, because they, generally, have more disposable income. Also, cameras have got cheaper in relative terms as manufacturers have introduced ever more automation on the production lines, as well as in the cameras.

 

So, if you look at modern family albums, yes, the pictures will look sharper and have better saturation because the equipment, including the enlargers at the processing labs, has got better.

[dan_fromm2]

Steve, not to be any less polite or more provocative than you are, but are you:

 

(a) trying to induce strangers to fight?

 

(b) blind?

 

© out of your mind?

 

(d) looking a crappy color prints or perhaps faded old ones?

 

(e) looking at crappy scans instead of the original slides or good prints from the original negatives?

 

I ask because I'm still shooting with lenses, e.g., 24/2.8 Nikkor,700/8 Questar, 38/4.5 Biogon, 47/5.6 Super Angulon, 65/8 Ilex Acugon, 80/6.3 Wide Field Ektar, 101/4.5 Ektar, ... , from the '70s and earlier and get beautiful color transparencies the same as always.

 

Not only that, but Kodachrome and even HS Ektachrome transparencies I shot in the '70s with a variety of Nikon bodies and lenses are still lovely. Speed for speed, the latest E-6 and C-41 films are better than those of 30-odd years ago, but 30 years ago E-6 films weren't bad.

 

Fixed focal length lenses from the better manufacturers, e.g., Canon, Leitz, Minolta, Nikon, Olympus, Pentax, Zeiss, haven't got much better since then either. Modern zooms are better than '70s vintage zooms and I understand the second tier manufacturers, e.g., Stigma, now make better prime lenses than they used to. But when I cheap out I buy used lenses made by good makers, not new lenses from the second tier, so I have no personal experience with, e.g., Stigma lenses.

 

By the way, your FX-3 is somewhat more recent than the '70s. In 1990 I carried a brand spanking new FX-3 Super 2000 with Yashica's 50 and 100 mm macro lenses to fit it to a biologist in Peru. Good kit then and if he hasn't dropped it in a river, good kit today.

 

All that said, old lenses that have hazed up will give less snappy images than they would if cleaned. But this is a question of individual lenses, not of "lenses >= 24 years old" in general.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[charles_stobbs3]

Unless the pictures were taken on Kodachrome, the slides or prints will have experienced fading or color shifts due to age, humidity, heat, etc.

[vivek iyer]

Steve:

 

For your FX3, get a nice Zeiss Planar 50mm f/1.4, take pictures and then compare it with any "modern"camera/lens results.

 

All my spectacular lenses are from late 1960s or early 1970s.

 

Charles:

 

You may want to look up the various discussions/postings on the stability of Kodachrome slides. Kodak always had problems with their image stability (slides, films, prints) until Fuji gave a run for their money and made them improve.

 

Vivek.

[richard_oleson]

There are older lenses which were considered quite good in their day which produce soft, unsaturated photos by today's standards, but in my experience (unless you're talking about zooms) you have to go at least back into the 1950s to find them. Three that come to mind are the 58/2 Zeiss Biotar, 50/2 Schneider Xenon, and the prewar 50/2 (uncoated) Zeiss Sonnar and its coated Russian siblings from the postwar period. I can't think of any post-1960 (non-zoom) lens designs that were considered top level when new that can't stand comparison to modern lenses.

 

rick :)=

[rob_murray]

Fixed focal length lenses of the 70's were good, zooms were

pretty awful, zooms have improved greatly and film has come

a long way in 30 years also,maybe thats what your seeing.

[jay_.]

<<I don't know why... but it always seems that photos taken with an older camera setup with an old lens from the 70's or so always turn out looking kind of soft >>

 

It's called "great bokeh" and Leica users pay thousands of dollars to get that look...and of course, to see the name "Leica" when they lovingly admire their equipment.

[Mike Gammill]

Ditto on the Planar 50mm lenses. I use mine on my FX-3 Super 2000. Now for the ultimate almost pocket SLR: Find the Contax 45mm f2.8 pancake lens. (I don't actually have one yet, but have seen one). With that lens it will fit in a jacket pocket. Put a short tele in a soft case to put in your other pocket and you'll have a walking around kit that won't get in your way.

[taner]

70s Minolta lens wide open - not sharp enough?

<p><img src="http://www3.sympatico.ca/askintaner/photonet_post/junta-135-portrait-III-x.jpg"></p>

[francois_gauthier]

Steve, you found a way to ignite a passionnate debate. It would help to narrow it down by adding some precisions.

 

A- are you talking about old or recent shots by these 'old lenses'?

 

B- do you have specific exemples of what lenses where actually used ?

 

C- where the scans made from slides, negatives or prints ?

 

D- where those scans made with a good scanner by an experienced user ?

 

and finally:

E- what lenses do you actually have for your FX-3 ?

[steve_simons]

A- are you talking about old or recent shots by these 'old lenses'?

Recent shots with older lenses.

 

B- do you have specific exemples of what lenses where actually used ?

Not every one.

 

C- where the scans made from slides, negatives or prints ?

Some slides, some negs, some prints.

 

D- where those scans made with a good scanner by an experienced user ?

The color in the scans were good, the person's shots with new equipment were also good, just the older camera shots weren't as nice.

 

and finally: E- what lenses do you actually have for your FX-3 ?

50/1.8ML, 28/2.8, Tokina 80-200/4 (I rarely used this). I wasn't talking about my prints from this cam tho since I was a very inexperienced photographer when I used it.

 

---------------------------------------------------------

 

I think my question was partially answered with one person though, didn't look at the name, but he said that the lens may be a bit hazy and need cleaning.

 

I'll take it that the results I was seeing were from hazy lenses and possibly nudged mirrors resulting in Poor Focus.

[jeff_matsler]

I shoot 70's era Nikon and Minolta glass. I think the reason people think the manual focus lenses from this period are "soft" or the colors are bad, is that they're dependant on the new cameras which take the picture for them. There's an art and a technique to taking good photographs with equipment from this period where a photographer had to be a photographer, not just a button pusher.

 

Jeff M

[dan_fromm2]

Jeff Matsler wrote: "I think the reason people think the manual focus lenses from this period are "soft" or the colors are bad, is that they're dependant on the new cameras which take the picture for them. There's an art and a technique to taking good photographs with equipment from this period where a photographer had to be a photographer, not just a button pusher."

 

Funny, back then the guys with RF cameras and SLRs without on-board light meters called those of us who had SLRs with TTL metering "button pushers" and abused us for ignorance of the underlying processes. My view then was, and still is, that matching a needle is matching a needle, whether the needle is visible in the camera's finder or in a hand-held meter. The really funny thing is that amateur cine cameras with TTL autoexposure were much more readily accepted than match needle SLRs.

 

With modern gear, i.e., an SLR camera with TTL metering, getting correct exposure with ambient light is so trivially easy that no one should ever go very wrong. That many people do is a source of amazement.

 

Cheers,

 

Dan

[col278]

Put a film in and try it..... its the only way to be certain the cameras ok. :-)

Col