nilanjan_sen

It was fixed by DAG Camera for $40 plus shipping. Don kept it for a while to make sure the problem did not reappear. It is fine now, and he gave me a 6-month warranty.

Mine had a problem with the color balance turning greenish. It happened right near the end of the warranty period and Minolta fixed it for free.

And it looks a lot sexier than a 50 too.

I am looking at my first roll of pictures with this lens. The sharpness and color rendition seem very close to my 50/1.8 AIS Nikkor, except the perspective is of course much more flattering for portraits. Very good even when wide open at its modest f3.5.

Thank you everyone for your help.

I am not sure I understand your first question. If you are asking whether the background would be slightly underexposed and the subject properly exposed in the scenario that you described, you are correct.

 

I have been informed that the camera tries to expose the background properly when in TTL mode while the flash takes care of the main subject. This would explain why the shutter speed would change when you turned the flash on. If you want a specific shutter speed, you can use shutter priority.

 

I had a related question and found the answers as well as Todd Peach's Web page helpful:

 

http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=00Eref

I am a little confused about the default flash synch speed with the

N8008S. I have IS0 800 film loaded in it and was shooting in program

mode with a 28-105mm lens and SB-28 flash set for TTL matrix

balanced fill flash. I noticed that the aperture stayed at F11 and

the shutter speed at 1/60 regardless of my zoom setting or camera

metering mode. The zoom setting was showing up correctly in the

flash LCD, so I know the interface was functioning. I was able to

use a faster shutter speed to minimize camera shake only by shifting

to shutter priority. Is this normal? For some reason, I thought the

shutter speed would default to 1/250 second when using flash.

I got the 90mm from Cameraquest. The fit and finish appear to be excellent. It is moderately heavy, with a well damped focusing action. The rectangular hood is a bit of a pain to twist on and off, and the lens does take up more room in the bag if the hood is left on. I still haven't got the first roll of pictures back, so I can't comment yet on the picture quality.

 

I feel reasonably sure that Cosina will also be involved with the new Zeiss lenses for Nikon. Maybe the Zeiss lenses will be even better finished than the Voigtlanders. I will hold out for a 28 or 35mm.

Stan, I am pretty sure you cannot get rear curtain synch with the N8008S and SB-28.

Thank you both. Strangely enough, I am finding good deals on SB-28's for about $80, but the SB-24's on EBay are more. It could be just a matter of timing.

I just bought a Nikon N8008s camera body to serve as the backup to

my F3. Is an SB-28 a good choice for this body or should I try

something else?

There is no question of undercutting the used Nikkors on price. The Voigtlanders are in the $300 range, other than the 125mm which is much more. They are definitely not a budget line.

I can't seem to find many authoritative reviews of the Voigtlander

SLR lenses that are available in different manual focus mounts

including Nikon AIS. I am especially curious about how they compare

with good Nikkors. Any firsthand experiences or links would be

appreciated.

Thanks for all your replies. Kelly, the aperture ring is not stuck or jammed in any way. It moves normally, but the aperture does not change. The outward condition of the lens and glass is really mint, so it is not damaged due to poor handling.

 

Aanyway, the seller is an honorable gentleman who was the first owner. He has asked me to check at the following repair center and let him know the estimate. By the way, he loves the lens and disagrees that it isn't worth fixing :)

 

http://www.mcvr.com

Thank you Shun. The lens is in absolutely beautiful shape and has obviously not been used in a while. Maybe that had something to do with it. At any rate, it does not appear to be worth fixing.

I just obtained a Micro Nikkor 55mm f2.8 lens. The aperture seems to

be stuck in the widest position and turning the aperture ring has no

effect. Is there an easy fix to this? If not, how much would

professional service cost?

My friend just got a Coolpix 8800. He is getting overexposed

pictures with an SB-22 external flash. Are the two not compatible or

is he missing something?

The Minilux was featured in the November 1995 issue of Pop Photo on page 32. The paragraph on the lens began as follows: "The 40mm f/2.4 lens is a six-element, four-group symmetrical design, called (shades of Leica's ancient 50mm f/1.5) a Summarit! In our field tests on slow slide film, overall sharpness ranked high for a point-and-shoot but was not up to the levels we've seen with posh-category compacts."

 

It continued to be listed as one of the Top Cameras in the December issues until the Minilux zoom was introduced, but with a tepid 3-1/2 star rating.

 

The Contax T3 was featured in the July 2001 issue. The lens test concluded with glowing praise on page 86: "The current lens is a stunning improvement over the Contax T2's already-pretty-darn-good 38 mm f/2.8, and would comfortably outrank the other two cameras tested in our "Posh Point & Shootout" in September, '94. Given its exceptional performance in flare, light falloff, and distortion tests, we are comfortable calling it the best point-and-shoot lens we have so far tested."

 

The reason for my starting this thread is that Minilux prices have dropped considerably and I was wondering whether to get one while they are still around.

I was reading some old issues of Popular Photographic, and noticed

that they found the lens of the Minilux to be OK but not of stellar

quality. They had no hesitation branding the Contax T3 lens as the

finest they had tested in a point & shoot. Is their experience an

aberration or is the lens really a notch below the T3?