george_c.

I've had good results from a Yashica Auto Yashinon DS 50mm f1.4, a solid, all metal lens you can pick up for pennies on the bay if you look

out for the old and defunct Yashica TL SLRs they are normally attached to...

I like the look of this very much, seems like they've taken their style clues from the Trip 35 somewhat. If it's responsive and that lens is a

35mm - 50mm equivalent I'll be buying, although I would have liked to have seen an optical viewfinder built in..<div></div>

On the optical viewfinder front, the graphics that Olympus are using to demonstrate the size of the micro lenses and bodies next to the

standard four thirds system show a silhouette of a camera body with an optical viewfinder in place, here's hoping..

Hi all:

Anyone had any experience using this lens on Pentax digital bodies? I like the idea of the 1.5x crop factor, gives me a bit more room than a

35mm lens on digital would. How does it perform? Any vignetting or sharpness issues?

Thanks in advance,

Regards, George

any one have to hand the ISO range and shutter speed range of the T

Zoom? I have some Delta 3200 loaded and wondered if it would handle daylight, I seem to recall it was

a reasonably slow top shutter speed. Thanks in advance, Regards, George

Careful with which adaptor you buy, find an offical Pentax, a Roxen, or similar (one that will

let you focus to infinity). Personally I fitted my 50 1.4 Yashinon with a Roxen, removed the

awkward pin / screw (I wasn't happy with the key tool and the pocess of removing the

adaptor), superglued the adaptor to the lens and drilled a small hole for the K Mount release

from my MXs so that the lens locks on to the body. It's a permanent conversion for the lens,

but I don't have any M42 bodies. The lens works wonderfully, but you'll have to focus with the

lens wide open and stop down to meter. There's certainly a few bargains out there if you take

the trouble to look. Regards, George

A simple query: if my MX body can only be set to 1600ASA and I'd like to run some Ilford Delta 3200

through it rated at 3200ASA, can I simply underexpose each frame by a stop? Thank you in advance,

George

It's a Nikon lens I think, although it doesn't have Nikon or Nikkor written on it, the SN is

2080629 so I guess that makes it simply 'AF' (thanks you for the link Peter), although it looks

different to the lens in first link you gave, it looks more like the f2.8 on the next page of that

link http://www.mir.com.my/rb/photography/companies/nikon/nikkoresources/AFNikkor/AF2870mm/index1.htm

but with a wider 'distance window scale', a maximum aperture of f3.5. and no MA / M switch

on the lens body. Any suggestions?

I have been given the opportunity to buy a D50 body for a very reasonable price, my question is this: will

my Nikon zoom that came fitted with my old N4004 fit the D50, and how many of its features will be

useable? The lens is marked as follows: 'Pro AF ZOOM 1:3.5-4.5 f= 28-70mm' and on the front, the only

additional information is 'Multi Coated Lens Made In Japan' The filter thread is 52mm. I have found it

difficult to find any information regarding this lens. I'm aware of the digital crop factor, I just wondered

how, if it fits, the camera will meter and if the aperture ring will be useable. Thank you in advance,

Regards, George

Is this possible: next gen DSLR comes equipped with a detachable incident light meter that can meter your

scene and wirelessly advise the camera body of the correct exposure, perhaps even communicating with

the internal meter so that the body can see through the viewfinder which part of the scene the detachable

meter is reading from at any given time, providing a more stable average or more specific spot reading..

Just a thought... Regards, George

There is no Auto / Manual Selector, I paid next to nothing for the lens (on a Yashica TL

Electro X which isn't much use without new seals) so I don't especially mind using it

exclusively wide open. I suppose if I found a way to hold that pin permanently down then the

lens would stop down as I turn the aperture ring: is this what is meant by stop down

metering.. permanent DOF preview? Any suggestions as to how to hold the pin down? I'm

thinking super glue and a tiny metal or plastic offcut to bridge between the flange of the K

mount and the top of the pin..

The lens has a small pin / rod that sits on the screw mount contact, the adaptor doesn't

interfere with this but the MX has nothing to press it inwards. If I'm holding just the lens i can

turn the aperture ring, and when i depress this pin, the lens stops down.. The pin is at the

bottom in this image..

Hello All,

Apologies if this is a simple question, I bought a Roxsen adaptor, fitted it to my MX body and screwed in a

lovely Yashinon 50 1.4 but I can't seem to stop down the lens at all, when i turn the aperture ring the lens

doesn't stop down and neither does it when I try DOF preview or fire a shot. I understand that I need to

'stop down meter', can someone explain to me what I'm doing wrong. Thank you, George

I find it to be more convenient than carrying a grey card, it fits in my camera bag and its not

going to get tatty like a piece of card does, so even if it only fulfills one of its functions, its

longevity as a grey card is worthwhile, George

Just and update: I held and shot with all three cameras today, firstly a K100 D Super, followed by a K10 D and finally a Samsung GX-1s (rebadged *ist DS2,

thanks Andrew). To be honest, I was left a little underwhelmed by the way these DSLRs handled, the viewfinders were all too small and dark for my tastes, and

when I pulled out one of my MXs to remove the 50mm f1.7 M and mount it on the Samsung I had a chance to compare the two bodies and standard lenses

side by side. In the end, these are the things that swayed me into thinking that I might wait for the next generation of DSLRs from Pentax:

-The Viewfinders underwhelmed me, although I hear that those from Pentax exceed those of other manufacturers

-The kit lens is too slow for me, I like shooting portraits in natural light

-I like the dynamic range of Black and White film, I can only hope that next gen sensors again improve monochromatic digital images

-I like to make my own prints, and I have piles of unused chemicals and papers, I do not have the money to buy a comparable printer to print digital from

home (and if I bought one of these cameras, I could see that I'd no longer use my 35mm SLRs so much)

-I worry that RAW files saved on a hard drive will be redundant in years to come: there's no chance my file of negatives will require reformatting in twenty

years!

Horses for courses as they say. Having said all of this, I'll probably be logging on in two weeks time to tell you all how much more use I'm getting out of my

new DSLR! There is something to be said for carrying what is, in effect, a collection of cameras, every film stock ever produced, a darkroom and a range of

techniques within a Laptop and SLR camera. Thank you all for your advice, George

http://www.alpineproducts.com/products/Spudz-photo.php#18

Thought I'd share this with you, i bought one a while back and it's come in very handy for metering, the

cloth is also very soft and it keeps itself clean by folding into its pouch.

Two birds, one stone, Regards, George

Thank you very much for all of the advice, I'd like to handle both cameras before I make a

decision obviously, but I'm leaning more to the *ist DS as the viewfinder is more important to

me than almost anything else (and the Samsung version is going for very little in the UK right

now.. the DS has the same size LCD as the current K100D Super anyway I think.. 2.5"?) One

last question, how do these cameras handle DOF preview through the viewfinder? Does it

simply stop down the lens? Thanks again, George

I currently shoot film on a couple of MXs, one is normally loaded with FP4 and one with HP5, I have access to

my own darkroom and regularly print to 10x8. I use Pentax M prime lenses, a 28mm f2.8 , 40mm f2.5

Pancake, 50mm 1.4, 55mm f2, and a 135mm f3.5. I enjoy the process of these manual cameras, i like their

small size and I like the results I get.

I also have a point and shoot digital which i use for snapshots, great fun and I happily have a play with the

resulting JPGs in Photoshop CS and Alien Skin Exposure (a plugin to emulate film, which does a pretty good

approximation).

I'd like to put one foot in the world of Digital SLRs, I don't want to commit fully as I still enjoy film and so I've

figured that one of the budget Pentax's would be a good idea. Bearing in mind that I very much enjoy the

manual process and that i'd be using the aperture ring and as many of my prime lenses as I could, which of

the two cameras (would suit me more?

Some considerations:

-Printing would be courtesy of a digital lab

-I'd be shooting mainly RAW and converting to B&W

-I don't require high burst speeds, I like to take my time to compose, although auto bracketing would be

useful

-I like the small size of my MXs, their bright viewfinders and simplicity

-Mega Pixels aren't a huge concern of mine, and I don't mind that the *ist is falling behind in its technology

(in fact the Samsung GX-1s is still available new and it's the same camera)

Does anyone have experience with both of these cameras? My question is effectively, does compromising Anti

Shake and Dust Removal and going for the older yet smaller *ist DS make sense for a user such as myself?

Also, the kit lens would probably see some use, anybody familiar with the 18-55mm? Am I going to be

disappointed with the speed or would the ability to simply up the ASA or, in the case of the K100D, turn on

the Anti Shake make up for this?

One last thing, I have a couple of A series lenses for a P30 which doesn't see much use, am I going to have to

use these on the DSLRs ahead of my M series lenses? I've heard that whilst you can use the M series, the

process is a little long winded.

Thank you in advance, Regards, George

I've been granted access to a darkroom that has been out of use for some time, amonst the debris are

some useful papers and chemicals that are salvageable. My question is, does a bulk roll of HP5 thats not

been opened in the dark nesseccarily need to be thrown out? If the roll is stil tightly wound, could i discard

the first few layers and load and use the remaining? Surely the only part that has been exposed is the

outer edge of the film (with the perforations) which is not important to the image anyway. Any help would

be much appreciated, Regards, George