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Lens size….
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Just curious about something recently… I recently got an adaptor to use my fathers old OM mount lens on the Canon 5D… One of the lens is a 24mm f 2.8 and I have to say its quite a sweet little lens… excellent colours and sharpness even at f2.8… Definitely useable except sometimes the exposures are a bit all over the place… Now my question is this… I now have 4 lens that cover the 24mm range… Canon 24mm F3.5 TS L, Canon 17-40 F4, Sigma 12-24 f4.5-5.6 and now the OM mount 24mm f2.8… In this day and age generally if a lens has a larger max aperature then its more than likely bigger to accomodate the larger piece of glass inside etc… Then why is it that the OM 24mm f2.8 so bloody tiny…? To put it in perspective, if any of you guys have the Canon 50 f1.8…. well its smaller than that…! In fact all of the old OM lens where much smaller than their current versions…! Its funny that with all electronics etc getting smaller and smaller that lens seem to be getting considerably bigger…! I know some companys have smaller lens and probably Canon have the biggest, but why….?
Curious….
Richie
sounds like you could do a lovely staqtic lens test- one digital body on a tripod, 4 lenses.
would be particularly be interested in the zuiko and the sigma, I use the sigma now, and still have the 24, but only for OM. How about a review of the mount/unmount, is it well made? feel good? pain in the arse?I’ve never had a canon, but I think my internal nikon/canon debate has just taken a tilt
Here’s my guess:
All the L series lenses are more weather resistant, and more robust than the regular lenses, hence they’re bigger to accommodate extra seals & more rugged components?
Also, some of the lenses you’re looking at are zoom, and not prime, so extra size for the multiple elements.
Finally, the L series zoom lenses stay a fixed length, and have non-rotating filter threads, unlike many of the older / cheaper lenses.
I’m quite possibly totally wrong, but that’s my stab in the dark anyway…
Personally I prefer the larger lenses – I think they hand-hold better.
Tim
Well the most basic reason is that all Canon EF lenses are full of AF motors and electronics. The optics themselves aren’t much different, but the lens barrel has to hold all that other stuff. I have several manual focus lenses, including Zuikos and East German/Russian ones, and even 135mm f2.8s are smaller than my 17-40L !!! If you ever get the chance to pick up a Zuiko 50mm f1.4 fairly cheap, do it! You’ll see why when you hold that lovely little chunk of glass and metal in your hand. They’re just so beautifully built, and the optics on fast 50s are works of art.
Also, Olympus specifically made the OM/Zuiko range to be as compact and robust as possible (remember all those ads in the 70s? They always used mountaineers like Chris Bonington for their posterboys).
I have a growing group on Flickr dedicated to just this, manual lenses on EOS cameras. Some good info and plenty of other retro glass nutcases there if you’re interested:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/eos-manual-lenses/Cheers guys… Yeah thats what i expected about the lens… ‘JB7’ maybe i will do a little test sometime… I would be very interesting for the members of the site and myself to be honest..! I have a feeling in terms of image quality it would end up with the 24 Tilt and Shift up top, 24 Olympus second, 17-40 third and the Sigma fourth…. but it terms of use, build etc it would be a different story…! Tim I agree about larger lens being nicer to hold altough I got the lend of a 300 f2.8 IS from a friend for the day a few months back and holy shit I had pains everywhere for a week after that…! Steve I will defo have to have a look through that flickr site… I know i too have been keeping my eye on ebay etc… I spotted a lovely zuiko 50mm f1.2 last week… it looked amazing…!
Talk soon
Richie
richiehatch wrote:
Tim I agree about larger lens being nicer to hold altough I got the lend of a 300 f2.8 IS from a friend for the day a few months back and holy shit I had pains everywhere for a week after that…!
I can definately relate to that! Add a flash and battery grip to it, and photography suddenly becomes a good workout! :lol:
Tim
I got rather alarmed today, getting all the glassware out for a porn session (lensporn that is), and discovered just how many I’d accumulated. This picking up cheap manual focus bangers on eBay is evidently an addiction ;)
Annotations and opinions on original at http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevefe/273859358/
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