I decided to delve into the world of adapted MF lenses for my PL1 and just purchased one of these from KEH after reading good things about it online. I'm planning to use it as a short-telephoto, since my 14-42 kit lens is quite slow (f/5.6) at the long end. Has anyone here tried the Minolta 50 1.7 before? How is manual focusing on the PL1?
Manual focus on the EPL1 is pretty straight forward but a VF2 is a really nice to have if you plan to do a lot of it. It allows you to hold the camera in a more stable position (I personally do not care for holding the camera at arms length to view the LCD).
I have used/tried both the MD 50/1.7 (from somewhere in the eighties) and the MC 55/1.7 (from the late sixties) on my GF-1. The MC55 is quite bad. The MD50 is a good performer, even wide open. The manual focus is OK on a GF-1 and I doubt a PL-1 will differ much in that respect. But I must add that I don't use it regularly. The main reason to use a 50/1.7 is that the combination of DOF, focal length, and speed fits the purpose of a portrait lens. But I prefer longer teles for that because of the perspective. You'll see me with a manual 90/2.8 instead.
I haven't tried the 50mm f1.7, but I have tried the 50mm f1.4 on my G1 with an inexpensive fotodiox adapter. I was blown away by how sharp the lens was when I made a few test shots. Blown away. Unfortunately, I haven't had a chance to try it out other than testing it a little bit. I got mine out of a grab bag of an SRT-202 kit. Along with the 202 body, I got this 50mm f1.4, a vivitar series 1 28mm f1.9 and a vivitar series 1 70-200 f3.5. The 28mm was interesting. It wasn't very sharp, and it had this weird look. I hope to use it for the lomo-ish effect it has. The 70-200 I haven't tried much with yet. I checked it out quickly with a couple of shots inside, but it was really too dark at the time to handhold it. I plan to try it out outside when I have a chance. Total price for everything : $55 shipped. (not including the mft adapter)
