Hi all, I've been lurking around here for some time now and I love the idea of old lenses on new technology, so - with a young family - I'm on a budget, so have just purchased a 2nd hand Lumix G1 and a Yashica f1.7 50 mm lens, but I'm a little confused about which adapter to get, so I've ordered this one from Germany: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/351096000741?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT Is that the right one? Also, while I'm on the subject, where do you guys get your adapters from? Is there a 'preferred place'? I'm in the UK. Thanks in advance. Wab
Hey Welcome aboard adapted lenses. I bought a G1 when they first came out and have had some fantastic pictures from it with adapted lenses. For someone on a budget its a lot of camera for tiny money. Your adapter seems right and I only buy off eBay. When I lived in Finland the EU taxation made me buy only EU stuff. Personally I'd also fish around for a 14-42 zoom for it which you should be able to pick up for under 100€ and that will compliment the G1 nicely. Here is a link to my blog which has a bundle of stuff there about adapted lenses. http://cjeastwd.blogspot.com/search/label/legacy lens I picked FD but they are all good and I am sure you will enjoy your yashica. Below is a shot of my god daughter at her naming day taken with my 50mm f1.8 legacy
Thanks, pellicle, in my impatience, I would dislike to have ordered the wrong adapter and then have to wait another WHOLE WEEK, for the correct one to arrive; that would've given me some kind of stress related illness, I'm sure. I've also ordered a 28mm Yashica lens, but I'll definately go looking for a 14-42 zoom too. Lovely shot of your God-daughter too. Cheers.
As @pellicle noted, that is likely the correct adapter. I believe Yashica did produce some early lenses with M42 thread mounts, but odds are yours uses the C/Y mount. EBay is a perfectly cromulent source for these types of adapters. Have fun with your new acquisition and share some images here when you have them.
Hi back when I got my G1 (2009) I only had the 14-45 that it came with. There were essentially no options back then, and so my first lens was a 50mm f1.8 ... really nice works came from that. I did a bit of looking around and wondered about a 28mm (thinking I'd like more a 'normal' lens). There aren't any well priced 28mm f1.8 lenses and when I compared the results of the 14-45 at about 28mm to the results of a legacy lens it didn't really justify using one. Personally I keep my OM 28mm lens because it also works on my OM-1 film camera (same is true for my 50mm). I found that the single stop advantage of the 28 didn't really equate to anything on images when using the 14-45 zoom. So now I just use the zoom. Perhaps this blog post will be of interest to you: http://cjeastwd.blogspot.com/2010/01/panasonic-20mm.html Made soon after the 20mm was released. Myself I've turned to legacy mainly for macro and tele work, where I can get value for money that just does not exist in the native world. If you were after a 'normal' with shallow DoF maybe a used 20mm f1.7 is the go for your next lens? I like it as a general picture taking lens, especially in close quarters like indoors with people. This is one where by not using flash I got a good DoF and a faster shutter. In such situations nothing substitutes for faster shutter as stabilisation (OIS or IBIS) will not help it when people move.
Post a photo of the lens mount please? We can tell for certain that way. The Yashica 50mm f/1.7 is a nice lens, at least I thought so when playing around w/ a copy a friend loaned me. It's on the "To Buy List" for me eventually. I get all my adapters from eBay, the quality w/ most of the vendors is on par w/ Fotodiox (who has screwed up by sending the wrong adapter 1 too many times in the past) and pricing is better. There are lots of inexpensive legacy lenses to choose from and damn near everything can be adapted to the μ4/3 platform.
Thanks, I enjoyed reading that - though I can't say I understood it all (I'm returning to photography after a 20 year rest), but I'll certainly explore that blog.
It's not been delivered yet, but it will arrive before the adapter, so I'll stick a photo of it up then.
well if you have any input on how I could express points better let me know ... sometimes I bash those out without thinking, but mostly I try to make my blog "assumption free" (if possible)
No, apologies, there's nothing wrong with your communication skills, it's the lack of my technical knowledge around photography in general that lets me down. I've did a bit of photography as a young adult (20 years ago), then life got in the way, but have recently returned to it a few months ago. This new-fangled digital photography is amazing; I love the way there's no sending your film rolls off to be processed. Anyway, the stuff I didn't understand, for example an "FD 2.8", I suspect that's a Cannon lens? Or a Cannon fit? I don't know what a "EF 300f4 with IS" is either. All this is minor stuff and is simply due to my lack of knowledge around this area. I'm learning though. One thing about me is that I can get pretty obsessive about stuff that takes my fancy, which isn't always a bad thing; but sometimes it is. Thanks for your help and pointers, they've been useful.
It came today: And this is the adapter I ordered: Oh, just to add, it came without a rear lens cap; does anyone know the correct sized one is called?
Uh oh...that's the wrong adapter. That lens is one of the earlier Yashicas which uses the M42 thread mount. The good news is that the M42 adapters are simpler in design and thus generally less expensive and more durable. There are also a wide range of M42 lenses available -- likely more so than in the C/Y mount. This is an example of the adapter you need to look for (I have no relationship to this particular seller): http://www.ebay.com/itm/M42-Lens-To...614?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2c8931686e
Your first assumption is correct -- FD refers to the original manual-focus Canon lens mount. In the second example, "EF" refers to the modern Canon auto-focus lens mount and "IS" refers to the fact that the lens has built-in image stabilization.
Thanks, I've ordered one from a UK seller. The wrong adapter could still be usable since I also ordered a 28mm Yashica lens too; that's yet to be delivered.
I've got individual adapters on all my lenses, so I just bought a bulk lot of μ4/3 rear lens caps to pop on the adapters. If you're going to hotswap 1 adapter among multiple lenses and want to have caps for the lenses themselves, just scope out eBay for m42 thread rear caps. Most any generic el cheapo ones will do fine. If you get bitten by the bug and start accumulating a sizeable collection (and plan to buy more of a specific mount-style) I've found that some of the eBay sellers will cut you a deal when ordering a quantity of adapters. I ended up getting a dozen m42->μ4/3 adapters on the cheap that way. Also, something specific to the m42 thread adapters. Check out my comment in another thread about indexing the lenses to the body of the camera. Just a little something that's nice to know. adapted m42 and m39 lenses dont line up with the top of the camera. Any way to fix this? My collection is slowly growing... Canon FD is the next OCD lens genre after I got a 55mm ƒ/1.2 on the cheap and was blown away by the images, so I'm going shopping for some nice specimens in other focal lengths to add to the collection. While the majority of the legacy lenses can't come near the quality of the lenses today, there are certain ones which definitely are worth owning if you're accustomed to manual focus. Then there's the fact that despite not being comparably sharp, there are certain legacy lenses which are known for giving a certain "character" to the images.
I ordered a Canon FD 50mm f/1.8 last night, funnily enough (not a f1.2 I know), and today Mrs Wab is making me take her to the shops, so I've suggested a place where there's a lot of 2nd hand shops, so I'll have a browse and see if there's anything I can find there. I can see how this could get addictive; I'm already in a 12 Step program for booze! Cheers for the tip about the rear lens caps and indexing a lens to the adapter/camera.
Thanks for this too; just ordered one. I've got to stop ordering lenses now; for the moment. Mrs Wab will be getting shirty with me when the postman keeps arriving with 'stuff'.
Just wait until you start browsing the galleries here for all the adapted lens images, and eventually find your way to http://forum.mflenses.com/ Once that happens you're pretty much screwed.
These may help... https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8bLj0xncj6UQWxCaXA1TnhoaG8/view?usp=sharing and https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B8bLj0xncj6URjRmblFzeW5JVm8/view?usp=sharing
