Oh the lenses you’ll buy

I have been on a bit of a buying spree lately for OM gear. Just over the last few weeks I have bought (in order)

OM-2, Vivitar 2x teleconverter, 35-105mm f/3.5

Tamron 28mm f/2.5

Sigma 28mm f/1.8

Vivitar 35-70mm f/3.5

and I have a Tamron 35-70mm f/3.5 on the way

As much fun as this has been I am downsizing my kit a fair amount. I am selling off the OM-2, the vivitar 35-105mm and I’ll likely sell off the Vivitar 35-70mm. The OM-2 and the Vivitar 35-105 I had gotten with the intention of cleaning them up and reselling them as I purchased both at a bargain basement price. The Vivitar 35-70 I decided to get rid of because of the sticking aperature (and replace with a Tamron 35-70mm f/3.5). I am also going to sell off my Vivitar 28-85mm f/3.5-4.5. It has been a great lens, but it is just a bit to large to fit in my camera bag with the lenses I want to carry around, which depending on where I am going will be my Vivitar 70-210mm f/3.5, Tamron 28mm f/2.5 (or sigma 28mm f/1.8), zuiko 50mm f/1.4, sigma 24mm f/2.8 and a wide to portrait zoom (had been my vivitar 28-85mm, now will be a Tamron 35-70mm f/3.5). The vivitar 28-85mm lens is just to long to fit another lens underneath it in the satchel, so it is going to have to go.

Sadly all good things must come to an end, and I am going to have to reign in my purchasing for awhile. Money is, as always, a little tight. I am hoping that this summer I can purchase a couple more lenses and I am going to go ultrawide this time, shooting for a Tamron 17mm f/3.5 and/or a Vivitar 19mm f/3.8

Price is relative

I wanted to share some thoughts I had been having lately. I think a lot of manual focus camera user’s are being spoiled by low cost used hardware. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t like spending a lot of money on anything, but look at the prices we see around. With the exception of some rare glass, most lenses for manual focuses cameras can be had for as little as $10 up to around $300 under most circumstances. A lot of similar quality autofocus glass new would run well over $1,000 for some of those lenses and in some cases more then that.

I can’t help but feel like I have been spoiled when I spend $100 on a lens and think how expensive that is or look at a Zuiko 400mm f/4.5 lens and think that I might have to spend $200 to buy one when compared to the Canon 300mm f/4L IS lens it is dirt cheap (which retails for around $1,100, admitedly 1/2 stop faster and with IS).

Anyway, just felt like sharing.

Frustration and Success

 

I have found that as with many things in life photography can be both very rewarding and also extremely inbittering. A couple of weeks ago I had been perusing Ebay’s OM lens listings and I ran across a closed auction for a Sigma 28mm f/1.8 lens. I got both really excited and very disappointed because I had missed the auction, but I also found out because of the auction that there was a fast wide angle lens made in OM mount. Previous to seeing the auction the only fast wide angle I knew about was the Vivitar series 1 28mm f/1.9 and the Vivitar 35mm f/1.9 lenses (not including f/2 lenses).

Then a couple of days later while going through the listings again I saw the same lens relisted. It turns out that the buyer wanted a ridiculous amount of things, so the seller relisted it. I was extremely excited! Well I lost the bidding on the lens at the last second because my browser hanged while I was trying to enter a higher maximum bid in the last 15 or 20 seconds of the auction. I was completely crushed because I had never seen the lens before in manual focus let alone in OM mount.

While fast forward another week and I saw another listing on Ebay for one, but starting at a much higher price. I had just decided that I would be willing to pay the price for it, as I really had never seen an example before after a couple of years of somewhat regularly looking at Ebay and other photography websites. I decided to look semi-last minute on some of the photography stores and I found that B&H had a mint condition example for a bit over $100! Much less then the Ebay auction was going for. I jumped on it and just yesterday my Sigma 28mm f/1.8 aspherical lens showed up on my door step.

Read the page with information and impressions on the lens (it is great). In general I am striving to buy and test out ‘low cost’ OM gear. That being said I am certain not above spending more on gear or lenses when the opportunity presents itself and I have the extra money. In general, for the lenses I am really interested in acquiring I am going to have to be willing to spend more.

Next I am going to try to go wider and get a Vivitar 19mm f/3.8 (fairly cheap $50-80) or a Tamron 17mm f/3.5 (not so cheap $150-250). Then I am going to try to get a Zuiko 300mm f/4.5 and then a Sigma APO 400mm f/5.6 or Tokina AT-x 400mm f/5.6. Lastly I would like to try to acquire a 35-70mm f/2.8 lens and a 70 or 80-200mm f/2.8 lens.

There are a number of other inexpensive and expensive lenses I would like to try to acquire, but those are my high points. Here and there with money permiting I would like to try to get other prime and zoom lenses to try out.

I am going to try doing some photography at my Wife’s Cousin’s wedding which is Labor Day 2009 and before the wedding I would like to try to acquire a Zuiko 85mm f/2 to complete my low light kit which would also include mySigma 28mm f/1.8 and Zuiko 50mm f/1.4.

Impressions updated

I have a couple of sample pictures and some impressions of how the Vivitar 35-105mm f/3.5, vivitar 2x teleconverter and vivitar 300mm f/5.6 handle. I’ve been using the tamron 28mm f/2.5 a bit more and I really like this lens. It isn’t the smallest thing out there, but it is pretty small and very light. The f/2.5 aperature is sweet and it is an amazing lens to pop in your pocket or bag or just have on the camera for walking around.

New lens info up

I’ve posted up pictures and information about the Vivitar 35-105mm f/3.5, Vivitar 2x teleconverter and Tamron 28mm f/2.5. I’ll have sample photographs and better impressions of how they handle optically soon as I am waiting on a couple of rolls of film to be developed with some trial photos from the lens on it.

I also have a Vivitar 35-70mm f/3.5 lens on its way, so I’ll post up information about that lens when I have a chance to try it out. The Tamron 28mm f/2.5 and Vivitar 35-70mm f/3.5 are going to replace my Vivitar 28-85mm f/3.5-4.5 as I have found the lens just isn’t fast enough through out the range and is a bit to large and heavy. The 28 and 35-70 lenses together should weigh close to what the 28-85 on its own weighs and gives me better quality (at least with the 28mm) and faster glass.

New gear

I just acquired an OM-2, a Vivitar 2x teleconverter and a Vivitar 35-105mm f/3.5. I will be testing all of this gear out this weekend along with my Vivitar 300mm f/5.6 and hopefully my Tamron 28mm f/2.5 (if it comes in time). Pictures, stats and impressions will be up early next week.

More updates

I added a page on my honeymoon with experiences (of the trip) and photos. Also I should have a new lens to test soon, a Tamron 28mm f/2.5. Along with tests of the Tamron I should have some experiences with my vivitar 300mm f/5.6 and sample photos from it up soon. I am hoping early next week for both.

Photography page

I’ve added a photography page (see Personal Photography) that has a number of pictures I have taken by catagory/location. It represents a selection of my photography. Unfortunately most/all pictures are scans from an Epson flatbed that doesn’t do the best job. Someday I’ll get a decent negative scanner to be able to get good captures.

The only modifications to any of the pictures is dust/scratch removal in post processing.

 I’ll update the pictures on the page periodically.

Big update

Today was my big update. As mentioned earlier I finished writing about my trip to England. In addition I have now updated the accessory information for my OM cameras and I have also spruced up some of the other articles pictures and I added more information under my Camera’s page.

I’ve finished writing up my trip to England and also my trip to Chicago. Take a peak. Hopefully it won’t bore you to much, but if it does there are some fun photographs you can look at.

More information on camera accessories up later today.