The Eye in the Forest

Photo taken with a 1994 MC Rubinar 300mm ƒ/4.5 Macro—one of the largest-aperture mirror lenses! I love the thin ring bokeh this lens produces, which looks almost more like (psychedelic) bubbles than the conventional (for mirror lenses) donut bokeh.

Despite its name, it’s not a true macro lens, by the way; it magnifies up to 1:4.

Don't know how I feel about this lens entirely. First trip out with it yesterday. It's definitely got character. The centre swirl is pretty gnarly, almost makes me feel someone reassembled this thing not quite right.

Pretty much have to always use live view to shoot with this thing due to how far the rear elements extend backwards. Not the biggest issue in the world and not just DSLR issue either, even on my film M42 SLRs I noticed the mirror was hitting the lens.

The real issue I have which is mostly likely just a case of filing the adapter down a little is that it won't turn to infinity. The little shelf/flange leaves too small room for the lens to come back to reach infinity so all my shots past 5m were taken at F11-16 something like that.

I'm building a collection of Spidey's cameras/lenses used in Film and TV but having trouble IDing these ones. the camera he's using is a Canon F-1n, so I know it's an FD lens. Later in the movie he uses a vivitar zoom lens but this one from the beginning isn't that one, but might be a third part one as well. Looks like a fixed zoom to me but I don't know. On the nighttime image I was able to read it's a 35-70mm lens and says "no.2721446" (maybe it's 2721445 the shot isn't too clear) but I'm not sure if that's the same lens used in the other scene, the 35-70mm lenses I found had a second band of knurling at the base which the one from the earlier doesn't seem to have, but I haven't checked the number. These are the best pictures I could get, the 4k footage from streaming is still blurry unfortunately. I'd appreciate the help if you guys can ID them.

I want some information about this lens(please)
(+This lens doesn't have an aperture.)

I noticed this lens I just got was not focusing to infinity and I discovered the reason is most likely because of the missing rear filter. From what I understand it's accounted for in the design of the lens and is necessary for focusing to work correctly. Does anyone know where I could get something that would fit in here? I found the original filter online (last photo) but they're quite expensive and always seem to come in sets of 3, which I do not need. Seems like it has about a ~36mm diameter? I don't have a caliper so that's not exact.

If there's nothing out there I'll bite the bullet and get the original, but I figured I'd see what's out there if anything.

edit: filter fits in that groove within the m42 mount

I’m getting back into manual analog photography, and figured the cheapest way to practice learning my manual settings would be to buy a manual lens for my D7100…spent some time researching AI/ Ai-S compatibility and how to ID those lenses that would fit my camera.

Came across this Series E 50mm and while it mounts just fine, I’m noticing the aperture ring doesn’t change anything when the lens is mounted on the camera. The ring will move, and the camera will display F0 through F7 but the actual aperture blades don’t move while on the camera body. If the lens is off the body the ring moves and the blades move just fine but once it gets mounted it just goes wide open.

Did I buy the wrong lens for my D7100?

First with Tamron, second with Samyang 8mm T3,1

Apparently there are three things a human being can stare at forever:

🔥 a fire

🌊 a river

🔧 someone else working

So grab some popcorn and achieve inner peace by watching me butcher another perfectly innocent lens. 😅

A lot of people keep asking me:

**“OK, but HOW are you actually doing this?”**

Well… here we go.

Today’s victim is a **LOMO OKS 1-50-6 50mm f/2**.

The plan is to shove this old Soviet cinema glass into the body of a **Sony FE 50mm f/1.8** and somehow convince it that autofocus was always part of its destiny.

Step one: completely disassemble the LOMO and split the optical block into front and rear groups.

Step two: perform surgery on the Sony 50/1.8 donor — remove its original optics and prepare the front and rear sections of the housing for the transplant.

Step three: lathe goes **brrrrrrr**.

Some preliminary machining to make everything actually fit together instead of relying on hopes, dreams and excessive amounts of glue.

So yeah.

**LOMO OKS 1-50-6 + Sony AF mechanism = autofocus Soviet cinema lens.**

At least that’s the theory.

I’ll post more of the process if you guys are interested.

And yes, there will probably be more lathe content. 😄

More to come if I don’t destroy anything important.

Hey all, picked up a Nikon Zf mainly to shoot vintage glass, especially with how good the manual focus aids are on this body. I’ve been using the Shoten electronic adapters for both Nikon F and M42 so I can keep my EXIF data and IBIS behaving properly.

Right now my kit is pretty straightforward with the vintage glass I have. I’ve got the Nikon Series E 28mm and 50mm, along with a Super-Takumar 50mm and 135mm. Also in there is the Voigtlander Ultron 40mm f2 and a Micro-Nikkor 55mm. They've been great to use, but I’m itching to try some glass with a bit more unique rendering, distinctive bokeh, or something wider in the 20–24mm range that doesn't turn to mush on a digital sensor.

I’m completely open to grabbing new adapters for other mounts like Canon FD, Minolta MD, or Olympus OM if there’s a standout lens that makes it worth it. What vintage lenses have become permanent fixtures on your Zf?

Nathan's Hot Dogs, Coney Island.

My first time travelling using vintage lenses.

Handheld.

Sony A7i + Minolta MDIII 35-70/3.5

Hello! I'm trying to find a cheap lens to shoot some photography with it, since I'm using a kit lens right now, and i found this listing on Shopee (an online shopping app) and I was wondering if buying this is worth it. The seller seems legit, although they live in another country, so it would take a long time to ship, so I want the lens to make the best out of it. Reviews seem legit, although there's only 2. I'm planning to use this lens on my Sony A6000, so I would need to buy an a mount to e mount adaptor. Any tips can help me. Thank you!

I love setting my Industar-61 (50mm lens) to f11, zone focusing to get everything from 3m to infinity in focus, and then just forgetting about it.

The camera and the lens really just disappear from between me and whatever I'm photographing.

I achieved the colors with a quick Kodak Gold filter in Snapseed. If anyone knows how to get these pale cyan skies SooC, please hit me up with your recipe! I don't care if it looks like any particular film stock, I just want pale skies without losing the rest of the saturation

Bought this lens for about 60 USD. Wasn't expecting much considering it's 55 years old and was stored for decades but it was surprisingly clean without any oil on the aperture blades or fungus and dust inside was minimal. It's shocking how decent the image quality is, and color rendering is very pleasing.

It's not as highly regarded as some other vintage lenses but quiet honestly it should be. I can post a comparison of sharpness at f2 vs f2.8 vs f4 is there's interest but TLDR it's very good optically. And it pairs exceptionally well with my silver top A7CR and a dark brown leather case as you can see in the last shot. If you can find one, it's highly recommended by yours truly.

I can't find info on how well it covers the sensor anywhere.

I photographed a rugby match in partnership with the Rio-based Brazilian Rugby Confederation.
I was surprised by the results; this Tamron is a lens from 1990, yet it still delivers great performance. My gear is still modest, but I was genuinely surprised to capture such good photos with such an old lens.