Well, I mentioned on day 4 that I was considering another option when it came to lens choice. I’m happy to say that a golden opportunity came up, when I visited the Aladdin’s Cave that is Mr Cad in Croydon. If you live in the area, have an interest in any kind of photography, but especially film and vintage stuff, I highly recommend a visit.
Anyway, the long and short of it is that, after a long and very interesting discussion with the owner (well, I assume he is the owner), I got what turned out to be a very good deal on a Cooke Ivotal 1 inch 1.4 c-mount lens, which mounts beautifully (and looks good to boot) on the Olympus.
First of all, the disadvantages. The focusing ring, whilst smooth, has a fair amount of resistance, and a lot of travel, so focussing is by no means quick with the lens. In fact, it’s glacial, which is something of a disadvantage. Another thing (and this is by no means the lens’ fault) is that with the adapter that I purchased for it, the focussing scale and aperture markings are on the bottom of the camera, so you have to actually turn the whole thing over to zone focus or set a specific aperture. These factors do make using it a little clumsier than I would like, and has diminished my enjoyment a little.
The other thing is that, inevitably, there’s some fairly heavy vignetting going on. I don’t mind this at all, and if one shoots in a square format, it’s not really an issue. But it does mean that the lens has a very distinct look, so it’s not really a general application lens – you’re going to have to live with, and take advantage of, the fact that it looks vintage.
So these are the downsides. What it does give me, however, is a 50mm equivalent, fast lens. If I have my physics right, the equivalent depth of field on a 35 mm camera at 50mm would be that of a 2.8 lens, which is nice, although obviously won’t isolate your focal point to the same degree as a 50mm 1.4. You still get the advantage of the 1.4 speed in terms of light flooding in, however. Again, tasty. It has a dreamy look in low light, or when facing into a bright light source, but appears pretty sharp in good light, even wide open.
Looking back at my previous post, this appears to be precisely what I opined over. So, is it what I wanted? Hmm. Yes, and no. As in all things, it’s a bit of a compromise. Being used to modern lenses (even my oldest manual focus nikon lenses could still be called modern, in terms of the principles of their design) this one is taking a bit of getting used to. The slowness in focussing is certainly something of a bugbear – I’m used to my Zeiss 40mm Summicron, which has a focusing tab, and which is quick and accurate. This lens is neither.
It also seems rather difficult, for some reason, to take advantage of the sharpness that is there. I don’t know why that is, but it’s certainly an issue. Im going to have to investigate this further, but again, maybe it’s just being spoiled by modern lenses and autofocus. Maybe I just need to care a little less. (By way of an aside, I was surprised when looking through the Henri Cartier_Bresson book just how many of the subjects were manifestly out of focus. And how I cared not one jot.)
So, talking about this lens is difficult. I’ll certainly be hanging on to it (although, investigating on ebay, and taking into account the price that I paid for it, I could actually turn enough profit on t to pay for the Panasoinc 20mm outright. Now, there’s a thought.). As photography is a visual medium, It’s probably best if I just post some photographs below – hopefully that will give you a better idea as to whether this is a path you’d consider taking yourself.
Addendum: Having uploaded these photos, I find that I really quite like them. Hmm. Maybe I need to re-appraise…