MicroFourThirds adapter at cameraquest

Cameraquest is a US Voigtländer reseller. They made a nice site about the Voigtlander MICRO 4/3 System Adapter. You can find many pictures and precious informations. Well done camerquest!

And if you want to know more about the german Novoflex Adapters check their homepage.
Novoflex has a long list of adapters:mft_novoflexBild 12

Links to shops with MicroFourThirds adapters:
Amazon US / Adorama / BHphoto / Amazon DE


Thanks Fabio for sending the links!

(UDPATED) micro four thirds infinite lense choice…

Today I found the time to google around the web looking for a fast lens to buy for my future Olympus m4/3 camera. So far as I know Olympus want release a very fast micro four thirds lens this summer (but I hope I am wrong). So I started my searching adventure from the very good cameraquest website. You can find almost every information over rangefinder cameras and lenses.

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What exactly am I looking for?

The most important thing to know is that…

1) I have a very limited budget (less than $1.000).

2) I need a very fast lens preferrable  faster than 1.7.

3) I will use this lens mostly as portrait lens that’s why 28mm (keep in mind the Olympus x2 factor) would be my preferred choice. But there is no fast enough lens (only the voigtländer 1.9 comes close to my required limit). So I am looking for lenses between 35mm and 50mm (at this focal lenght you have the widest lens options).

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The 35mm lenses

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Voigtländer 35mm 1.2 lens (M-mount)
Voigtländer 35mm f1.2 lens (M-mount)

At 35mm you can find some fast Voigtländer modern lenses (Canon and Nikons counterparts are very old and difficoult to find, Leica is to expensive). There is the Voigtländer 35mm f1.2. It seems to be a very good lens with no weaknesses. Sean Reid reviewed the lens for Luminous landscape :”The aperture ring, beyond F/1.4 has click stops in 1/2 f/stop increments and each stop felt distinct and precise. The focus ring moved smoothly and was well weighted.” The only thing I do not like is when I compare the lens size with the size of the Voigtländer 35mm f1.4. WOW! This lens is available at adorama.com for $899.

Voigtländer 35mm 1.4 (M-mount)
Voigtländer 35mm f1.4 (M-mount) on a Bessa R2A

At first I thought this is THE  lens I need! But after reading some reviews I began to fall in troubles. It seems the tiny f1.4 lens performs not very well compared to the f1.2 lens. You can find a very good comparison at luminous landscape. For the record, there are two versions of the lens. One is single coated and one is multi-coated.What does change? Theoretically the single-coated lens should have lower-contrast and to quote Cosina’s President Mr. Kobayashi “The 40 f1.4 SC lens was produced for those who believe single coated lenses give more beautiful imagery in Black and White.” But people seems to not see any visible difference. I found a usefull review of the 35mm f1.4 lens here. You can buy the lens at amazon.com

We make a very short Voigtländer break and we take a look to Canon’s alternative: The Canon 35 f1.5 ! Again from luminous landscape: “In terms of absolute sharpness and contrast it isn’t in the same league as the Voigtlander…“. This lens is an older one and it seems to suffer from ghosting effects when used wide open (you can read the thread inside rangefinderforum where the problem has been discussed.).

I skip the Voigtländer 40mm f1.4 lens which is similar sized like the 35mm f1.4 and seems to have the same performance. I preferr the 35mm focal lenght.

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The battle begins, the 50mm lenses

Nikon 50mm 1.1 (for Nikon SP cameras)
Nikon 50mm f1.1 (for Nikon SP cameras)

The 50mm f1.1 Nikon Rangefinder Lens is probably the hugest 50mm lens ever made. I hear only good things over it but the problem is the price.

Looking for cheaper lenses the Canon 50mm f1.2 seems to be a good choice. It is a cheap lens, and like the expensive Konica 50mm lens it has a very interesting f1.2 aperture. At photo.net you can find some threads where people share their opinions. It seems most of them like the lens. So may it will be an option for me…

What really appeals me is the new NEW Super Fast Voigtländer 50mm f1.1 ! Incredible fast, incredible small (if compared to Konica, Canon and Nikon counterpart). It costs me exactly $1.149. This is the most interesting option I found.

In fact there are many other lenses, the old Nikon 50mm f1.5 for example. Than we have exotic lenses like Soligor ‘ITV’, Carl Meyer ‘Moviar’, Angenieux ‘Type M1’ but I believe with such a big palette of good lenses may I should go for modern lenses only.

Sonnar T* 50mm f1,5 ZM
Sonnar T* 50mm f1,5 ZM

Finally I found a very well made review at rogerandfrances.com. With this kind of reviews I can have a very good idea over the strenghts and weaknesses of the Zeiss Sonnar lens. I invite you to read the article. I find that the strenghts of the lenses far more important to me than the limits the lens has. So may this Zeiss is an option for me! The lens isn’t to expensive at ebay.

Canon megafast 50mm f0.95 lens!
Canon megafast 50mm f0.95 lens! M-mount

May you don’t know it, Canon made a hole range of M-mount lenses. You can see the list at cameraquest. When I saw the f0.95 lens I thought I have to buy it only because of the f0.95 aperture! I found an ebay auction (it ends tomorrow) and it seems to be not sooooo expensive. The image quality seems to not be bad at all!

Coming back to Voigtländer I could go for the 50mm f1.5 lens. It seems to have a better image quality than the 35mm f1.4 Voigtländer. The only thing I do not like is the size. It is bigger than the 35mm f1.4 ! It s a really cheap lens (more or less $300),

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UPDATE: Some readers gave me some more tipps. There is the Zeiss Planar 50mm f1.4 which should be sharper than the Zeiss Sonnar. Than we have the Leica D Summilux 25mm f1.4 ASPH (after a quick look the lens seems to have as only downside the bigger size compared to some of the other lens I mentioned in this article).

Frank sent us a very interesting link: http://www.outbackphoto.com/
It seems in some cases you have to be carefull using a M-mount lens on a m4/3 camera.Not every lens performs well on m4/3 sensors!

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I stopped here. There are other lenses I could look for but this are my preferred options. As you have seen I skipped all the Leica lenses only because of the price. It will be a difficoult and long trip in Oceania and Asia, and I risk to loose, break or see stolen my equipment. I can’t afford to loose $2.000 on a single lens.

Summa Summarum I have some nice options, the Voigtländer 35mm 1.4 (tiny and cheap) the Voigtländer 50mm 1.1 (fast and good image quality) the Zeiss Sonnar (tiny and very good image quality). 35mm would be my preferred focal lenght the 50mm could probably be to close in some cases.

May you have experience with some of the lenses. Would be nice if you can write your opinion as comment on this article.

See you!

Alejandro

UPDATE: Where can you buy the lenses?

Voigtländer lenses are available at adorama

Zeiss lenses at adorama

Leica R and M Adaptors for Micro FourThirds by Panasonic


Panasonic Press Release

New Optional Accessories for Lumix G Micro System
M Mount Adaptor DMW-MA2M and R Mount Adaptor DMW-MA3R

Panasonic is pleased to announce two new mount adaptors, the M Mount Adaptor DMW-MA2M and R Mount Adaptor DMW-MA3R, to further enhance the photographic experience with cameras from the Lumix G Micro System.

The M Mount Adaptor and R Mount Adaptor are developed under support of Leica Camera AG, making it possible to attach Leica M lenses (DMW-MA2M) or R lenses (DMW-MA3R) on DMC-G1 and DMC-GH1. Users can enjoy outstanding image rendering offered by the combination of high quality Leica lenses and Lumix G cameras that are full of Panasonic’s cutting edge digital technologies. These adaptors also allow users to use the movable MF assist function, which enlarges the selected area when focusing manually.

http://panasonic.jp/support/global/cs/dsc/

Good news folks…order the Novoflex micro four thirds adapter !

Novoflex is a german company and we still miss a complete english translation on his website. But if you speak some german you can order the adapter. Price is 149 Euro.

http://www.novoflex.com/de/produkte/objektiv-adapter/fuer-microfourthirds/

The super friendly administrator from ww.forum-fourthirds.de allowed us to share the review he made over the new Novoflex adapter.

Please respect the copyright. You can download the document for free but don’t make any change of it and don’t make any commercial use of it!

DOWNLOAD test-novoflex-adapter

Short summary: buy it! it is the best adapter avaiable!

If you have some request to Novoflex please write us. We can let them now what you need!

a little bit of M-mount lenses ;)

One thing is sure. With your Panasonic or Olympus micro four thirds camera you will be able to use a lot of M-mount lenses! We already wrote an article over the very loooooong adapter list.

Don’t forget the new Novoflex and Voigtländer Adapter.

Wouldn’t be wonderful to use Leica lenses on your digital camera? So you want to see which lenses are avaiable and how good they are?

I will give you some help ;)

1) Voigtländer lenses. This page list them all adding some personal judgment from the author

2) A very deep review of M-mount lenses are avaible here at luminous landscape.

3) And we don’t want to forget to mention the BIG guru Ken Rockwell!

Feel free to update the list in your comments!!!

(FT 5) New Novoflex adapter coming for Panasonic and Olympus

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Mr. Hiesinger from Novoflex confirmed the launch of three new lens adpater for Olympus and Pansonic micro four thirds cameras.

In May we will see:

  • MFT/MIN-AF (Minolta AF / Sony)
  • MFT/NIK (Nikon)
  • MFT/PENT (Pentax)

In March Novoflex launched follwing adapter for 119 Euro each:

  • MFT/CAN (Canon FD)
  • MFT/CO (M 42)
  • MFT/CONT (Contax/Yashica)
  • MFT/LER (Leica R)
  • MFT/MIN (Minolta MD)

If you speak german unlike me than you can read this post:

http://www.forum-fourthirds.de/news/431-neue-novoflex-adapter-canon-minolta-leica-r-uvm.html

UPDATE: We remeber you that Voigtländer just announced a new adapter one week ago:

https://43rumors.com/voigtlander-vm-zm-adapter-for-micro-four-thirds-cameras/

And don’t forget the very loooooooong adapter list article:

Panasonic G1-GH1 …very looooooooong adapter list!