Thursday, November 17, 2011

Buying Vintage Glass

Cost Effective Glass
I see a lot of questions on how to acquire lenses on the cheap at the GH2 user forum on Vimeo and thought I'd write up about what I've learned from acquiring great quality lenses on a low budget.  If you're like me then you may have exhausted most of your funds when purchasing the camera body.  I am still extremely new to interchangeable lens systems, and when I invested in the GH2 I was coming from the school of thought that the camera is the deal.  You get a great camera, you get great images right?  Wrong.  So having never purchased lenses before I wasn't ready to understand two things: 1) how expensive they are 2) how important they are to image quality.

Glass is expensive.  Having entered into the world of interchangeable lens systems you need to understand an important rule: INVEST IN GLASS.  Lenses are an investment.  They are the eye of your camera.  How the image looks through the lens is how it is going to look.  If you have a crap lens your footage will look like shit.  If you have a stellar lens your footage will be amazing.  So there's a reason why certain lenses are hundreds of dollars and others are thousands.  Yet there's a cost effective way to buy lenses.  With an adapter and the help of Ebay you can purchase a 50 year old lens for next to nothing and get great results.

MF Lens Systems and Adapters
Let's start with lens systems.  When you invest in a camera body you are really buying in to a certain lens system.  When looking for vintage lenses you need to look for outdated MF (meaning manual focus) lens systems.

  • Minolta MD/MC - Stick with the Rokkor line
  • Canon FD
  • Nikon Nikkor MF
  • Pentax M42 mount
    • Check out Super Takumar
  • Yashica
  • Konica
  • Olympus Zuiko MF

Go Russian!  Very inexpensive lenses can be found from old Russian lens manufacturers.  These are usually sold by people from the Ukraine, so shipping is going to be around $20.  They are either for the M42 or M39 (Leica) mounts.

  • Helios
  • Jupiter
  • Industar

I've never spent more than $30 on an adapter.  Don't see the point in dropping a lot of cash on a piece of metal.  Unless you have to purchase an adapter which requires a piece of glass, then I'd consider paying a bit extra.  Most of my adapters are from Fotodiox.  It's a solid brand.

Before you purchase a lens, research it.  There are great forums out there like forum.mflenses.com and flickr is a great resource as well.  Look at photos taken with the lens.  Pay attention to sharpness and detail, color rendition, flare, vignetting.

What to Look for?
Keep in mind you're buying vintage glass.  You aren't buying a new lens.  The lens will be used.  And it will have decades of wear.  And certain things can happen to the lens that you don't want.  However, we want to buy a lens that works like new.  So, when buying a lens on Ebay you want to make sure the seller checks for certain things.

  • Haze, fungus, scratches - these affect the glass and therefore image quality.  Even if the seller says they don't, they're lying.  Purchase a lens which does not have these.
  • Oil on aperture blades - Still don't know why, but I know it's bad.  You don't want this.  Avoid.
  • Aperture blades are snappy - You want to make sure your aperture ring actually works and that the blades are responsive and snap into place.  I've ran into trouble a few times where I have ordered a lens whose aperture ring doesn't move the blades.  If you haven't checked ahead of time you will not be able to return it.  So double check with the seller and make sure the lens actually works.
  • Smooth focusing ring - over time the focus ring can get dust or rust, or the grease can wear off and focusing becomes stiff and problematic.  Make sure the focusing is smooth.
  • Dent on filter ring - to me, this makes a lens useless if I can't put a ND filter on it or at least a UV filter for protection.  If you really want to save money, go ahead, but I don't want a busted lens.
Do not purchase a lens without a description that reviews these areas or asking the seller about them.  Don't purchase a lens where the seller only provides pictures and says "you get what you see".  You cannot judge a lens' functioning based upon a picture.  Do not buy a lens from a seller who says "I don't know much about these things but it seems to work".  This person has no idea what they're talking about and wants your money for junk.

How to Search on Ebay
As stated above, make sure the seller understands what they're selling and make sure your lens is in good condition.  That way if it arrives in a condition less than described you have a right to return it.  To search for vintage lenses on Ebay you can type in any of the lens systems previously stated or you can search for a focal length.  Go under Camera and Photo and select "Lenses" you want "Used" and "Manual Focus".  The best way to save money on ebay is to follow an auction until the last 30 seconds then make a bid.  Give yourself a $10 cushion as other people also take this same approach.  Or look for newly listed lenses and jump on a good "buy it now" deal. 

IMPORTANT: before bidding and buying familiarize yourself with the price range of the item you are considering.  Do not pay more money than you need to.  Many people over price vintage lenses.


Please comment below if you found this post helpful or have any questions.

2 comments:

  1. Oh, and to add. When attaching an old lens to your camera you need to navigate through your menu and select "shoot w/out lens". Your camera expects the lens you use to be electronic and does not recognize when a vintage lens is being used.

    ReplyDelete