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Considering a GFX50R for only Vintage Manual Lens am I crazy?

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gatorengineer

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Current A7R2 user, Amateur, Shoot mostly Portrait, Street, and Landscape. I use the A7R2 with only manual vintage glass, I do have the first rev of the Sony 35 F1.4 somewhere but the plasticrap of this lens bothers me so I never shoot it. To me part of the joy of the hobby is the tactile feel of the lens, and frankly I am old enough to have started long before auto focus.

Every comparison I see of the Fuji Medium format stuff is done at basically infinity focus or stopped down to a very deep depth of field, and the reviewer says see no difference.

I have a very nice Vintage bucket of glass, all FF, or Rangefinder and what I have seen browsing all of the online stuff is that there seems to be something special about the focus transitions and the pop on this camera when glass is shot wide open, especially vintage glass. I also like the idea getting a little wider field and a little shallower DOF relative to a Native lens on the Fuji.

Am I out in left field and the pics that impress me are just by "better than average photographers" or is there something special with this camera and vintage glass?

thanks for any input.

PS Yes I also know Fuji Native glass is generally excellent, but frankly not in the budget.
 
gatorengineer said:
Current A7R2 user, Amateur, Shoot mostly Portrait, Street, and Landscape. I use the A7R2 with only manual vintage glass, I do have the first rev of the Sony 35 F1.4 somewhere but the plasticrap of this lens bothers me so I never shoot it. To me part of the joy of the hobby is the tactile feel of the lens, and frankly I am old enough to have started long before auto focus.

Every comparison I see of the Fuji Medium format stuff is done at basically infinity focus or stopped down to a very deep depth of field, and the reviewer says see no difference.

I have a very nice Vintage bucket of glass, all FF, or Rangefinder and what I have seen browsing all of the online stuff is that there seems to be something special about the focus transitions and the pop on this camera when glass is shot wide open, especially vintage glass. I also like the idea getting a little wider field and a little shallower DOF relative to a Native lens on the Fuji.

Am I out in left field and the pics that impress me are just by "better than average photographers" or is there something special with this camera and vintage glass?

thanks for any input.

PS Yes I also know Fuji Native glass is generally excellent, but frankly not in the budget.
Click to expand...
Hi,

With the GFX 50R you will get worse sampling compared to the A7rII.

The image is projected by the lens. The sensor just samples the projected image, more or less correctly.

The GFX 50R may make use of a larger part of the image circle, if the lens covers a larger area than 24x36 mm.

Vintage glass is a poor description. Some vintage glass is excellent and some is not.

With excellent lenses the A7rII probably will yield better images.

With less good lenses, lens issues will dominate over sensor.

If you have MF lenses, like Hasselblad V/H, Pentax 645 or Mamiya 645, using them on the GFX 50 makes perfect sense.

The only advantage the GFX 50R has over the A7rII is the size of the sensor.

It is quite possible that the GFX50R is a nicer camera than the A7rII. If it would yield better images with legacy 24x36 mm lenses is possible but probably rare.

If you consider a top notch 24x36 mm lens, like Zeiss Otus, the GFX 50R may have some advantage in sharpness, due to the reduced pixel aperture, but at the cost of significant aliasing.

This comparison may tell a story .

The same story, with a different narrative.

Best regards

Erik
 
Thats for the comments. I tried to read as much as I could find on the camera and comparisons. This long series of blogs draws a very different conclusion about the 50R versus FF DSLRs, there are a bunch of them....

Fujifilm GFX-50S Review - the last word

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post about making a mistake and losing my place in the B&H line for the GFX. I said then that it would be a while before I reported on the camera. I was wrong. A GFX did the web equivalent of following me home, and I received
blog.kasson.com blog.kasson.com

My glass is all full Frame Vintage, alot of it is excellent. Kern Macro Swiatar, Zeiss Ultron, Leitz both M and R, Japanese Contax, plus Select Minolta and Canon glass. The glass will definitely out perform any sensor 50MP and under. Alot of the glass I own I own not just for resolution but for the way it renders.....

Given all of the reading and research, I am still on the fence, and why I posted here......

I take it that you either had or have a 50R or 50S? Do you find any strong points to the camera over the Sony A7R series?
 
gatorengineer said:
My glass is all full Frame Vintage, alot of it is excellent.
Click to expand...
Then do yourself a favour and buy a Full Frame camera body. Really.

Adapting FF lenses to a GFX body can work (sort of) in some specific cases, but in most others you'd just be forcing the lenses to perform outside of their design envelope.

Having said that, I do 100% get where you're coming from. To me, too, the tactile experience of many older manual focus lenses is worth dedicating a camera body too. And if fact, I use a GFX50R with vintage manual lenses only! But they are all medium-format lenses, originally designed for a *LARGER* (not smaller) image circle.

Marco.
 
gatorengineer said:
Current A7R2 user, Amateur, Shoot mostly Portrait, Street, and Landscape. I use the A7R2 with only manual vintage glass, I do have the first rev of the Sony 35 F1.4 somewhere but the plasticrap of this lens bothers me so I never shoot it. To me part of the joy of the hobby is the tactile feel of the lens, and frankly I am old enough to have started long before auto focus.

Every comparison I see of the Fuji Medium format stuff is done at basically infinity focus or stopped down to a very deep depth of field, and the reviewer says see no difference.

I have a very nice Vintage bucket of glass, all FF, or Rangefinder and what I have seen browsing all of the online stuff is that there seems to be something special about the focus transitions and the pop on this camera when glass is shot wide open, especially vintage glass. I also like the idea getting a little wider field and a little shallower DOF relative to a Native lens on the Fuji.

Am I out in left field and the pics that impress me are just by "better than average photographers" or is there something special with this camera and vintage glass?

thanks for any input.

PS Yes I also know Fuji Native glass is generally excellent, but frankly not in the budget.
Click to expand...
No you are not crazy. I typically use older manual 35mm camera lenses and medium format lenses on my 50R and some of the results are great. There are loads of adapters to fit almost every lens too. I have some of the GFX lenses and use them too, but the vintage lenses definitely have a different look when shot fully open, especially the faster lenses. The only negative point is some 35mm camera lenses don't fill the frame. I have some samples on my instagram page https://www.instagram.com/nardonmisc/
 
gatorengineer said:
Thats for the comments. I tried to read as much as I could find on the camera and comparisons. This long series of blogs draws a very different conclusion about the 50R versus FF DSLRs, there are a bunch of them....

https://blog.kasson.com/gfx-50s/fujifilm-gfx-50s-review/

My glass is all full Frame Vintage, alot of it is excellent. Kern Macro Swiatar, Zeiss Ultron, Leitz both M and R, Japanese Contax, plus Select Minolta and Canon glass. The glass will definitely out perform any sensor 50MP and under. Alot of the glass I own I own not just for resolution but for the way it renders.....

Given all of the reading and research, I am still on the fence, and why I posted here......

I take it that you either had or have a 50R or 50S? Do you find any strong points to the camera over the Sony A7R series?
Click to expand...
Actually not! I have used a Phase One P45+ with Hasselblad V series lenses.

The P45+ is an older generation CCD back. It has some things in common with the GFX 50R.
  • Larger sensor, the P45+ is 37x49 mm, slightly larger than the GFX 50S.
  • Undersize pixel aperture. Modern sensors often have microlenses so the pixels samples nearly all of the pixel surface. With undersize pixel aperture we get higher acutance that comes with increased aliasing, which is false detail.
But, the P45+ is an old CCD design, which brings a disadvantage in DR of about two stops.
  • Just to say, I know a few things about physics, and physics does matter.

    So, what advantages have I found with the P45+ over the A7rII? None!
  • So, what advantages have I found with the A7rII over the P45+? Less aliasing and significantly more DR.
Both cameras can deliver great images, especially with good lenses. Would I make a lot of 70x100 cm prints with both cameras, I would not be able to tell them apart.



I think that this is a good example, half of that image was shot on the P45+ and the other half on the A7rII.
I think that this is a good example, half of that image was shot on the P45+ and the other half on the A7rII.

Do you see a significant difference? Just to say, this is comparing 2007 CCD with 2015 CMOS. Comparing GFX 50R to A7rII would be a much closer comparison.

What physics say?

Looking at MTF data (measured by me) the images would be very close. The A7rII would have much better dynamic range, but DR would have zero effect on this pictures as luminance range is pretty low.

The A7rII allows for much better focusing accuracy and that may tilt the field in favor of the A7rII, but you may still prefer the P45+ side of the image.

Just to say, I now mostly shoot with the A7rIV. In most senses, it is a much better camera than the A7rII. But, regarding image quality the both are pretty close.

On the other hand. The A7rII delivers a lot of aliased detail with good lenses at near optimal apertures. In that sense the A7rIV is a huge improvement, much to my surprise.

The way I work, I mostly use the A7rII for tilt and shift work, using legacy lenses, Zeiss/Contax and Pentax 645. The reason is that the A7rIV is jut to big to fit my T&S gear.

Having the A7rII around is a great backup. It is capable of great images.

What about the MFD gear? It sees very little use since 2015. But it is nice to shoot with old gear time to time.

Except the aliasing issues, it can deliver great images. Any day, I would be able to use it if I needed a backup.

But, in the end, Sony gear beats it 100% of the time.

It's like having a old Mercedes in the garage. Today's Toyota will be better in any sense, but there may be some things about that old Mercedes.

Just to say, I have owned a lot of Toyotas, they all worked well. Never owned a Mercedes, and I will die before buying one. Other cars I have driven were not so great.

Essentially, I like gear that gets the job done, preferably without a lot of fuss.

Best regards

Erik









--
Erik Kaffehr
Website: http://echophoto.dnsalias.net
Magic uses to disappear in controlled experiments…
Gallery: http://echophoto.smugmug.com
Articles: http://echophoto.dnsalias.net/ekr/index.php/photoarticles
 
Hi,

And, on the other side of the coin, I would not bother with any vintage full frame lenses on a medium format sensor. I'd stick with all sorts of medium format vintage lenses. As already mentioned, full frame lenses are outside their design limits when mated to the larger medium format sensor.

Stan

--
Amateur Photographer
Professional Electronics Development Engineer
Once you start down the DSLR path, forever will it dominate your destiny! Consume
your bank account, it will! Like mine, it did! :)
 
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What do you consider vintage? Some older 6x6 lenses, for a Hassleblad 1000F, and East German Practica and Pentagon, as well as some Russian Kiev cameras. The camera bodies were not well built or in the Hasselblad over built and were complex to repair. But the lenses were very good none of these would have coverage problems. Some 1960s Leica M telephotos, 90mm and up had excellent coverage, the 90 Elmarit, 135 Elmar and Tele-Elmar aren't Leica lens money. TheTele-Elmar is a Leica Sonnar clone and an excellent lens. Wide angles may give you more problems.
 
gatorengineer said:
Thats for the comments. I tried to read as much as I could find on the camera and comparisons. This long series of blogs draws a very different conclusion about the 50R versus FF DSLRs, there are a bunch of them....

https://blog.kasson.com/gfx-50s/fujifilm-gfx-50s-review/

My glass is all full Frame Vintage, alot of it is excellent. Kern Macro Swiatar, Zeiss Ultron, Leitz both M and R, Japanese Contax, plus Select Minolta and Canon glass. The glass will definitely out perform any sensor 50MP and under. Alot of the glass I own I own not just for resolution but for the way it renders.....

Given all of the reading and research, I am still on the fence, and why I posted here......

I take it that you either had or have a 50R or 50S? Do you find any strong points to the camera over the Sony A7R series?
Click to expand...
I know of no Leica M glass that will cover the GFX sensor. Some R glass either covers or comes close. The 280/4 Apo-Telyt is a lens I use a lot on a GFX 50R that's been IR-converted, although it doesn't cover completely. For close working distances, FF macro lenses will have better coverage with a Fuji 18 mm extension tube.

There is one very good reason to use FF glass on the GFX: you like square photos.

In general, the best results for adapted glass on the GFX are to be found with lenses made for MF format, or industrial lenses with appropriate coverage.

To deal with your final question, voting with my feet, I have sold all my Sony gear and still have GFX's.

Jim
 
HI Jim,

Thanks for your blog, I spent alot of time there.... Not encouraging to hear on the FF on the 50R, I wasnt expecting to get the whole frame but was hoping to get some of the qualities of these vintage lens at a slightly wider, and shallower DOF view.

Being honest one of the reasons I was looking at the Rangefinder and FF lenses was size. Going to MF lenses would be physically too large of a rig for what I am looking for.

Can I ask what made you vote with your feet and dump your Sony gear?

Mark
 
This question is for those who know physics and optics (I don't know): when adapting FF lenses that were designed for film (I think the classic Zeiss ZE and ZF.2 will be in this category) to GFX we won't always have incompatibility problems with the sensor, the thick glass in front of it, etc? Will we see image degradation, amplification of lenses problems, etc? Thanks.
 
Pansottin said:
This question is for those who know physics and optics (I don't know): when adapting FF lenses that were designed for film (I think the classic Zeiss ZE and ZF.2 will be in this category) to GFX we won't always have incompatibility problems with the sensor, the thick glass in front of it, etc? Will we see image degradation, amplification of lenses problems, etc? Thanks.
Click to expand...
I've not seen any issues with the lenses that provide near-total coverage. Those lenses tend to be longer in focal length, though.

I've certainly seen that issue with short, symmetric lenses (I'm looking at you, Leica M) on FF cameras.
 
gatorengineer said:
Thats for the comments. I tried to read as much as I could find on the camera and comparisons. This long series of blogs draws a very different conclusion about the 50R versus FF DSLRs, there are a bunch of them....

https://blog.kasson.com/gfx-50s/fujifilm-gfx-50s-review/

My glass is all full Frame Vintage, alot of it is excellent. Kern Macro Swiatar, Zeiss Ultron, Leitz both M and R, Japanese Contax, plus Select Minolta and Canon glass. The glass will definitely out perform any sensor 50MP and under. Alot of the glass I own I own not just for resolution but for the way it renders.....

Given all of the reading and research, I am still on the fence, and why I posted here......

I take it that you either had or have a 50R or 50S? Do you find any strong points to the camera over the Sony A7R series?
Click to expand...
Some thoughts having adapted to both 50S/R and 100S:

Coverage:
  • At close distance wide open for central subject, the rendering on 44x33 can be really nice. In some cases, though, it's quite terrible with excessive swirl at the edges, DOF increasing at edges causing bokeh to become less blurred, etc.
  • At infinity just forget about IQ across the frame stopped down unless shooting with a longer focal length (100mm+ with a few exceptions) and you need a perfectly shimmed adapter.
Cover glass thickness and M lenses:

The GFX cover glass is much thicker than digital Ms, and it's spaced 9mm away from the sensor so as to defocus dust – both of which are not ideal for M lenses.

Adapter length:

My Contax C/Y and Minolta MD have been close enough to the right length, but all the Leica M adapters I've tried for the GFX are far too short for ideal IQ. For example, my Novoflex adapter for M to GFX is much too short, so the M lenses hit infinity long before the hard stop. This makes trying to shoot landscape with them stopped down a futile exercise, particularly for lenses with floating elements like the most recent 50 Lux – sharpness turns to mush even before you get out of the original 35mm frame size. So you will likely need to shim your adapter and hope you don't introduce another issue with IQ consistency from one side of the frame to the other. Even then, you still have to contend with coverage and IQ outside the 35mm frame.

Recommendation:

Shoot full frame adapted lenses to the GFX for fun, never as a replacement for a full frame camera. You will find a few 35mm lenses that delight you on the GFX, but many more that disappoint.

Some of my favorite 35mm lenses to use adapted to the GFX:
  • Minolta 58 1.2 – soft, glorious rendering wide open at close distances, very sharp at infinity stopped down to f/5.6 when cropping in slightly to excluding far corners/edges of the 44x33 frame
  • Contax C/Y 35 1.4 – crazy sharp at close distances, crop to square-ish proportion at infinity since corners are smeared even stopped down
  • Contax C/Y 50 1.4 – close distance wide open rendering is painterly and active
  • Contax C/Y 100 f/2 – great at all apertures and distances – better on 50S/R than the 100S for infinity/landscape – rendering is similar to GF 110 with a less harsh transition zone and less abrupt focus falloff
  • I've never used the Otus 85 1.4, but images I've seen taken with it look really good at all distances and apertures – far corners sometimes need a slight crop.
 
JimKasson said:
  • JimKasson wrote:
Pansottin said:
This question is for those who know physics and optics (I don't know): when adapting FF lenses that were designed for film (I think the classic Zeiss ZE and ZF.2 will be in this category) to GFX we won't always have incompatibility problems with the sensor, the thick glass in front of it, etc? Will we see image degradation, amplification of lenses problems, etc? Thanks.
Click to expand...
I've not seen any issues with the lenses that provide near-total coverage. Those lenses tend to be longer in focal length, though.

I've certainly seen that issue with short, symmetric lenses (I'm looking at you, Leica M) on FF cameras.
Click to expand...
 
Thats what I am really triying to get is that transition rendering. Going to try and work with a local seller of a 50R to see if they will let me try Three lenses on the camera to see how they do.

1) Canon 35 F2 LTM. Even if I get a frame that is the equivalent of a FF28mm, I would be very happy, i have seen that this may not be a great combo.

2) Summicron 50 F2 non floating. I have seen some amazing stuff shot with this combo, and am interested in it. (also have the canon 50 1.4, and 1.2 LTMs, but I think the Chron has the best chance of success). Thinking with corner cleanup this would be around a 40-42mm FF

3) Canon 100F2 LTM - Dont know what to expect here its a nice portrait lens, at 73mm should be a nice focal length.

These are my normal traveling compliment for the A7 when I want a small and compact setup. If they dont work then, probably just stick with the A7R2 as the 3 doesnt seem that compelling and the 4 is out of my budget.
 
gatorengineer said:
Thats what I am really triying to get is that transition rendering. Going to try and work with a local seller of a 50R to see if they will let me try Three lenses on the camera to see how they do.

1) Canon 35 F2 LTM. Even if I get a frame that is the equivalent of a FF28mm, I would be very happy, i have seen that this may not be a great combo.

2) Summicron 50 F2 non floating. I have seen some amazing stuff shot with this combo, and am interested in it. (also have the canon 50 1.4, and 1.2 LTMs, but I think the Chron has the best chance of success). Thinking with corner cleanup this would be around a 40-42mm FF

3) Canon 100F2 LTM - Dont know what to expect here its a nice portrait lens, at 73mm should be a nice focal length.

These are my normal traveling compliment for the A7 when I want a small and compact setup. If they dont work then, probably just stick with the A7R2 as the 3 doesnt seem that compelling and the 4 is out of my budget.
Click to expand...
I only use adapted manual lenses on my 50R.

It would be great if you could try out your favourite lenses on a 50R body. However, I'm going to be the guy that says stick with your A7R2 and A7. This really is a classic example of, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it".
 
gatorengineer said:
Thats what I am really triying to get is that transition rendering. Going to try and work with a local seller of a 50R to see if they will let me try Three lenses on the camera to see how they do.

1) Canon 35 F2 LTM. Even if I get a frame that is the equivalent of a FF28mm, I would be very happy, i have seen that this may not be a great combo.

2) Summicron 50 F2 non floating. I have seen some amazing stuff shot with this combo, and am interested in it. (also have the canon 50 1.4, and 1.2 LTMs, but I think the Chron has the best chance of success). Thinking with corner cleanup this would be around a 40-42mm FF

3) Canon 100F2 LTM - Dont know what to expect here its a nice portrait lens, at 73mm should be a nice focal length.

These are my normal traveling compliment for the A7 when I want a small and compact setup. If they dont work then, probably just stick with the A7R2 as the 3 doesnt seem that compelling and the 4 is out of my budget.
Click to expand...
For not much money in medium format terms, you can get the GF 50 new for $999 USD. It doesn't have a huge amount of bokeh wide open, but it does have a very nice transition zone and is insanely sharp edge-to-edge for landscape. This will give you much (much!) smaller overall setup for travel, plus the AF on the GF 50 is pretty fast. And you can crop for more reach if needed. Even on a camera the size of the 50R, the adapters for 35mm lenses really push them out far from the body.

The GF 50 would probably cost not much more than the electronic EF to GFX adapter (required to change aperture) plus a Novoflex M to GFX.
 
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