I happily use all my manual lenses and I think that the differences discussed between lenses and betwen digital and analog applications are overrated - and the words on the "digitally improved" labels that some lenses now carry are mostly marketing blurb.
What can be said is that comparing lens performance has become much EASIER with digital, so that many people do it - but you can still make many mistakes that spoil the results and lead you to false conclusions. I have myself 'compared' many of my lenses and I have however fooled myself many times... As an example, when you look at 100% crops of images taken wide open, you are not only judging the lens - you are also judging the focussing ... unless you made sure that the focussing was VERY accurate (i.e. done manually with a loupe). Autofocus is not good enough here. My bottom line is that with digital it is LESS important which lens you take. At least stopped down a little they all work well. As an example, here is a comparison between a lens with a mediocre reputation, the M 2,8/40 and the F 1.4/50 of which some say it is the best, both at f=8. www.mynetcologne.de/~nc-kellersv2/4050.jpg Yes, you can see the difference - but it isn't big. Sven -----Ursprungliche Nachricht----- Von: Shel Belinkoff [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Gesendet: Montag, 21. Februar 2005 16:45 An: [email protected] Betreff: Manual Focus Pentax Glass on istD The time is getting closer for me to make a decision about getting a DSLR, but more information is needed. There have been some comments on the list to the effect that some manual focus Pentax lenses don't produce very good results when used with the istD(s). A little more information is needed. Which lenses are giving poor results? In what way are the results poor? When using a particular lens, are the problems only in certain circumstances, or across the board. I've seen some awful looking results with some longer lenses (Paul's bird shots), but they seemed to be relegated to backlit scenes. So, any comments on the quality of images with various manual lenses would be appreciated. Reasonably sized pics (sections of larger images) might be helpful as well. Thanks! Shel
