It doesn’t come easy, doing street photography with a 28mm manual-focus lens, but I’m trying hard because I like the results when I get it right.
The ultimate 40mm lens for street photography?
I wondered enough to finally get one, hoping to find the ultimate 40mm lens for street photography: the Minolta M-Rokkor 40mm 1:2 is a very light lens with a relatively long focus travel and a tab to further support easy focussing. And because it is in Leica M-mount it means that the register distance is short, so the total length of adapter + lens on the Sony A7R2 is also really small.
Continue reading “The ultimate 40mm lens for street photography?”
American stuff
These lenses came from people who had a home in Curaçao besides their Dutch home; the equipment probably was bought in Curaçao, but the seller couldn’t confirm that. Anyway, the total set was imported in America, as both lenses and the accompanying SR-T 200 camera bore American type designations; I don’t think Celtic lenses were sold in Europe, except maybe in the UK.
The Minolta macro heavyweight champion
The most prominent feature of this lens is its weight indeed: with 600g it is the heaviest Minolta macro lens you can find. It is a chubby, hefty lens and it oozes mechanical quality. The matching life-size adapter is aptly provided with a tripod mount, while the adapter for the MD Macro 100/4 successor hasn’t one.
A Minolta MC 135mm lens
My first Minolta MC 135mm lens, this is the oldest of the two MC versions with a rubber-clad focus ring. According to Dennis Lohmann’s lens index it is the optical design with 6 elements in 5 groups; the later version has the 4/4 design in common with the early MD Tele Rokkor 135/2.8 lenses.
The Minolta Rokkor-TC 135mm 1:4
Found this lens last Sunday on the Dutch Fotografica fair. It was priced at € 20, I offered € 15 but the English seller didn’t understand me and said I could have it for 10. Deal struck.
The slowest Minolta 200mm lens
This is a somewhat rare find: a Minolta Tele Rokkor-QE 200mm 1:5. The lens doesn’t have an automatic diaphragm and wide-open it’s only f/5, thus keeping the price lower. It was introduced in 1964 and so it wasn’t Minolta’s first 200mm: in 1960 Minolta brought the more expensive Auto Tele Rokkor-QF 200mm 1:3.5. In the price list shown at Dennis Lohmann’s site the 200/5 is listed for $119.50 vs. $199.50 for the Auto 200/3.5.
Carl Zeiss Tessar 45mm 1:2.8
I bought this one to enhance my options in the 40-50mm range. My ideal standard lens is a bit shorter than 50mm and shows excellent sharpness across the frame at f/8 for landscape pictures. There’s only one other 45mm lens in my line-up, the Minolta MD Rokkor 45mm 1:2 and to be honest, I really don’t like it. Optically it is useable though not stellar, but especially the mechanics put me off: focussing feels plasticky and not at all smooth, even on the rather nice-looking copy I have now. Yuck.
Another Minolta 35mm
Picked up this 35mm Minolta lens which is the second version of the MC 35/2.8 line-up, the one with the hills-and-dales focussing ring. In Dennis Lohmann’s list it is number 72, type MC-II.
Minolta 200mm and 300mm lenses
In my ongoing quest to enhance my Minolta collection I recently acquired two nice telephoto lenses. Continue reading “Minolta 200mm and 300mm lenses”