[TheBeastFieast]

Originally Posted by typeOnegative

@theBeast, from what I have read +/- 1 at either side is recommended if you are taking 3 exposures. The more stops the better. Have seen examples on Flickr that were made from 9 exposures, though I do not have all details.

Thanks, something to try and experiment. I heard Humanyun Tomb @New Delhi is a good candidate, will visit it soon.

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by TheBeastFieast

Wow excellent explanation, thanks a lot. I have a question, should i go with bkt of 3 shots with +/- .3 or something like that OR have multiple bkt with different exposure compensation settings and then make a HDR i.e. 1st bkt with +/- .3 and then another with +/-.7 so this will give me more shots.

The number of bracketing shots depends both on the scene as well as the dynamic range. If the range is 12 stops and the sensor has only 8 stops, then you need a 4 stop gap between two shots. Which can be achieved in 3, 5 or 7 shots depending on the options of bracketing.

To be safe, it is advisable to have 3 or 5 shot sequence with +- 3 EV at the extremes. This ensures that the software has more data to balance the dynamic range.

There are some excellent tutorials for HDR on the net.

[gd1418]

Thanks Shaju. The damage is 50K and this glass is brand new.. Heading to field planned for this Sunday..

Originally Posted by shajufx

Congrats GD sab, looks like a stealth weapon by all means
Its a beautiful piece of glass which I considered and googled on for an entire month. Somehow Sigma 70-200 looked more affordable to me. Whats the damage by the way ?

Now stop admiring and head to the field

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by Aroy

. Regarding Minolta lenses, they are a generation older and may not be as sharp for smaller digital sensors as the current batch of lenses optimised for digital sensor. Chromatic aberration which was tolerable during film days is more pronounced in digital sensors.

I do not know about Minolta in particular but lens being for Digital sensor etc is a great FUD in many cases.

Check this image sample from 50mm F1.4 Takumar lens , Not a great artistic shot but just casual one with no proper lighting. My son was not in very cheerful mood this pink shirt was of his play school annual day, and I clicked this from a distance of about 8 - 10 feet.



Now look at the 100% crop from the shirt and notice the weave pattern is visible. Can a so called digital lens provide better resolution ? I do not know if it is still that clear after converting to JPG and saving for web with mid quality or not but on my PC with full quality the weave pattern looks as if I am seeing after holding between my fingers.

[rajb3125]

Originally Posted by Aroy

The idea of bracketing for HDR is to get High Dynamic Range. For example if the image has 20 stops of information and your sensor 12, then either you are blowing the highlights or masking low intensity in shadows. In either case you cannot recover the data.

Spot on.

There is still so much data available in RAW that we don't even know about and we have just touched the boundaries of it (according to Adobe), yet sometimes it is not sufficient enough to capture the whole scene and HDR is needed.

That being said, perfect example of HDR is where you CANNOT spot it. If you can spot the image and say its an HDR, well then the photographer has gone over the limit

Originally Posted by gd1418

After waiting long for the Nikkor 70~200 f/2.8 VR-I and not being able to afford the VR-II version of this lens, I settled for another wonderful glass - the Nikon 80-200mm f/2.8 AF-D ED Macro.

There was an version of the same lens available in AF-S but it had the exactly the same optics, where it worked better was AF/3D tracking. Hang on to it for few yrs and you probably will make decent profit out of it (remember 70-180mm Micro), that's assuming you don't let a speck of dust touch it and not a single scratch

Also 70-200mm VrII is a Step back from 70-200mm VrI

Originally Posted by amitk26

I do not know about Minolta in particular but lens being for Digital sensor etc is a great FUD in many cases.

Biggest detail pretty much everyone forgets about is internal reflections and Digital SLR's being prone to them.

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by rajb3125

Biggest detail pretty much everyone forgets about is internal reflections and Digital SLR's being prone to them.

Multi coating to prevent internal reflection exists since ages. Pentax introduced SMC in late 60s and canon introduced SSC in early 70s. Many 3ed party lenses were also multi. Coated
I do not mean to say all the old is gold but in few cases this holds true. Minolta lenses are optically better then many modern ones.
Some of third party lenses in minolta mount are great bargain for Sony users example Vivitar Series 1 macros.

[rajb3125]

Originally Posted by amitk26

Multi coating to prevent internal reflection exists since ages. Pentax introduced SMC in late 60s and canon introduced SSC in early 70s. Many 3ed party lenses were also multi. Coated

Multi coatings are used to reduce REFLECTIONS from FRONT ELEMENT so maximum amount of light passes through WITHOUT being REFLECTED outside.

NIKKOR Lens Glossary | Nikon

Nano Crystal Coat is an antireflective coating that originated in the development of NSR-series (Nikon Step and Repeat) semiconductor manufacturing devices. It virtually eliminates internal lens element reflections across a wide range of wavelengths.

Originally Posted by amitk26

I do not mean to say all the old is gold but in few cases this holds true. Minolta lenses are optically better then many modern ones.
Some of third party lenses in minolta mount are great bargain for Sony users example Vivitar Series 1 macros.

I am not saying anything about Minolta lenses.

Everyone has a favourite brand and they swear by it but its universally agreed Nikon used to make best UWA's, Canon made best Telephotos and Olympus had the best Overall system.

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by rajb3125

I am not saying anything about Minolta lenses.

Everyone has a favourite brand and they swear by it but its universally agreed Nikon used to make best UWA's, Canon made best Telephotos and Olympus had the best Overall system.

Dear Rajib in many of the old lenses the rear elements were also coated to avoid reflection , This is specially true for Takumars and Yashinon-Tomoioka macro lenses. I do not know much about Nikons though if you say may be it is true.Old Nikons have a big problem of oil on blade because the aperture grease deteriorated with time but yes heard optics were stellar.

Well the discussion was about Minolta and I was just responding to a generic statement that old lenses are not good for Digital systems as they do not have enough resolution. I gave an example picture in a very mediocre lighting condition with pop-up flash indoor to dis-spell that resolution myth.

May be yes you are right but can some one tell me why a Yashica-Yashinon / Mamiya-Sekor 60mm Macro manufactured by Tomioka where both manufacturer and reseller are out of business sells costlier then a new Tamron 90 SP AF Macro or new Canon 60mm Macro USM ?

Optical formula for good macro and 24, 28,35 and 50 mm fixed focal length lenses is nearly same since 1950s, There are great advances in Zooms though and older zooms and UWA are mostly craps.

And some of the newer lenses are simply amazing like Canon DO lens which can pack 70-300 Telephoto under 10 cm without any extension in barrel or rotating front but there is a cost , It is costlier then some of the Canon L lenses.
Similarly Canon 100mm Macro USM is great lens because it can be used as walk-around apart from macro with amazing focus speed. But in case you want to use macro just purely for macro then buying a manual focus makes sense. Because even on Canon 100mm Macro USM you need to turn off the AF and rock back and forth to lock focus if you need 1:1 magnification.
This is after my experiments with Canon100mm Macro USM.

So I save myself some money and purchased an Old Canon FD mount Vivitar Series 1 90mm F2.8 1:1 Macro lens yesterday night :-)

Advantages : Incredible lens with cult status at half the price of used 100mm Macro USM.

Disadvantage : Can be used only for Macro on EOS body as infinite focus is not possible due to FD mount usage on EF-S.

The lens is right now in US will land in my hands very soon.

[typeOnegative]

Great info on lenses. So a proposed Sony DSLR acquisition makes sense. Correct?

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by typeOnegative

Great info on lenses. So a proposed Sony DSLR acquisition makes sense. Correct?

Don't know exactly it is very personal thing.

1. for adopting M42 , Nikon F , M39 , OM , PK mounts . yada yada Canon EF-S and Pentax are the best, If you know a sure shot supply route of Minolta and others which can be adapted to Sony go ahead and buy it.

2. If you feels ashamed of buying and using old stuff and love to discuss the new shiny stuff this is not the route for you.

3. If you have enough $$$ in pocket buy the system which offers maximum range of first party and third party lenses and that is again Canon and nikon folks will say that actually is Nikon.

4. If you are a professional who can earn back the money he spends on gear then does not matter how costly the gear is and latest and greatest is best.

Sorry can't help you here

[Aroy]

Originally Posted by amitk26

I do not know about Minolta in particular but lens being for Digital sensor etc is a great FUD in many cases.

Digital lense is formulated to achieve focus in one plane. Colour film had three layers (how ever thin) so each colour was focused on a separate plane, not so with digital sensor.

The digital sensor is getting smaller and smaller, hence lense generally needs to be sharper. You may not notice the better quality in modern lense with respect to the older lenses due to

. Camera shake/ subject shake
. Slight out of focus
. Small enlargement
. Lense was superb to begin with (many older manual focus lenses are still at par or better than modern middle range AF lenses), but then we are talking of really expensive lenses.

But when you shoot a stationary object on a tripod the difference is discernible, especially on full frame sensors.

[kkr2k2]

I am more than willing to adopt the manual lenses, first tell me who is donating them!!! (I know it was a TYPO!!!)

Originally Posted by amitk26

Don't know exactly it is very personal thing.

1. for adopting M42 , Nikon F , M39 , OM , PK mounts . yada yada Canon EF-S and Pentax are the best, If you know a sure shot supply route of Minolta and others which can be adapted to Sony go ahead and buy it.

Very well said, I see the pentax DSLR's with the Penta-Prism is the best suited for Manual lenses esp the M42!! e.g. Pentax K10D or K20D (if you want the newer ones, get the K-7 or K-5< they take videos too!!). They come with in-body stabilization and with a the penta-prism being brighter and marginally bigger than penta-mirror will help a lot in manual focusing!! Of course you can think about split-prism, focus confirm chips and blah blah as focusing aid!!

[typeOnegative]

@amit, but you helped.

I do not mind buying older lenses but I am a bit wary of older bodies. That being said I have not figured out where I could get older lenses. In short I think I will be restricted to considering a Canon or Nikon. Maybe Olympus at a stretch though I am scared of the possibility that they would / have ditched DSLRs as a product line.

[typeOnegative]

@kkr2k2, I am impressed with whatever I have learnt about Pentax and the K-r seems to be in range. But how will I procure one and get service if need be. To my knowledge, Pentax is non existent in India.

[amitk26]

Originally Posted by Aroy

Digital lense is formulated to achieve focus in one plane. Colour film had three layers (how ever thin) so each colour was focused on a separate plane, not so with digital sensor.

The digital sensor is getting smaller and smaller, hence lense generally needs to be sharper. You may not notice the better quality in modern lense with respect to the older lenses due to

DSLR sensors are not getting any smaller the APS-C is APS-C and it is bigger then half frame format of 70s which was quite popular. Full frame sensor is exact same size as 35mm film. There are medium frame digital backs for Mamiya / Pentax 645 medium formats now. So as I see they are getting bigger by each passing year as manufacturing costs come down.

Does the microscopic thickness of film really matters ? Actually the digital sensor also has a built in UV and IR filter which sits on top of sensor and actual light capture happens behind the focus plain by a fraction of mm.
If you want to do IR photography on DSLR you need to remove this internal filter.
Again I am not pitting a junk modern lens against stellar old lens but lets say a modern Kit lens with a kit lens of 70s.
FYI Helios 44-M , SMC Takumar 1.4 , Nikon AI 50mm were kit lenses back then. If you remove the AF motor part and just compare image quality with primes of today they are comparable.

Originally Posted by Aroy

. Camera shake/ subject shake
. Slight out of focus
. Small enlargement
. Lense was superb to begin with (many older manual focus lenses are still at par or better than modern middle range AF lenses), but then we are talking of really expensive lenses.

But when you shoot a stationary object on a tripod the difference is discernible, especially on full frame sensors.

I do not use any tripod as I don't own one yet , I have ordered a cheap manfratto clone which I suggested here and Rudra Sen gave his nod on this thread from deal-extreme and it is under shipping.