The Limbo Connection's photos with the keyword: legacy lens

Canon EOS 30D + Chinon 55mm f/1.4 + extension tube.

Photographed with a Nikkor-H 85mm f/1.8 lens on a Nikon D2Xs, The lens dates from 1971 and bears the battle scars of rattling around unprotected in at least one camera bag and more likely several. But the optics function well enough. This is a hefty crop of the bottom left-hand corner of the original, which might have survived unsullied if the focus had been consistent. The greater the degree of telephoto, the more need for stopping down, which carelessly I failed to do.

Two people walking in step photographed through the classical porch added incongruously to the front of the Georgian building in Corsham housing the Methuen Arms hotel. I used a Carl Zeiss Jena 50mm f/2.8 lens on a Canon EOS 20D. This lens is a Tessar design of just four elements and was a lower cost option to a Pentacon equivalent on a Praktica camera in the 1970s. It was slower of course; f/2.8 compared to the Pentacon's f/1.8. Yet in good light the Carl Zeiss was every bit as good, better maybe. Certainly a sharp lens, and capable of closer focussing than many other standard lenses. I bought mine second hand for £12. I doubt if a lens in good working order and engraved with 'Carl Zeiss' could be found cheaper.

Photographed with an old M42 screw lens coupled via an adapter to a Canon digital SLR camera. The subject is a camera bag badged 'Miranda' which was an ebay win in 2012 costing £11 and contained a Nikon FG-20 camera, a Vivitar 28mm f/2.8 lens and a Soligor 80-200mm zoom lens. A lucky day for Limbo. In the early 1980s, the British electrical and photographic retailer Dixons acquired the rights to the Miranda brand and used it on a range of photographic equipment.

The one with the bus ticket doing duty as a bookmark. This was definitely photographed with an old M42 lens on a Canon EOS 30D. I was using three old lenses and so whilst I cannot be certain, I am almost sure that the Soligor C/D Wide-Auto f/2.8 28mm (made by Sun in 1980) was on the Canon in this instance, along with a Minolta Close-Up Lens No.1 in the filter mount.

An extension tube between the camera and the lens enabled close focussing here. The Japanese Tomioka company made the Chinon 55m f/1.4 lens to a Planar design by Johannes Berger of Zeiss, which Zeiss never themselves used, having something similar which they considered superior. I bought the lens - still attached to a Chinon CX - from an eBay seller. It is engraved ‘Auto Chinon’ but in all other respects is identical to 55mm f/1.4 lenses badged ‘Tomioka’ which Chinon were supplying before 1974 when there was a change of ownership at Tomioka. The company was taken over by Carl Zeiss in 1974 and the name Tomioka was removed from the front of lenses being supplied to camera manufacturers. Tomioka was at one time the largest lens producer in Japan. It was more economical for Chinon, Mamiya Sekors, Ricoh, and others to buy from Tomioka than to manufacture their own lenses. In this they were not alone. Vivitar and Soligor, for example, never made lenses. They specified what they wanted, and various Japanese optical companies bid for the contracts. When sold new in the UK by Dixons the f/1.4 lens was available as an option to the normal f/1.7 for an extra £10 over the £69.95 usual price (I quote from a 1976 advertisement in ‘Amateur Photographer’). That was quite a premium and as a result the f/1.4 version is relatively scarce.

Photographed with a Carl Zeiss Jena 50mm f/2.8 Tessar lens mounted on a Canon EOS 30D via an EOS-M42 adapter.

Photographed with a Carl Zeiss Jena 50mm f/2.8 Tessar lens mounted on a Canon EOS 30D via an EOS-M42 adapter.

Photographed with a Canon EOS 40D and a Chinon 55mm f/1.4 lens rescued from a Chinon CX camera.

A picture of some pretty daisies to brighten up the dark dank days as we approach the winter solstice. Photographed with a Chinon 55mm f/1.4 lens on a Canon EOS digital camera.

Shirts photographed with a Canon EOS 30D with a Meyer-Optik Gorlitz Orestegor 200mm f/4 Zebra lens mounted via a cheap EOS-M42 adapter. Subsequent processing in Adobe Lightroom.

Photographed with a Nikkor 28mm f/3.5 AI lens mounted via an adapter on a Canon EOS 30D camera.

Canon EOS 30D + Sigma M42 80-200mm f4.5 - 5.6 zoom lens. Neither of these costs much now. The lens goes for pennies, sometimes literally, on eBay.

Working with a Nikkor-H Auto 85mm f/1.8 lens made sometime between 1964 and 1972 and on the day I made this photograph rather perversely mounted on a Canon digital camera via an adapter. The field of view was thus more like 135mm in old money. Processed in Lightroom. 100 ISO. 1/125th sec.