So... is it a Pen F or Pen FT?

[Doug]

Hi Karl -- Yes, correct, the 24x18mm half frame has a 30mm diagonal vs 43.3 for full-frame, so the "crop factor" is 1.44... And the magazine was wrong in figuring 2x, their error was what caught my attention! (Above I said: their incorrect 2x focal length "crop factor")

Actually, some sources hold that the half-frame format is 24x17mm rather than 18mm, and this makes a certain sense because there's a bit of space between frames, and half frame has not only twice as many frames, but also twice as many inter-frame spaces. And, keeping a reasonable width, these extra spaces have to come from somewhere... Measuring my Pen frames crudely with a plastic caliper, it seems they are about 17.2mm each. That would raise the "crop factor" to about 1.47x

[kb244]

LoL for simplicity sakes I guess I'll continue to refer to it as 1.4 (lil easier to assume 25 seems like 35 as opposed to 36.75) , however when it gets up into the higher lens say 250mm thats a difference of 350mm vs 367.5mm

[raid]

I sometimes use my Pentax SMC lenses on the Pen FT via an adapter for M42 to Olympus mount. If we take the 1.44 factor into account, a 50mm/1.4 becomes an improved 72mm/1.4 lens with higher resolution due to shooting through the center of the lens. Using a 85mm/1.8 lens would give you a 122mm/1.8 lens!

Raid

[kb244]

Originally Posted by raid

I sometimes use my Pentax SMC lenses on the Pen FT via an adapter for M42 to Olympus mount. If we take the 1.44 factor into account, a 50mm/1.4 becomes an improved 72mm/1.4 lens with higher resolution due to shooting through the center of the lens. Using a 85mm/1.8 lens would give you a 122mm/1.8 lens!

Raid

if I could even find the damn adapter ( either M42, or Canon FD) I would be doing just what you said since I got plenty of lens for either.

[shadowfox]

Originally Posted by kb244

Speaking of original Pen.

Kinda getting 'cute' I just need an OM-1 then.

Not so fast, you need a Pen D, EED, EM, W, S, EE-S, EL, then you can start your OM...

[kb244]

Originally Posted by shadowfox

Not so fast, you need a Pen D, EED, EM, W, S, EE-S, EL, then you can start your OM...

Nawwwwwww besides I have no desire for fully automatic RFs (EE*) Pen D maybe...

[raid]

Originally Posted by kb244

if I could even find the damn adapter ( either M42, or Canon FD) I would be doing just what you said since I got plenty of lens for either.

Karl,

Nobody actually must use the half-frame cameras, but they are fun to use. Having such an adapter opens the door for using other lenses that we may not have for the Pen F.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by raid

Karl,

Nobody actually must use the half-frame cameras, but they are fun to use. Having such an adapter opens the door for using other lenses that we may not have for the Pen F.

This I already understand just a matter of how difficult they are to find, and if you do they're like 350$. Because you know sometimes I might just want to have a small little SLR body on me, and then pick up a nice fast 50 or 85mm prime to slap on the front cheap.

[Doug]

Originally Posted by raid

Having such an adapter opens the door for using other lenses that we may not have for the Pen F.

Very true, Raid; it opens up whole new worlds of lenses to get more use out of the sleek little bodies!

Four years ago I got an M42 adapter from Kevin Cameras, and it's been useful... though the lenses must be stopped down manually for exposure if you focus wide open. I've used my 28mm SMC and 50/1.4 on the Pen and it works fine.

So KevinCameras was the first place I thought of when the adapter subject arose here, and I just went to his site to have a look. He has two M42 adapters now, $145 and $165. Plus an OM adapter, a bunch for Nikon and a whole slew of Exacta adapters. These others are more expensive than the M42 ones.

http://www.kevincameras.com/index.html and then click on Pen F in the list below, then choose "Misc" category. He usually carries a lot of Pen F stuff, fun to look over...

[raid]

Doug:
The asking price of about $150 is not too bad.
I may have paid $35 or so for the M42 adapter; this was many years ago though. I get very sharp results with the SMC 85mm/1.8 and the Pen FT.

Raid

[Cale Arthur]

Now that i have some OM glass, one of the OM adapters would be nice to have around, but, strangely, they seem to be the toughest adapters to find..

Both Mount Magic and the hilariously-named Screw World make replacement lens mounts that adapt some pretty exotic lenses to the F's (Alpa, Robot, and a bunch of other oddities).. still just as expensive, though, and not as 'modular'.

--c--

[ZeissFan]

Originally Posted by Doug

Very true, Raid; it opens up whole new worlds of lenses to get more use out of the sleek little bodies!

Four years ago I got an M42 adapter from Kevin Cameras, and it's been useful... though the lenses must be stopped down manually for exposure if you focus wide open. I've used my 28mm SMC and 50/1.4 on the Pen and it works fine.

So KevinCameras was the first place I thought of when the adapter subject arose here, and I just went to his site to have a look. He has two M42 adapters now, $145 and $165. Plus an OM adapter, a bunch for Nikon and a whole slew of Exacta adapters. These others are more expensive than the M42 ones.

http://www.kevincameras.com/index.html and then click on Pen F in the list below, then choose "Misc" category. He usually carries a lot of Pen F stuff, fun to look over...

Fun to look at, but not too fun for your bank account. Most of his eBay stuff is WAY WAY WAY overpriced. It's far beyond dissuading resellers.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by ZeissFan

Fun to look at, but not too fun for your bank account. Most of his eBay stuff is WAY WAY WAY overpriced. It's far beyond dissuading resellers.

Yea, I was bout to say "Hey isn't that the same guy who has the stuff waayyy overpriced on ebay?"

yet he seems to be like one of maybe two of the only people on ebay to have them.

[kb244]

Just so you guys know, I did an actual live shoot today and the Pen FT performed well, I can't really complain.


Ilford FP4+ 125
Kodak Tmax 1+4 68F 8min

[Doug]

Nice shot indeed, Karl! Smooth gradations and just a bit of texture from the grain. I like FP4 in the Pen F @250 in Diafine, partly for the grain structure.

I agree Kevin is expensive, and caters to the collector crowd. But when you want something, and he's got it, then you can opt to pay to get it. I suspect his eBay prices are even higher than his online store prices though. I noted a few months ago he was offering on eBay something I wanted, with a BIN of $650 or Best Offer. I offered $450 and he countered with $499 and I declined. He's kept renewing his 30-day auction and I think it's still up now with a dozen or so offers either declined or expired. So be it... I found the item elsewhere for about what I'd offered him.

So if one has a yen for, say, a 70mm f2 Zuiko for Pen F, one can shop at Kevin's and pick among 3 or 4 different ones at varying conditions and (highish) prices... and maybe bite the bullet.

For a while I was shopping for a good M42 SMC 55mm f1.8 just to use on the Pen adapter, figuring the equivalent ~80mm would be pretty useful. And this lens has a good reputation.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by Doug

Nice shot indeed, Karl! Smooth gradations and just a bit of texture from the grain. I like FP4 in the Pen F @250 in Diafine, partly for the grain structure.

I had least couple people look at the photo above and then say something like "grain is an understatement" as if its got like too much ( I dunno guess in the digital age, any grain is too much grain and the girls gota look like plastic ).

[raid]

Originally Posted by kb244

I had least couple people look at the photo above and then say something like "grain is an understatement" as if its got like too much ( I dunno guess in the digital age, any grain is too much grain and the girls gota look like plastic ).

Karl:
The posted photo is a fine one.
Why did you choose to take it with a half-frame camera?
Was there a specific reason for doing so or did you simply want to excercise the Pen FT?

Raid

[raid]

These are two photos of my daughters, taken with the Pen FT and the 38mm/1.8 lens on TMZ3200 for extra grain.

Raid

http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=5859392
http://www.photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=5859354

[Doug]

Nice, Raid! Yes, I think nowadays one reason to choose the half-frame is to bring in noticeable grain as a picture element. High acutance and sharp grain would be preferable to a solvent developer and mushy grain with less sharpness.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by raid

Karl:
The posted photo is a fine one.
Why did you choose to take it with a half-frame camera?
Was there a specific reason for doing so or did you simply want to excercise the Pen FT?

Raid

A number of reasons.
1) I wanted the benefits of an SLR but the compact and sleak design of a rangefinder due to my habit of ALWAYS carrying a camera with me.
2) I wanted to have the "option" of being a shutter bug if I so wished.
3) I wanted the ability to 'emphasis' the grain pattery on some of my favorite emulsions.
4) Interchangibility on such a small camera sounded fun, along with flash sync up to 1/500th of a second.
5) Bragging rights.

Also...
It really helps when you scan on a proper scanner as opposed to my flatbed. These are some of the results from the Nikon Super Coolscan 8000 ED, with autofocusing point set on the eyes. The scans earlier were off my Canon 8400F flatbed scanner.







Nice thing is the grain structure is still visible just much more clarity to it.

[raid]

These are beautiful scans and photos. The eyes have it.

Raid

[kb244]

Originally Posted by raid

These are beautiful scans and photos. The eyes have it.

Raid

And for your curiousity a 100% crop at 4000 dpi.

[ZeissFan]

Originally Posted by kb244

Also...
It really helps when you scan on a proper scanner as opposed to my flatbed. These are some of the results from the Nikon Super Coolscan 8000 ED, with autofocusing point set on the eyes. The scans earlier were off my Canon 8400F flatbed scanner.

How did you autofocus with the Olympus Pen? Or do you mean that you can set the scanner's focus point? That sounds like a great feature for a scanner.

Either way, excellent photos.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by ZeissFan

How did you autofocus with the Olympus Pen? Or do you mean that you can set the scanner's focus point? That sounds like a great feature for a scanner.

Either way, excellent photos.

Sorry for the confusion, it was a feature of the Nikon scanner that we somehow missed in all the time the store had the scanner. The idea is that even in the holder there is still 'some' film curvature of the 35mm strip (where as the scanner has a very good 120 holder where it grabs one side and you pull it tight to straight and lock it into place) we discovered the ever so obvious 'focus' icon on the control panel and we ran some test first scanning like we always do letting the scanner do it's own autofocus, then by taking the focus point and clicking the area we wanted it to focus and it did it's own auto focus then we scaned again, the difference was most definitly noticible, as you could actually see the grain structure quite crisp and clear at 100% when scanned at 4000 dpi as opposed to being ever so mildly soft. It really helps when you know where you want the scanner to focus, we knew it had autofocus just didn't know about the specific ability to tell it where to zero in on.

If the Oly Pen had an autofocus lens, no doubt would it be ever-so-horrible as Canon's autofocus zoom lens they made for the Canon FD mount that was slower than doom and looked equally as ugly.

[kb244]

Originally Posted by ZeissFan

Fun to look at, but not too fun for your bank account. Most of his eBay stuff is WAY WAY WAY overpriced. It's far beyond dissuading resellers.

I noticed that he has the same things on his own site at cheaper prices, but an automatic 10$ shipping on his own site as opposed to 2$ to 5$ on an ebay winning. For example there was a 135$ M42 adapter on his ebay, so I sent him a best offer of 100$, then countered with 125$, then I noticed the exact same one on his website (despite saying EX++ condition theres a small rust spot on the back as shown in the picture) for 120$ but wanted 10$ for shipping which would be 130$ total. I guess even if I went with the counter offer on the ebay auction I'd still be paying the same just saving 5$ from 135$. Either way was the lowest I've seen the adpter for thus far, he says he'll ship it out monday and shall see from there. Lucky I had a large format lens sitting around that I wasn't using to get in the money to pay for the adapter.

Right now I'm in the process of making a Canon FD adapter cutting up a Bowen slide duplicator adapter and attatching a FD body mount unscrewed from a pulverized AE-1.