Wide Ideas From Voigtlander and Leica

If you are into landscape photography or architecture with the Leica, Fujifilm X-Pro1, Olympus micro 4/3, Panasonic Micro 4/3. or similar cameras that can take the Leica M-mount lenses, here are two very good ideas.

The first is the Voigtlander 21mm Ultron f:1.8lens. It has an integral metal lens hood as part of the mount but also has a filter thread on the front. heavy, solid construction and 1/2 stop detents between the full stop markings on the aperture ring. Apertures down to f:22. We have one for sale new at $ 1195.

The second lens is the multi-focal type from Leica. The 16-18-21 Tri-Elmar is intended to be used without an additional view-finder - eminently suitable for the Leica M or the new Leica T with the appropriate adapter. It is a little more - $ 6365 - But you can console yourself with the thought that the RRP is $ 7000.

Proof Of The Pudding

You'll recall that the last blog posting mentioned a new wide-angle converter for the Fujifilm X-100 series of cameras. It converts the 23mm lens that is fixed on the X-100 and X-100s to 19mm. You might think that 4 mm wider is not significant...but it really is.

Wide angle photography is a funny business. Leaving out panoramas and wide-format film cameras...and these are truly funny...we come to the way that standard digital cameras can be made to see a wide view of the world. Please keep in mind that wide also means high - when you drop the focal length by whatever means you effectively pack more into the frame vertically as well as horizontally. In other words you don't change the aspect ratio as you shoot.

Except, of course, when you do, Some cameras allow you to shoot in a 16:9 format to accommodate wide-screen television display. One client recently found that his camera has an external switch that does this, and when he inadvertently clicked it over he got image files that do not print out all that well on standard 2:3 inkjet paper. Now he knows.

For my part, I exercised the new converter on the X-100 at the Whiteman Park car show yesterday. There was a Nikon SB 700 helping to add sparkle and to cope with the shadows when the sun came out. It all worked splendidly.

As far as I can determine, the shots from this show are every bit as sharp as those taken with the companion camera - the Fujifilm X-E2 - taken at a previous show. In addition, the leaf shutter of the X-100 meant that I could run the shutter speed up and down for background effect without worrying about  getting the wrong flash synchronisation.

The focal length on the camera is now effectively 19mm and this approximates to 28mm on a full-frame camera. This is wide enough to allow a little closer shooting at a car show but avoids the looming corner effect of wider focal lengths - this is about as wide as you want to go to preserve some proportion in the result.

It must be noted, however, that if you need to go close-in, you need to unscrew the converter, turn off the powerful Nikon SB 700, and use the in-built flash on the camera. If you leave the converter in place you get a semi-circular shadow on the bottom of the image where the lens blocks the light.

Methinks the next stage of experimentation is to put a Fujifilm TTL flash on a coiled cord and see if it can overcome this handicap.

Will Wider be Wiser With Fujifilm?

Justin put me on to it. Or is that put me up to it...?

 He looked at my car pictures and recommended that I use my Fujifilm X 100 for daytime shots - better flash integration than a DSLR and a great deal lighter burden to haul about.

I needed a bit wider view than the fixed lens on the X100. It is 23mm and equates to the view that one would get with a 35mm lens on a film camera. I really wanted the view that one gets with a 24-28mm on a film camera but on the Fujifilm sensor.

Hey, presto, Fujifilm make just the thing. I ordered a WCL X100 converter lens. Mine is black to match the camera, but we also got in two more for stock - another black and a silver. That's what you see paired to the shop's Fujifilm X100s in the picture.

I've tried mine at home in the semi-gloom and it looks like it works - now to try it on Sunday at the car show at Whiteman Park. I shall show you the results so that you can compare them next week.

Note: the converter is actually small and light so it doesn't seriously affect the balance of the camera.

Like Peas In A Pod - With Fuji

Are all mirror-less cameras the same? Are the systems really identical - like peas in a pod? Can you buy one camera and use other lenses? Should you get a body here and the accessories there? How many forums should you read at any one time before your brain explodes?

To give you a quick series of answers; no, no, yes, no, none.

There are at least 6 mirror-less systems that I can think of and only two of them share similar lens mounts. With a bit of a fiddle and two trombones you can adapt some of the other maker's lenses to some of the other maker's bodies but you always drop some of the maker's automatic features...and you frequently pick up optical distortions that make the whole thing an exercise in futility.

While I love to hook up unlikely combinations of optics and sensors - after all I work in a camera shop - I have come to the conclusion that in general you really should stick to the lenses on offer from the particular manufacturer of bodies you have chosen. The exception to this rule would be if  Zeiss offers a lens for your chosen lens mount. These are likely to be very good lenses indeed and you will be asked to trade many potatoes for them.

All the above leads to the subject of this post: the new Fujinon 10-20 lens for their X-mount cameras. Fujifilm are forging ahead with the APS-C sensor cameras - the new X-T1 being hot at present - and they needed to supply a wide angle zoom for the landscapers and interior shooters. The 10-24 will give the same angle of view as a 15-36 would on a full-frame camera, but with a fast autofocus or focus peaking on suitable bodies.

Note: The focus peaking really does work well for manual focus in a studio situation - it makes it easy to see in dim conditions when you are dead on for focus. It also costs a few potatoes but is well worth it.

Fast Relief From Fuji - New Lens Just Arrived

Fuji X-series owners please crowd around.

The new 23mm f:1.4 lens has just come into stock. This is every bit up to the superb Fujinon standard plus it has direct mechanical manual focusing for pre0selecting your distance.

Street shooters in particular will appreciate this - they can estimate a distance, set it and then get a blazingly fast first shot. If they are discrete they can get a blazingly fast second one, too, and then run for it.

The historical focal length equivalence of this is 34.5 mm - classic wide angle and people viewpoint. It could well become the one go-to lens for travelling photographers. The fact that it also focuses as close as 28cm means that it can cope with table-tops.

Come in with your X Pro-1 or X-E1 and give it a go.

It's Just 3 Millimetres...

This is a post dedicated to the mum and dad photographers - the ones who do the family snaps and the holiday pictures and the wedding groups - after the pro has posed the bridal party. The people who take pictures because they want to see what is in the pictures - as opposed to the people who take pictures because they want to take pictures...

Not that we are knocking the latter - where would we be if hordes of us hadn't gone out on every Saturday afternoon and failed to find out where the pictures are...didn't stop us from getting new equipment and neither should it stop you.

But back to the modest family photographers. More often than not they like to take landscape pictures, and pictures inside the school assembly hall, and family groups. The one thing they need more than anything is a wider view of the world - and preferably one that is neither distorted, not expensive, nor hard to get. These are not customers for the widest fish-eye or the exotic rectilinear that costs as much as a TV set. These are the customers for the kit lens.

Canon makes two good options for Mum and Dad - the EF-S 18-55 f:3.5-5,6 IS II and the EF-S 15-85 f:3.5-5.6 IS USM. The first is kitted with a number of the entry-level bodies and the second comes out with the 7D. Of course they can be put on any small-frame EOS Canon, just as you please.

The real eye-opener is when you compare their viewpoints - as you'll see in the images. That 3 mm difference in the wide-angle viewpoint makes a world of difference in what you see. Of course there is a difference in the longer end - 85 mm vs 55 mm but I'll bet in most family circumstances that wide 3 mm will be more useful than the long 30 mm.

Of course there is a cost - greater weight and higher price - but this can be spread out over a long time - Canon lenses keep their value - and it would be great to see more pictures making more mums and dads happy.