Home

Please support mflenses.com if you need any graphic related work order it from us, click on above banner to order!
SearchSearch MemberlistMemberlist RegisterRegister ProfileProfile Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages Log inLog in

Rubinar 500mm f5.6 mirror lens, tested with Oly OM-D E-M5
Post new topic   Reply to topic
Home   Manual Focus Lenses
View previous topic :: View next topic  


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 9:51 pm    Post subject: Rubinar 500mm f5.6 mirror lens, tested with Oly OM-D E-M5 Reply with quote
Rubinar 500mm f5.6 mirror lens

500mm focal length
F5.6 fixed aperture
Minimum focus distance approx. 2.2m
M42 mount
105 x 1 mm filter thread
Built-in tripod collar with very nice rotation feature that has clicks every 45°
Lens weighs 1520 g with hood fitted and no caps (information added after original posting)
According to the booklet (all in Russian) the lens was made on 23/11/94, so its 18 years old today. Happy birthday!

Pictures of the lens on the E-M5 (added after original posting)







This is the sharpest mirror lens that I have; better than both the Zuiko and Tamron 55B 500mm f8 lenses, both of which are very good performers. There is a caveat in that the close-focus performance (within 4m or so) is not so good and the Tamron is definitely better.

Of course, it is not an easy lens to use. Depth of field is very thin at f5.6, and with an equivalent focal length of 1000mm on 4/3 getting accurate focus is tricky. These shots were all made with the Oly OM-D E-M5 using a monopod. I found switching the EVF to the fast refresh rate was essential to get a good focus whilst using the magnified view (just 5x magnification). Otherwise, the inevitable wobble causes the image to smear and focus cannot be judged. I wish Oly would introduce focus peaking.

All test shots have a small amount of PP, viz. a tweak to the levels and a small amount of sharpening. Image contrast is actually good by default (I used the supplied hood and the sun was behind me) but almost anything can be improved with a bit of levels adjustment.

First shots, some very exotic bird life. Laughing


#1


#2


#3 100% crop from above


#4


#5


#6


#7 100% crop from above


#8


Last edited by SXR_Mark on Sat Nov 24, 2012 5:29 pm; edited 2 times in total


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 9:57 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I tried some shots of fast moving objects. Hopeless!! I am not able to judge focus without using the magnified view, but it is impossible to follow anything moving quickly with the magnified view and a lens of this FL. These were the best I got. They aren't very good and the first one isn't even moving quickly!!


#1


#2 This is quite soft, but a nice shot anyway.


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 10:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Now some more gentle action. The lens really works well here. I think this is a great lens. Only someone who cannot tolerate the bokeh would be displeased with it.


#1 Ok, this is not a great shot to start with, but it does show how sharp this lens can be.


#2


#3 100% crop from above


#4


#5


#6 100% crop from above


#7


#8


#9 100% crop from above


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 10:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Thank you for sharing this review, photographer make difference until this review I thought this lens is less good than Tamron or other Russian mirrors.


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 11:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Attila wrote:
Thank you for sharing this review, photographer make difference until this review I thought this lens is less good than Tamron or other Russian mirrors.


Thank you, Attila. It's my pleasure and privilege to contribute to your wonderful site.

This is a crop from the test chart shots I did to compare the Rubinar with the Tamron. The extra resolving power of the Rubinar is quite clear to see.



Mark


PostPosted: Fri Nov 23, 2012 11:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Indeed, very visible!


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 6:00 am    Post subject: Re: Rubinar 500mm f5.6 mirror lens, tested with Oly OM-D E-M Reply with quote
SXR_Mark wrote:
I wish Oly would introduce focus peaking.


If they would, you would find out that it is not very helpful.

SXR_Mark wrote:

First shots, some very exotic bird life. Laughing


Looks excellent, especially considering that this lens was not designed for the MFT format. Looks like you benefited from some sunny days too.

How heavy is this lens?

Thanks for posting these great samples.


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 10:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Enlightening review, thanks for the effort. Smile


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 11:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Very nice, is this the same as the MTO


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 12:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Tervueren wrote:
Very nice, is this the same as the MTO


No MTO have two version smaller is F8, faster is F6.3.


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 12:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Thank you Atilla, never really considered getting a mirror lens but results from this one look very good. I guess they fetch a good price.


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 12:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I think that's very good. I have not seen a better result, created by a mirror lens. Sharp, fast and with not too disturbing donuts in bokeh Wink


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 5:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Thanks to everyone for the kind comments.

For future reference, I've added pictures of the lens to the original post.

Laurentiu Cristofor wrote:
SXR_Mark wrote:
I wish Oly would introduce focus peaking.

If they would, you would find out that it is not very helpful.


Do you say this because it does not work accurately or because it is not useful with moving subjects?

Laurentiu Cristofor wrote:
Looks like you benefited from some sunny days too.


Yes, I was lucky with a couple of sunny days. Winter sun is good for photography, but is in short supply in northern England. Some very pretty smiles also helped. Very Happy

Laurentiu Cristofor wrote:
How heavy is this lens?


The lens weighs 1520 g with hood fitted but without caps. (I've added this info to the data at the start of the original posting). It's not light, but is well balanced with the E-M5 when mounted via the lens tripod collar.

Tervueren wrote:
Very nice, is this the same as the MTO


Thanks. This link has a good summary of Russian mirror lens types

Tervueren wrote:
I guess they fetch a good price.


This one cost me £120, which I personally think is cheap for a lens of this calibre. It's not "mint". There is a slight mark on the front element and a few very feint scratches on the rear element, but they have no discernible effect on the performance. There are also some minor cosmetic marks. The 500mm f5.6 lenses do not appear very often, so it is not easy to give a "typical" price. A good Tamron 500mm f8 will sell for about this in the UK.

izvar wrote:
I think that's very good. I have not seen a better result, created by a mirror lens. Sharp, fast and with not too disturbing donuts in bokeh Wink


Thanks. I think it possible that the donuts are less obvious due to the faster aperture (f5.6 vs the usual f8 ). But you can't get away from them entirely with a mirror lens. Very Happy

Mark


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 9:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
WOW.
that's a good one for sure.
Nice series and thank you for sharing.
I'm quite surprised by your comparison with the Tamron SP 500 F8. Which version was it : 55B or 55BB ?
http://www.adaptall-2.org/index.html


PostPosted: Sat Nov 24, 2012 9:52 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Olivier wrote:
WOW.
that's a good one for sure.
Nice series and thank you for sharing.
I'm quite surprised by your comparison with the Tamron SP 500 F8. Which version was it : 55B or 55BB ?
http://www.adaptall-2.org/index.html


Thanks!

My Tamron is the earlier 55B. My Zuiko 500mm f8 is only a whisker sharper, so I always considered the Tamron a top-notch mirror lens.

Mark


PostPosted: Tue Nov 27, 2012 7:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
SXR_Mark wrote:

Do you say this because it does not work accurately or because it is not useful with moving subjects?


My experience with it was that it's not very accurate when your DOF is really thin. And the DOF you get from this Rubinar, which is rather fast for a 500mm mirror, is really thin. And if focus peaking is not accurate on static subjects, then it won't help at all with moving ones. I also expect that the lower microcontrast of mirror lenses would challenge focus peaking even more than usual.

You can perhaps experiment on your E-M5 with this trick to simulate focus peaking.

The challenge for the focus peaking is that it is generic and it has to use thresholds that covers a wide range of lenses that have different MTF curves. See this article for some details. It might also be that it will use even larger thresholds just to make sure that it actually gets to highlight enough of an area to make it visible in the EVF/LCD. This means that it will err on the side of highlighting areas that are not quite in focus. With thin DOF I found this to be more distracting than helpful.

SXR_Mark wrote:

The lens weighs 1520 g with hood fitted but without caps. (I've added this info to the data at the start of the original posting). It's not light, but is well balanced with the E-M5 when mounted via the lens tripod collar.


Thanks for the info!
Post new topic   Reply to topic
Home   Manual Focus Lenses
Page 1 of 1