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Vivitar Series 1 24-48mm
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PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 12:27 am    Post subject: Vivitar Series 1 24-48mm Reply with quote

I did loan this lens from my friend to give it a try. Huge glass Kiron made and perform pretty well , but certainly not same well than a good prime. Any experience ?

My pictures are here.

http://forum.mflenses.com/vivitar-series-1-24-48mm-panasonic-g1-t47458.html


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 12:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

This is probably my number 1 walkabout lens, It never disappoints me, I get a very good hit rate from this lens.
It's big, it flares, but I love it. Nice colours and sharp. I use a Cokin P Series hood sometimes and that helps a lot.

And best of all. it's a great length for a zoom on a DSLR. I paid about £40 for mine and I would have paid more if I knew how good it was.


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 12:46 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Is this the Macro? Very Happy


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 11:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Mine isn't, it a constant 3.8 aperture which is good though.


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 12:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lloydy wrote:
Mine isn't, it a constant 3.8 aperture which is good though.


+1 mine too


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 3:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I made this post in your picture thread, but is probably more appropriate here, so this is a repeat...

It's pretty much understood that a zoom won't be as good as a prime, right? Still, that seems pretty good performance for a zoom of that era. Today is different with some of the high end zooms offering outstanding performance that equals older primes. With that constant aperture, does it hold focus throughout the zoom?


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 3:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've tried a lot of zooms, all older ones and I've only found a very few that were even mediocre, the rest were awful. I can name just four that I would rate as good, all Konicas - 28-135, 70-150, 65-135 and UC 80-200.


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 6:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

woodrim wrote:
I made this post in your picture thread, but is probably more appropriate here, so this is a repeat...

It's pretty much understood that a zoom won't be as good as a prime, right? Still, that seems pretty good performance for a zoom of that era. Today is different with some of the high end zooms offering outstanding performance that equals older primes. With that constant aperture, does it hold focus throughout the zoom?
Both place fine to me, usually people like to make discussion here , this is main reason why I start two thread on a lens.


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 8:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quick and dirty test, across the room focused on a wall light maybe 20 feet away, lens wide open, it seems to retain focus as I zoom.

I'll bang it on a tripod outside tomorrow and be a bit more scientific. Wink


PostPosted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 8:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lloydy wrote:
Quick and dirty test, across the room focused on a wall light maybe 20 feet away, lens wide open, it seems to retain focus as I zoom.

I'll bang it on a tripod outside tomorrow and be a bit more scientific. Wink


I have noticed none of my Konicas are parfocal, they do vary in how varifocal they are though.


PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2012 4:11 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I tried it out today on a tripod to see if the focus stays fixed through the zoom range, and it does. I tried the lens at 7 meters and 0.6 meter. Set at f3.8 - 8 and 22, then zoomed from 48mm to 24 mm. At no time did I alter the focus ring.

The long shots are focused on the reddish stone in the centre.
The close shots were focused on the corner of the stone.

#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

forum.mflenses.com/userpix/20122/1849_Image00011_1.jpg[/img][/url]


#13

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#18


PostPosted: Sun Feb 26, 2012 4:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I must have been thinking about one of the other Vivitar zooms that required re-focusing with every zoom change. Still, I'm not sure that I'd trust the focus so much that I wouldn't refocus anyway. I might trust going from tele to wide more than the reverse.


PostPosted: Sun Aug 23, 2015 7:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

woodrim wrote:
With that constant aperture, does it hold focus throughout the zoom?

I know the answer to this question arrives more than three years late, but I got this lens yesterday and page 4 of the instruction manual says the following:

"The cam-operated zooming system of your Series 1 lens will maintain the focus as you zoom to your desired focal length. When precise focus is critical, recheck the focus after zooming".


PostPosted: Sun Aug 23, 2015 8:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thank you.


PostPosted: Sun Aug 23, 2015 10:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I still have this lens, and I guess I always will. It's that good. Cool


PostPosted: Mon Aug 24, 2015 12:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

woodrim wrote:
I must have been thinking about one of the other Vivitar zooms that required re-focusing with every zoom change. Still, I'm not sure that I'd trust the focus so much that I wouldn't refocus anyway. I might trust going from tele to wide more than the reverse.

You might have been thinking of the VS1 35-85mm F2.8, which even says "Auto Variable Focusing" on the front bezel. (?)

As for touching up the focus after zooming, that's something I always do (compulsive, I guess). I tend to assume that "parfocalness"/"parfocality" (what is the noun?) is an approximate convenience - that is to say, I assume a parfocal lens tries to keep the focus close while I zoom, but it's up to me to verify or obtain final focus.

This is more "spontaneous" with a "one touch" zoom (as found more often in telephoto zooms), but it requires a more deliberate action (i.e., moving ones hand from one ring to the other) with a "two touch" zoom.

I guess, if a lens were truly (as in 100%) parfocal, I might trust going from shallow-DOF-longer to deep-DOF-wider without refocusing more than the opposite, just as you have suggested.


PostPosted: Mon Aug 24, 2015 12:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lloydy wrote:
I still have this lens, and I guess I always will. It's that good. Cool

+1



PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2018 2:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Is it still an 'always' for you?

That would be amazing, 6 years for a thread regarding a particular lens like this and people still favoring it enough to call it an "always" lens..

Why?....I finally ran across one of these on flea bay ...I have used this zoom focal range extensively from the Tamron, all 3 Nikkors, Tokina, and more and of them I have always preferred the Tamron Adaptall-2 .... but, the series 1 has eluded me until now and it's been a long time coming ...these lenses have souls ....they were truly a labor of love believed impossible to achieve ....and it was and they are all quite good lenses in this range, even though it required huge struggles to develop and people lost their jobs involving some of them (Nikon)...totally ignored today is their significance and largely their performance because now it's just so standard to have broad range zooms as if it were no feat to create them at all ...


Last edited by wildlight images on Fri Feb 09, 2018 5:10 am; edited 1 time in total


PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2018 2:47 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have been very impressed with my copy of this lens - Canon FD mount.
I started a thread on it some time back.
Here:

http://forum.mflenses.com/viewtopic.php?t=77197

Tom


PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2018 10:44 am    Post subject: No stop down Reply with quote

I bought one of these with my OM2N and ran off a test film in Manhattan, and in the evening in Connecticut, over 24 keepers out of 36 Kodak slides, I blew up 4 to 8X12 and a manager in the office asked for a 10X14 of Lower Manhattan. The only issue is a slight blue cast, could be the office window glass, film, film to paper. or the lens.

Sadly the webbing that goes through a lightweight slot failed to stop down on a family holiday Crying or Very sad. I believe this is a common failure.

I still have the lens And would love to have a repair.


PostPosted: Fri Feb 09, 2018 11:11 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Still got it, works just fine on my A6000. Like 1 small



PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 2:33 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Me been trying to get one of these for some time--everyone in here knows why--nice pics everyone. jt


PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 4:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I bought one of these S1 24-48s shortly after I started buying back into Canon FD in 2009. Since then I've had to open it up twice to clean oil off the aperture blades, and the reason why I haven't used it again is because it's aperture blades are stuck once again. Sheesh. I must be doing something wrong -- or at least not to completion.

Anyway I've seen enough photos here that indicate to me just how good this lens is, so I have no excuse. I need to open it up again and this time thoroughly clean the aperture blades. About a year or so ago, I bought the Tamron 13A SP 24-48, and thankfully its aperture blades are working fine. I want to get my Vivitar working again so I can compare the two. True, the Vivitar has a constant f/3.8 aperture, and the Tamron's is variable, but it might as well be constant with a f/3.5-3.8 variability.

Anybody else compared these two lenses? Guess I need to get cracking on my Vivitar.


PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 8:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Just recently i noticed an ad with a Soligor C/D 24-45 lens, is it the same lens as the Vivitar S1?

(the ad is gone, just checked....)


PostPosted: Sat Feb 10, 2018 8:56 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

TrueLoveOne wrote:
Just recently i noticed an ad with a Soligor C/D 24-45 lens, is it the same lens as the Vivitar S1?

(the ad is gone, just checked....)

No, I think that the Soligor is a Sun made lens.
Quite different but it may be a good lens nonetheless, as the C/d line was supposedly their best
Tom