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Olympus OM E.Zuiko 200mm F4
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PostPosted: Sat May 09, 2015 2:39 am    Post subject: Olympus OM E.Zuiko 200mm F4 Reply with quote
I found a few threads on this lens but they generally seemed to kind of peter out in a single post and ... not be about much. If a mod wants to move this then that's fine Very Happy

I'm quite happy with it so far. Perhaps not the best technical image quality but I quite like what comes out the other end of it - kind of ineffable quality to it that is just, well, really pleasant to me.

Some samples, shot at f4-5.6 (CA is kind of well, nasty here sometimes), RAWs via my PEN E-P5, done in Olympus Viewer 3 to mimic SOOC jpgs (0 sharp, 0 contrast, 0 saturation, normal graduation, no noise removal, natural colour profile, warm colour off). Please forgive any elementary errors in composition or exposure since they were mainly just taken to show the lens at its nastiest, and typically shot into the light as well.

Click for full size.
















Some from a day later, usually around F/8-11. PP this time (some with some fairly savage highlight / exposure recovery and CA removal). Birding is not my thing and birding with an MF lens is uh, well, let us say I experienced a greater degree of difficulty than I expected Very Happy





these turned out OK though, I thought -






Some flowers - CA/bright/sharp work only, colours left at SOOC levels -










For a lens that cost $69aud, in excellent condition (seller's words, better than a lot of stuff I've seen rated as such) with a UV filter and caps thrown in - this was pretty damn good, I thought.


PostPosted: Sun May 17, 2015 10:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote










I'm an ... indifferent birder (you are looking at something like shots 15 through 20 I have successfully taken of any birds ever here Very Happy) but it occurs to me that once you ditch the entirely useless UV filter off the front of this lens and give it a little PP work, it is not at all bad image quality wise.


PostPosted: Sun May 17, 2015 10:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
I would be happy with that lens, you have some fine pictures from it.


PostPosted: Mon May 18, 2015 2:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Nice shots, and yes birding with a mf lens is a challenge. :0)


PostPosted: Mon May 18, 2015 2:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Yeah I guess if you only see the ones that work collected like this, it seems pretty good Very Happy

For the bolder and more common birds you can find anywhere here (rainbow lorikeets, noisy miners, butcherbirds etc) you can pretty much shoot as much as you like. It's when you find something slightly more rare or shy, or you get an opportunity to shoot a bird doing something specific that's hard to repeat, that the cursing begins!

Also I should post some shots of this with the Vivitar 2x Macro Focusing Teleconverter on it - it's pretty funny looking even fitting it on my camera (combination of OM/M43 adapter, extended 2xmftc, lens, extended lens hood is not small). And then you get, what, an 800mm F16 equivalent lens to try and swing around and aim at things, with some truly psychedelic CA even at that Very Happy


PostPosted: Mon May 18, 2015 7:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
That would be a fun photo! You should take a shot of the extended rig next time.
I just learned about the Vivitar macro converter and picked up a Canon version to try out. Looks quite impressive for a 2x teleconverter. Images don't suffer much degradation.

I also have this OM Zuiko 200 f/4. If I hadn't run across this post, I think I would have forgotten all about it. Initial test shots were quite good, with color like your wonderful captures. But I didn't see much if any CA. Only some PF in OOF areas.

I've discovered 200mm isn't a FL I often use on my APS-C Sony. Plus I found a cheap Konica 200 f/3.5 that was notably sharper than the Zuiko. That pushed the Zuiko further back on the stack.

A few quick test shots...

DSC02260 by wNG 555, on Flickr
DSC02268c by wNG 555, on Flickr
DSC02288c by wNG 555, on Flickr

The shot of the bomber is a crop. I heard a some odd sounding engines and looked up. Photo op! Like birds, this one came out surprisingly clean for a manual-focused moving object capture.


PostPosted: Tue May 19, 2015 12:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Wow nice catch with the B-25!

Some samples from when I first put the 200mm/f4 and Vivitar 2xmftc together - unfortunately the weather here has been pretty miserable the last few days so I only have a few from a brief period of bright sunlight a few days back. Similar subjects to before and as in the top of the first post just at camera default post process, pretty sure all of them are at maximum extension on the tube and closest possible focusing distance.



^ same flower as compared to the Tokina 90 2.5 here - http://forum.mflenses.com/tokina-at-x-90mm-2-5-macro-t71198.html#1436768 Very Happy



^ the CA seems to go in several directions at once if you've got a highlight in focus, and OOF areas seem to head into green in a way that seems more difficult than usual to remove, since there's not really an "edge" to it.





Very difficult to use handheld, even with the E-P5's 5 axis IBIS - though again as an 800mm equivalent doing macro from a few feet away I should probably be grateful to have gotten anything at 1/125 - 1/200 Very Happy. Nonetheless these are pretty much the best picks out of a dozen or so attempts at each. Would maybe be usable stopped down more but it's already quite a slow lens used "wide open" with the MFTC extended.

Should also add, it's quite possible there are better examples of this lens - I came across something some time ago (on photo.net ?) detailing what the different initials and markings indicated on the 200mm f/4, and I believe this is one of the earlier non-multicoated versions (e.zuiko, no "mc" mark).

Oh and - mounted and everything fully extended -



Hoping that when it arrives, the Vivitar 135 2.8 Close Focusing turns out to be more agreeable with the 2xmftc Very Happy


PostPosted: Tue May 19, 2015 4:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Very cool and LONG set up. Wink

Still pretty impressive, resolution is still acceptable. Looking forward to trying this Vivitar 2x MFTC.

So, you got me curious and I went to dig out my Zuiko, and it's a later release, with MC and black nose.
I think I'll keep it out and capture some light with it. I just got another Zuiko that I've been jonesing for, a 24mm f/2.8. Take the two of them with me next chance I get.


PostPosted: Tue May 19, 2015 1:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
WNG555 wrote:
Very cool and LONG set up. Wink

Still pretty impressive, resolution is still acceptable. Looking forward to trying this Vivitar 2x MFTC.

So, you got me curious and I went to dig out my Zuiko, and it's a later release, with MC and black nose.
I think I'll keep it out and capture some light with it. I just got another Zuiko that I've been jonesing for, a 24mm f/2.8. Take the two of them with me next chance I get.


Yeah I'd been looking at the old OM Zuiko lineup for treats - basically was attempting to get the most bang for buck out of the adapter and 2xmftc, although that plan fell through once I had to substitute a Nikon mount Tokina 90 2.5 for the OM Vivitar S1 90 2.5. Was initially lusting after the 90/f2 as a macro lens in that length but the prices were ~3x what you could get a Bokina for, which just didn't seem worth it at all - nice as the Zuiko looks, the lens case or hood individually seem to go for about 1/2 a Bokina Very Happy

Still there are enough other nice looking toys in it like the 24 and 50 at semi reasonable prices, and I have the other Vivitar 135 2.8 CF coming for it, so that should be enough amusement for a while.

Edit - oh and yes, regardless of anything else, the resolution of the 200/f4 is a nice surprise - the shot of the rainbow lorikeet side-on to the camera produces a few isolated spots of moire even before compression/resizing, so it's probably safe to say it's good enough in that regard. Just need weather that supports shooting at around F8 / 1/200 on it Very Happy


PostPosted: Sun Nov 10, 2024 3:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Yesterday a got an late multicoated version of the lens, an "OLYMPUS OM-SYSTEM ZUIKO MC AUTO-T 1:4 f=200mm". Unlike other Zuiko lenses for the OM SLR system, this one is neither smaller nor lighter than the corresponding lenses from other manufacturers. At 516g (measured) it's as heavy as the first (bigger and larger) version of the Minolta MD 4/200mm (518g), and only a few g lighter than the Nikkor Ai 4/200mm (533g). The Minolta and the Oly have almost exactly the same length, and the Nikkor is about 10mm shorter.

Performance-wise I can't say much yet - we have some quite nasty fog here, not favourable for tele lens testing indeed!

A few indoor shots at a distance of about 10 m have shown the Olympus to be comparable to the Minolta MD-I 4/200mm and the Nikkor Ai 4/200mm. On 24 MP FF cameras, their center resolution is excellent even at f4, and corner resolution is very good for all these lenses mentioned, too. Their only weakness are lateral and longitudinal CAs - it remains to be seen whether one of these lenses is really better than the other ones (I doubt it). It also will be interesting to see how these lenses perform on cameras of the 50 MP camera class.

S


PostPosted: Sun Nov 10, 2024 5:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Looking forward to your images. Olympus lenses IMHO, though generally excellent, vary from focal length to focal length in their rankings vs competitor lenses. The 200 f4 is just OK, the 28mm f2 is just OK. The 90mm F2 macro is stellar. The 50mm 1.2 is very very good. The 40mm f2 is stellar. The 135mm 2.8 is just OK. But as you mention they were demonstrably better at "small sizing" quality lenses vs competition in most cases.


PostPosted: Sun Nov 10, 2024 5:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
jamaeolus wrote:
Looking forward to your images. Olympus lenses IMHO, though generally excellent, vary from focal length to focal length in their rankings vs competitor lenses. The 200 f4 is just OK, the 28mm f2 is just OK. The 90mm F2 macro is stellar. The 50mm 1.2 is very very good. The 40mm f2 is stellar. The 135mm 2.8 is just OK. But as you mention they were demonstrably better at "small sizing" quality lenses vs competition in most cases.


some of their latter nMC coatings are praised to be somehow the best , but in some cases, didn´t smaller size come with more wignette (in FF of course)?


PostPosted: Sun Nov 10, 2024 7:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
jamaeolus wrote:
Looking forward to your images. Olympus lenses IMHO, though generally excellent, vary from focal length to focal length in their rankings vs competitor lenses. The 200 f4 is just OK, the 28mm f2 is just OK. The 90mm F2 macro is stellar. The 50mm 1.2 is very very good. The 40mm f2 is stellar. The 135mm 2.8 is just OK. But as you mention they were demonstrably better at "small sizing" quality lenses vs competition in most cases.


It's most probably a question of their respective age. As you know I've been comparing lots of lenses under controlled conditions and side-by-side. Quite often there are

* more differences between different lens generations from the same manufacturer than
* between lenses of the same generation but from different manufacturers

The two Oly lenses you regard as "stellar" are from the late 1980s (2.8/90 Macro) or from 1983 (2/40). It's no wonder they are better than the other lenses you mention as "just OK". We can observe similar diferences in the performance of 1970s vs 1990 lenses also at Leica (R and M) and at C Zeiss/Contax (e. g. CY 2.8/21mm and 2/100mm).

That said, the Olympus OM 4/200mm seems to be a pretty capable lens for 24 MP FF, as long as you can circumvent the LoCAs and/or remove the lateral CAs by postprocessing.

I'm looking forward to test & compare the lens with other well known 200mm MF lenses ...

S
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