The Great Cheapo Lens Challenge - 1 (Optomax 2.8/28)

[miran]

The lens just arrived from Austria this morning. Thanks, Patrick! It does look ugly, I can't wait to see what kind of photos it can take. Will post soon.

[miran]

I'm done!

To be honest I didn't find this lens to be as bad as some have said. Well, I wouldn't want to actually put it in my bag, but it can make acceptable images as long as you don't need sharpness outside the center, apertures larger than f/5.6 or straight lines near the edges. I didn't see any CA or flare issues but that's probably because I didn't get to shoot it in conditions that will give problems in this regard.

Here are my results, all taken with a NEX-5, converted from raw and postprocessed in whatever way was necessary to make them look presentable (including a bit o straightening and mild cropping on one or two):

1. Close up (which can double as a street shot):



2. Landscape (with a sort of building included):



3. Building(s):



4. Street (I don't do street photography so I'm showing a photo of a street instead):



5. Portrait (of a stuffed animal toy sitting on a balcony rail covered in pigeon crap):



Summary. What I don't like about this lens: looks ugly and is fiddly to operate, unusable for serious purposes wide open (or even at f/4 if you're not very forgiving), gets very soft very quickly when going away from the image centre (even on an APS-C sensor), bad distortion, long MFD. What I like: nothing.

I eagerly await further instructions.

[peterqd]

Wow Miran, how did you do that??? So superior to mine. This lens seems to have been improved while on its travels!

[miran]

Hehe, nothing special. There's not even any special postprocessing, just normal raw conversion (my personal default settings) plus some obvious oversharpening. I should dial that back a bit actually. These were all taken at f/5.6 and f/8 (didn't keep notes so though) except the last one which is at f/4. I wouldn't dare try to use this lens at f/2.8 unless I was going for a very old style lo-fi look. Also I think the weather helped me. In strong sunlight who knows what would happen. But anyway the drop in sharpness towards the edges is really quite apparent even at this small size in 2, 3 and 4. I wouldn't recommend this lens to anyone.

But the biggest problem I had with it was the focusing. With my adapter it focused way past infinity and judging focus even on my NEX with focus peaking was difficult. Wide open it's not sharp and contrasty enough for focus peaking to work and stopped down most of the time too much of the frame is in focus to be able to nail it without having to go into x7 close-up mode.

Anyway, it was a nice experience, but I'll gladly send it to the next person in line. Until then I might actually take it out again if I find the time.

[miran]

Took it out to see some sun before I send it off to Finland. To be honest I think it's not that bad apart from the massive flare. I hope it's ok to post here. Frames 1, 2 and 5 are all wide open, I think, 3 and 4 are stopped down to f/5.6 or f/8, can't remember:

1.


2.


3.


4.


5.

[ManualFocus-G]

The lens is definitely getting better with age I love the third shot from the last set, but everyone is doing really well with such a limited lens

[tanheis]

Received the lens yesterday evening.
Will try the lens and post photos here.

I also have another body (crop) for a while before it's going to my friend in Kenya so I will compare it how it works on both.

[tanheis]

Here are first two shots I took today later evening after while the sun was setting.
These are with full frame and I noticed the corners are soft but center and upper / lower area is not so bad.
Lacks contrast and needs to be adjusted for better images

Lake landscape


Small lake/pond


Same as previous but shot with crop body 500D

[tanheis]

Building #1 (The Tampere Cathedral)


Building #2 (The Tampere Cathedral)


Close up


Street shot

[Attila]

Hey so many excellent shoots from a 'crappy lens' clearly shows, subject,light , photographer much more important than lens , camera. Race to have better camera , better lens quiet funny if we see this results.

[hoanpham]

[tanheis]

Portrait


Focusing this lens is awful and I do it always with live view.

[tanheis]

Lens is travelling to Norway at the moment.
Soon we will see snowy images here from Norway?
We got some snow here as snow storm arrived here on Friday.

[hoanpham]

Picking note is here. I hope to get it before the post office is closing...

[DigiChromeEd]

Has this challenge died?