Off to Taipei with an M8

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Benjamin Marks

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Off to Taiwan for three weeks. The M8 is coming, natch. Lenses: 15 CV, 24/28 Asph, 35/2 Biogon, 45/2 Contax Planar (converted), 50/1.4 Asph. A crazy set of focal lengths? Maybe, but the Biogon is new and I want to see what it can do, the Planar was just tweaked by DAG and is sooo sweet, the 50 Asph is the lens I don't leave home without . . .

So I'll be taking a break from RFF to actually spend some time in the streets!

Best to all and (to steal shamelessly from a LUGG'er): keep pressing that shutter; it'll come unstuck!

Ben Marks
 
yeah! I want to know who can convert contax G planar lenses for leica M because I know Kocera did better job making Zeiss lenses than cosina. Please let me know.
Thanks
 
caparobertsan said:
yeah! I want to know who can convert contax G planar lenses for leica M because I know Kocera did better job making Zeiss lenses than cosina. Please let me know.
Thanks
Click to expand...

The lens is fully RF-coupled. After a little tweaking, focus is dead on at all apertures and distances. The conversion was done by Hayata Camera Labs in Tokyo, Japan. Actually, the process was a bit of a hassle, because Hayata does not ship outside Japan (or at least not to the US). I had to find a correspondent in Tokyo who was willing to act as a middleman. In the new mount, the lens back-focussed slightly. Rather than deal with sending the lens back to Tokyo, I had DAG tweak it. He did a great job and, for me at least, it has been worth it. The Contax 45/2 Planar is one of my all-time favorites. So much so, that I actually went looking for another on which to do the conversion. I found one for a very reasonable price from an RFF'er; however taking the expense of the conversion into account, you could certainly buy a 50/2 Planar for what I finally paid, all in. Still, I'd been hoping to do this for a while and so far have been very happy with the results.

Hyata, BTW has a web-page in Japanese and they seem to offer M-mount conversion for a range of lenses. Their work was of good quality -- because the original lens is autofocus, they had to create a manual focus helical and tube matched to the 45/2's focus characteristics. The aperture is non-click stop, but works. The final product looks a little bit like a collapsible lens that has been fully extended. FWIW, I had checked around with my favorite repair-people (DAG, Sherry) and machinists in the US and found no one who was willing to both take on the job and guarantee the results. Hayata has done hundreds of these conversions and although there is a hassle factor in getting the lens (and payment!) to them, I wanted someone to do the conversion who had been through the process before.

I'll post some pics at the end of April when I am back from my travels.

Ben Marks
 
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