OM, I've become a Zuikoholic!

Well I just received an OM-Zuiko 35mm/2.8 today. It came to me in near mint condition, still in its original leather case which is also flawless.

It's a lens I've never owned so now I will find out for myself if it is as terrible as some people claim.

I'm done buying OM stuff now.
 
I know, right?!
You couldn't give the damn things away on eBay not even twelve months ago...now...$550 for a 28mm f3.5? $400 for a 100mm f2.8? $700 for a 24mm f/2? Holy smokes!
 
wait until the M-(ilestone) finally arrives, OM prices will go through the roof.... OM's are smaller and cheaper but usually about the same quality as the leica R-lenses.
 
Keith said:
You gotta love these OM threads ... one person asks a simple OM question and the festival of Maitani starts in ernest! 😛

By the way ... is the candlle light vigil at Maitani's grave site for the first anniverasry of his death still on track for next year?
Click to expand...

I missed this by a long way but I would be interested if anyone knows the location of his grave so I can go and thank him in person for his work.
 
no Zuikos in these images, but decent OM.

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EDIT: please note the fitting Voigtländer deluxe strap 🙂
 
It is the real OM version. It was released in MD, OM, FD, Ai-S and various other mounts. But this is only the second OM Heliar lens I have ever seen for sale, so I had no choice other than buying it.

It was mint and, according to the friendly sales person unused (until yesterday, that is).

Just a quick snap shot to finish the roll or Portra 160 that was in the camera:


Pfefferoni bei der Friedensbrücke von kanzlr auf Flickr

mind you, this is a straight VueScan -> RAW Tiff -> ColorNeg
no other tweaking other than resizing.

The lens seems plenty sharp wide open (and given that it is said to be the same optical formula as the M39 version, this was expected) and it is a rarity any way.


EDIT: according to the official Voigtländer website it was released in the following mounts:
Canon FD, Minolta MD, Nikon AI-S, Olympus OM, Pentax KAR, Praktika-Schraubge-winde PS M-42, Yashica CY-MM
 
I have been lurking on this thread for a while and I cannot say how much I appreciate the Zuikoholics here on RFF.

I do have quite a stash of OM gear, but today I am going to show off some Zuiko gear that is not very common and was a lost batch. Its the autofocus OM that was introduced with OM-77 AF in the 80's as Oly was late to the AF party. The reason its special is because the OM-77 AF was the first SLR that I bought with my own money (I had played with my dad's OM-10 when growing up). I had the 35-70mm AF kit zoom but later bought the Zuiko AF 24mm prime and I was hooked with Zuiko. These lenses were not popular as they did not have any manual focus collar. Plus the OM-77 AF camera was not much of a success as many of you know. Oly was quick to dump the family and move on to digital and other good stuff. An AF speed demon it is not, the OM-77 AF camera itself has a very nice and big viewfinder and a pleasure to use like a OM-4T. However, the lenses share the same optical formula as the manual focus OM lenses and the primes especially are tasty.

Anyways, recently I was looking through some slides I had taken with that camera and decided to hunt the camera down on eBay along with several OM AF lenses that I drooled over in my early days. I got all those lenses for a song (compared to manual focus OM lenses).

Here are some shots I wanted to share that I took in and around Reno, Nevada in 1990 (thats 22 years ago!). All scanned from slides (pardon the scan quality) and primarily with the Zuiko OM AF 24mm 1:2.8:

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Zone System Study Kit

Zone System Study Kit


Zone System Study Kit by sreed2006, on Flickr


There are five rolls of TMax 400 in the five cameras. The rolls will be developed differently: N-2, N-1, N, N+1, N+2. I'm spot metering each scene and setting the exposure for the shadows, then taking notes on the meter readings and predicting which of the development methods will give the best results. Then, when the rolls are developed, I'll compare the notes with the negatives, and see if I'm learning how to use the Zone System correctly. It takes a lot of time to do it this way - but I cannot think of a better way to do it with 35mm film.
 
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sreed2006 said:

Zone System Study Kit by sreed2006, on Flickr


There are five rolls of TMax 400 in the five cameras. The rolls will be developed differently: N-2, N-1, N, N+1, N+2. I'm spot metering each scene and setting the exposure for the shadows, then taking notes on the meter readings and predicting which of the development methods will give the best results. Then, when the rolls are developed, I'll compare the notes with the negatives, and see if I'm learning how to use the Zone System correctly. It takes a lot of time to do it this way - but I cannot think of a better way to do it with 35mm film.
Click to expand...

In actual practice, modern films do not look good when developed N-2, and in more than 15 years of Zone system work I have never once developed a film N+ anything. I just carry two bodies, one for normal and one for N-1 and that works for everything.
 
You're gonna need more lenses...

sreed2006 said:

Zone System Study Kit by sreed2006, on Flickr


There are five rolls of TMax 400 in the five cameras. The rolls will be developed differently: N-2, N-1, N, N+1, N+2. I'm spot metering each scene and setting the exposure for the shadows, then taking notes on the meter readings and predicting which of the development methods will give the best results. Then, when the rolls are developed, I'll compare the notes with the negatives, and see if I'm learning how to use the Zone System correctly. It takes a lot of time to do it this way - but I cannot think of a better way to do it with 35mm film.
Click to expand...
 
Well, You've got to start somewhere to someday possibly reach the impressive gear line-ups in this thread. And this is all Your fault.... 🙂

I started reading this thread, and have just required an OM-2n with 50/1.4.

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But, some questions araise.

1 It seems that even with the switch in Manual position, the aperature prio is still in effect. The shutter speeds corresponds to the Auto-setting.

2 As beginner OM-owner, I did try to fire the shutter without batteries, with the result that the mirror didn't return. After getting fresh batteries and googling, I read about the Reset-function of the main switch, when pushing it to Check position. My camera did have the Reset marking, but nothing happened, mirror didn't return.

Then I read about the Reset marking on the baynet mount. Here my camera read "Lock B". Nothing happened when I pressed this mini push button.

But moving the shutter dial to B released the mirror/shutter.

So that problem is fixed, but i am confused about the manuals etc I find on Internet, since my camera is not identical to the instructions given. Early production?
 
Chriscrawfordphoto said:
In actual practice, modern films do not look good when developed N-2, and in more than 15 years of Zone system work I have never once developed a film N+ anything. I just carry two bodies, one for normal and one for N-1 and that works for everything.
Click to expand...

Chris, thank you for the information.

Am I nuts for going to all this effort? Maybe. It is just a learning exercise.

If the TMax 400 looks terrible at N-2, I'll never do that again. But just this once, and for my own education, I want to see for myself what it looks like.
 
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