Stuart,
I too, am a Pen F user. I have the Pen FT and use it as an adjunct to
my OM System via the use of an "Pen F to OM" adapter (one on eBay at
this time). They also made quite a few other adapters for other make
lens also. Like Skip said, they are really well and solidly built and
were a true system camera with probably 75 to 100 different components
made and were quite popular here in the US. I recently purchased one of
the Pen range finder cameras (Pen S) and was pleased to find the
construction to be of the same standard as the Pen F series. I also was
surprised when I jokingly requested an operating manual for the FT from
Olympus (1-800-622-6372) and they did send me a photocopy of one.
Olympus, for all their faults, still a great company.
Rand E.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Skip Williams wrote:
>
> Stuart,
>
> I've had a Pen FT for about 9 months and I really like it. I've got a
> 40/1.4 and a 100/3.5. The Pen F's It's a real small gem, easy
> handling, and solid. The Pen F is a double stroke, meterless body.
> The Pen FT adds single stroke shutter cocking and a TTL meter (it uses
> PX625's). The meter isn't coupled to the lens though, you must
> transfer the meter reading (1-7) to a special scale on FT/FV lenses.
> Older F lenses do not have the meter number scale on the aperture
> ring. The Pen FV deletes the meter from the FT. Since the partially
> silvered mirror is the light's path to the meter cell, you lose light
> on an FT vs FV/F (An original Modern Photo test says 2 stops loss,
> Steven Gandy at his CameraQuest site says 1/2 stop). But I see about
> 50 FT's for sale for 1 FV. If brightness is an issue, go with the F.
> Just be aware of its shorter, double stroke winding lever. The FT/FV
> lenses fit fine on the F.
>
> I'm intending to assemble a "full" system, but I don't want to pay
> through the nose. Look on my page at
> http://www.skipwilliams.com/Zuiko_Ebay_History.htm to see recent Ebay
> Pen lens prices.
>
> As for body + lens prices, this is the most I'd pay with the 38/1.4,
> $40-60 more for the 40/1.4: F: $200, FT: $250 ($50-100 more for
> black), FV $300.
>
> If you're looking for info, the following two have all the poop.
> http://members.aol.com/xkaes/olympus.htm
> http://www.jetlink.net/~cameras/olypenf.htm
>
> The camera seems to be popular, there's someone buying all those Pen
> F/FT's on EBay. There's a few fans on this list, most vocal is
> Francisco Mostaccio <francescoarg@xxxxxxxxxxxx> from Argentina.
>
> I have not done any real tests on the lenses, but they've been rated
> very good. My few B&W rolls have been nice and sharp.
>
> Skip
>
> At 7/20/99 08:46 PM -0400, you wrote:
>
> > Is anyone on the list actively using an Olympus Pen system? I am
> > contemplating buying a Pen F and would like to discuss a few things.
> >
> > Stuart Phillips
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