/s/ Zuikoholic wrote:
>Any pre-press secrets? I'll just go out and stock up of the "Great Zuikos."
>Just give me an excuse.
I mainly wanted to take the opportunity to point out the excellence of
some of the Zuiko lenses to people who aren't aware that decent lenses
can possibly be made by any but the "big four" (Zeiss, Leica, Canon,
Nikon), and to plump for the 50/2 macro, which in my opinion is one of
the great ignored lenses of all time. Lens connoisseurship depends on
taste even among those who really _do_ understand optical properties (a
small minority). I, for instance, don't much care about absolute
resolution; with my preferred films, coarse-structure contrast (5 lp/mm +
or -) is more important. Lens "tests" generally tend to drive me batty
for this reason, because they typically test for absolute resolution at
atypical distance conjugates, which I just don't think matters all that
much. And then they assign an arbitrary number or grade to that property,
so you don't even have data to work from--never mind the fact that even
having real data would still give a very incomplete picture. I'm a
dyed-in-the-wool subjectivist, and there isn't much being written about
lenses subjectively outside of Japan.
Bottom line is that I think the Zuiko 50/2 is a superb all-purpose normal
lens if you like the focal length. IMHO it blows away the various
Summicrons, Planars, and Nikkors that "Received Wisdom" seems to assert
cannot be bettered. The article treats six or eight lenses, but the
longest section is on the 50/2 and that's really what I wanted to talk
about. That lens deserves more of a reputation than it has.
I've owned the Olympus 50/1.8, 50/2, 50/1.2, and 50/3.5. They're all nice
lenses in their own ways, all quite different from each other. It would
take a while to characterize their differences in writing, so I won't
try. The 50/2 is the all-around best, the 50/1.8 is the best bargain (a
really nice lens for $30 or so), and, oddly, I have a soft spot for the
50/1.2 MC, despite frequently disliking fast Planar-types. It's a
"gentle" lens but a nice one, and it doesn't suffer from some of the
typical flaws of fast Planar-types generally. This is not to say I don't
like the 50/3.5, because that one is nice too. Olympus is a good brand to
shoot if you like the 50mm focal length!
I could talk about lenses all day, so I'd better shut up.
Joel Wilcox wrote:
>I think Photo Techniques is the magazine that used to be called Darkroom
>Techniques? This was the one indispensible magazine to me 10-15 years ago.
>The subscription lapsed in a period of catastrophe, but I'll have re-up it
>again. Good to have you here.
That's us. The Sep/Oct issue (at the printer's now) is our big slam-bang
20th Anniversary issue. As Jerry O'Neill points out in "Recent News,"
magazine years are similar to dog years, so 20 years is a good run
already.
>I hope Gary Reese will be duly credited in your forthcoming article. ;-)
He's not credited with anything because he didn't write any of it, nor
was his data used to draw any of the conclusions. But his website is
referenced--it's a good one. Valuable, too.
John Hudson wrote:
>Now as long a you keep similar "illustrations" off the Vestal at Large page
>I'll keep on buying! Out of the dozens of photo magazines available yours
>is most certainly one of the very best.
Uh-oh. The Vestal page has a big illustration in the upcoming "20th
Anniversary" issue. Hope you won't hate us too much. <s>
Seriously, thanks for the nice comments. It's _really_ difficult
publishing a magazine that's not mainly servicing a client industry.
Forgive me if you've heard me say this before (I'm like a broken record
about this, I'll admit it), but it's worth taking a slightly more
proactive stance toward any magazine you really like and want to support.
The #1 best thing you can do is a) subscribe for more than one year at a
time and b) send payment with your order. That goes for _any_ magazine
you really enjoy, approve of, and want to support, in any field--not just
ours.
--Mike
Mike Johnston, Editor-in-Chief
_PHOTO Techniques_ magazine
(www.phototechmag.com)
Preston Publications Division of Preston Industries, Inc.
Niles, Illinois
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|