third party 18-20/21mm lenses would end up selling for what I considered outrageous prices in M42 or K
mount. I finally gave up and purchased a new FA 20-35mm. It is one of the sharpest lenses I have, only
2/3-1 stop slower than the f2.8 or f3.5 primes that were selling for as much or more, (faster than the Takumar
20 f4.5). I thought this lens was going to be a compromise, but I'm quite pleased.
(Last time I saw a Carl Zeiss Jena 20/2.8 on e-bay it eventually sold for $800.00+ and it looked like it had been
used to club a baby seal to death).
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
For a decent 20mm, you could pick up a Carl Zeiss Jena 20/2.8 in M42
mount.
If I could FIND one. I know, they exist on e-bay, but I have yet to
locate an example for sale from a dealer in the USA. I'm not savvy enough to use e-bay without getting burned. Fuji apparently made some great glass too, but despite having bought what appear to be the last three
screw-mount Fujicas in the world, I have NEVER seen a Fuji EBC lens
in M42 mount for sale. With patience and searching I have managed to locate pretty much all the Pentax K-mount and M42-mount lenses I wanted
eventually.
Probably the best bet w/ wide glass on a Canon is to get something in
the Canon mount though. Even if it's a sigma/tokina/tamron/etc. I have
to wonder how some of the newer digital zooms (18-55, 16-45, etc.)
stack up when compared to the older wide glass. I'd be willing to bet
they'd be as good as some of those early wide-angles.
Better, probably, especially if I got something recent. Computer-aided
design, advanced aspherics, exotic glasses, etc have made miracles possible. The 15/3.5 was state-of-the-art in 1974, but now we have
the Sigma 15-30 and various 12-24s which would have been impossible back then. The 20mm/2.8 EOS lens is apparently mediocre by modern standards but the 16-35/2.8 is supposedly quite good.
The goal of the Canon 20D, though, was to be a digital host for my screw-mount lenses--I'd have bought a Pentax DSLR if they'd had one with 8MP, 5fps, a 20 frame buffer, and the ability to see B&W images in B&W in the camera.
A nifty Canon ultrawide isn't going to fit on my Spotmatic SPIIs.
Perhaps a new cheap zoom (18-55/16-45) or a third party ultrawide would be
better than the SMC Takumar 20/4.5 which has troubles with distortion and
sharpness towards the corners, but I'm not convinced. My experience with 3rd party lenses has been quite poor compared to Pentax/Nikon glass both in terms of optical performance and build quality. Both Pentax and Nikon
have unfortunately recently learned how to make lenses almost as cheap
and cheesy as the off-brand guys, and these haven't been impressive either--slow, distorted, loose and plasticy. And none of them are
going to fit on a Spotmatic either. Most of the damn things don't even
fit on a Nikon F4 or Pentax LX anymore due to the loss of physical aperture-coupling.
DJE
--
A man's only as old as the woman he feels.
--Groucho Marx
