You and I know it’s easy to get to many cameras and lenses ;) Some of us suffer from “ebayitis”. If you want to get rid of some equipment ebay is not you only option. There are stores that will buy or trade your gear. Through 1001noisycameras I found the american store Calumet, who seems to buy stuff. Mostly DSLR, but they also have Mamiyas and Hasselblads and such. In sweden we have several stores with webshops you can buy, sell or trade with – let me know if you need some links to them.

Photo from Wikimeda Commons

Uhh, this one feels sharp! Just took some snapshots yesterday, no masterpieces but interesting to see the characteristics of this lens. Will have to compare with my other 50mm lenses later on.

Read the full article "First try with Yashica ML 50…" »

Maybe not the best saturation (it was a gray day, though), but sharp and very interesting bokeh. Here at f2, if I remember it correct. Today my C/Y->EOS adapter arrived, so now I can try my ML-lenses and compare. I see a test of 50mm-lenses in the not to distant future :)

Why not try to catch a swallow with a 50mm lens? Good practice, don’t know how the image turned out though ;) Show me your’s! This is taken with Canon EOS 350D and Yashinon DX 50mm/1.7 (m42):

Bokeh - If your starting out with photography and manual lenses, you will probably come a cross that word. The word comes from ”boke”, the Japanese word for blur. It is used to describe the part of a picture that are out of focus, and that the lens shows as blurred. Bokeh of lenses may have very different aesthetic qualities. This is most apperent in larger apertures, when part of the picture is a lot out of focus. Soft edges on the blurry reflexes are often considered preferable!

 

Some great reading about bokeh:

Great Bokeh-test from Rick Denney
Ken Rockwell on bokeh
Understanding bokeh by Merklinger

Need some inspiration for street photography? The major barrier for me to photograph strangers on the street is that I live in a smaller town, I think people will notice me, even if I just carry a little rangefinder camera. Some of these guys have advice on how to stay invisible, but mind you – they shoot in big cities like New York, I think that’s must be easier. Look at this for advice on how to act, and for inspiration:

• Flickrgroup “Hardcore Street Photography”
• Street Photography by DeeJey
• Jeff Mermelstein (Media Matters) Part 1a
• Jeff Mermelstein (Media Matters) Part 1b
• Jeff Mermelstein (Media Matters) Part 2
• Street photography part 1 by fast
• Masters of Photography – Henri Cartier-Bresson (1/2)

Joel Meyerowitz On Street Photography:
[flash http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5dipTqJfiE4 w=340 h=275]

I suspect that many photographer wrinkles on the nose when I tell of my Helios-lens, manufactured in BeLOMO, Minsk in the early 80′s 90′s. Surely it can’t be any good?

The states of former Soviet union actually made a lot of good camera equipment, and what I’m going to write about now is a copy from a Carl Zeiss-factory that ended up in the Eastern block after the war and “moved” to russia. Helios is a Carl Zeiss Biotar-copy. Lets see how it handles…
Read the full article "Review of MC Helios 44-3 58m…" »

Now you can read articles on Retrocamera.net in your own language. Use the Google tool in the column to the right to translate the page. Sure, it won’t be a perfect translation – but if there’s something you don’t understand this tool can help you.

This tool from Google is called Translate Gadget and you can use it on your website too! Enjoy.

In the latest moths I have discovered a new world. A world where I can buy good camera equipment for almost nothing. I want to reveal a major source of inspiration for this interest, where I also find a great part of the information I need – I’m talking about the forum at www.mflenses.com. This forum and Google is my main tools when I sift through ebay in search for that special item.

 

Knowledge, inspiration, passion. The other day a user sent me a Yashica-lens for free from UK, for me to test. Now thats incredibly generous and shows the good spirit on the forum, I think. Another volunteered to help me with shipping from ebay.co.uk (some sellers refuse to ship overseas). I have also been offered a shipment of wine from italy and other things. People help each other, share information and tip, creates a network…

Read the full article "MFlenses – learn more …" »

I bought a Pentax Super Takumar 35mm/3.5 from a friend on the net, zewrak. It looks and feels very nice! Gave it a couples tries, today with macroring and one of our sunflowers.