Something Old, Something New

Something Old, Something New

I have a few vintage lenses and projects waiting for the time to pursue them, and one has made some moves over the past few days. I was given some Minolta film cameras and lenses and also some Yashica lenses plus a film body, so plenty to have a go with as time allows. The Sigma AF 400mm f/5.6 in Minota "A" fit looked interesting, so that is well under way. My first thought was to use it in manual focus using a simple adapter and the Sony A7R III body. However, then I thought why not look for a low cost Sony A DSLR body and use it with AF? This was prompted by having a look at some of my Pentax K20D images, which were just 14.6 MP and looked pretty good:




So why not look for a 14.6MP Sony DSLR body, and I found a reasonably priced Sony A350 that fits the bill. So it was back to the same location as the Pentax shots and one very warm day later (it was last Sunday) the shots were in the bag. Without giving too much away in advance, here's a couple of examples:




The Pentax shots were using the SMC Pentax-DA 55-300mm lens and the Sony shots were using the Sigma AF 400mm f/5.6, but both sensors were 14.6MP. They are not the same sensor, as the Pentax used the Samsung CMOS sensor and the Sony presumably used the Sony one.
One thing did become apparent is that Pentax's claim to superior optical viewfinders is a valid one. The silver coated pentaprism finders they use are not the cheapest but they are so much better than the pentamirror type that the Sony uses. Having said that, the AF on the Sony was pretty remarkable for its age.
So that's what Sue and I have been up to this past weekend. There may be time to play a little more with the old kit before the new stuff starts arriving again in a few days time. The weather's good, there's fuel in the car, the batteries are charged.....