I may have missed it somewhere, but has anyone reviewed the 8 element collapsible lens? Or compared to the original? I've searched Google and forums with little to no luck. Appreciate any help.
Did you see this article? To me this is turnoff:
"A little snag with using the Light Lens Lab 35mm ƒ2 Collapsible is that I realized that since the whole barrel (basically the whole lens) turns together with the focusing ring, every time I needed to change the aperture size, I would need to actually shift the focusing ring position back to the infinity lock position, adjust aperture setting before returning to shooting. A little inconvenient, but it was something I got used to after 10 minutes." Collapsible LLL Lens
Victor Santos wrote:
I may have missed it somewhere, but has anyone reviewed the 8 element collapsible lens? Or compared to the original? I've searched Google and forums with little to no luck. Appreciate any help.
Victor
Collapsible version:
— It’s collapsible
— MFD of 0.5m
— Infinity lock
— Focusing knob thing
— Aperture numbers are on both sides of the aperture ring so can either show white or orange aperture numbers
— Set aperture before focusing (aperture ring rotates with focus ring)
— Built-in UV filter
— Cannot accept filters
— No lens hood. Supposedly one is in the works that will also take filters, but it’s been so long I don’t think it’s coming
I found the collapsible version a bit fidgety, and the regular 8-element is almost as small as the collapsed collapsable anyway.
OscarF wrote:
Did you see this article? To me this is turnoff:
"A little snag with using the Light Lens Lab 35mm ƒ2 Collapsible is that I realized that since the whole barrel (basically the whole lens) turns together with the focusing ring, every time I needed to change the aperture size, I would need to actually shift the focusing ring position back to the infinity lock position, adjust aperture setting before returning to shooting. A little inconvenient, but it was something I got used to after 10 minutes." Collapsible LLL Lens
Those replies are review enough to make me rethink the collapsible. I was mainly leaning that direction for the mfd and secondarily the collapsible nature of the lens. I'll pick one up if it's a significant discount, otherwise I'll go with the regular version.
Victor Santos wrote:
Those replies are review enough to make me rethink the collapsible. I was mainly leaning that direction for the mfd and secondarily the collapsible nature of the lens. I'll pick one up if it's a significant discount, otherwise I'll go with the regular version.
A few more thoughts about the collpasable:
When focusing, you can still turn the aperture ring, it's just not aligned to the center mark so you can't see what it's being changed to exactly. Of course you can count the clicks to figure it out. I bring this up in case the previous comments make it seem like the aperture wasn't physically capable of being moved while focusing.
The 0.5m MFD is a bigger deal that it seems on paper. It makes the lens much more useful.
highdesertmesa wrote:
A few more thoughts about the collpasable:
When focusing, you can still turn the aperture ring, it's just not aligned to the center mark so you can't see what it's being changed to exactly. Of course you can count the clicks to figure it out. I bring this up in case the previous comments make it seem like the aperture wasn't physically capable of being moved while focusing.
The 0.5m MFD is a bigger deal that it seems on paper. It makes the lens much more useful.
When the lock is not engaged, will turning the aperture ring change the focus? No one mentioned image rendering so I'm guessing it's the same.
Victor Santos wrote:
Those replies are review enough to make me rethink the collapsible. I was mainly leaning that direction for the mfd and secondarily the collapsible nature of the lens. I'll pick one up if it's a significant discount, otherwise I'll go with the regular version.
My experience w collapsible lenses, is I basically never collapsed them. So while the idea was cute, I didn’t use it as it was another step getting in the way of grabbing a shot. But it does make for a compact package for storage.
Desmolicious wrote:
My experience w collapsible lenses, is I basically never collapsed them. So while the idea was cute, I didn’t use it as it was another step getting in the way of grabbing a shot. But it does make for a compact package for storage.
Never tried a collapsible before, so I don't know what involved in closing it up and popping it out, but your report makes it sound complicated.
Victor Santos wrote:
Never tried a collapsible before, so I don't know what involved in closing it up and popping it out, but your report makes it sound complicated.
It’s not. It’s just pull and twist to get it into shooting position. Twist and push to collapse. Just, for me, after I did that once or twice, I just left it in the open position ready to go.
James,
Do you remember/know if the focus changes if you adjust the aperture while focus is not infinity locked? Thanks again for the information you're providing.
James,
Do you remember/know if the focus changes if you adjust the aperture while focus is not infinity locked? Thanks again for the information you're providing.
Victor
Hi, Victor. Although the aperture ring rotates with the focus ring, the aperture ring turns independently and can be changed at any focusing distance. It's just easier to change the aperture while at infinity because that's the only focus distance where the aperture number aligns with the center mark on top of the lens, which is your only confirmation as to what aperture has been selected. So if you start off with the lens at infinity, the number you see top-center at the mark is the aperture in use. Say you have it set to f/2, then you focus the lens to near MFD. The actual f/2 number on the ring rotates around to where you can't see it any longer, but you still know it's set to f/2. Since you know it's at f/2, at any time, you can still rotate the aperture ring without changing focus. Two half-stop clicks to f/2.8. Two more to f/4., etc. If you get confused, just throw it back to infinity to check what number pops up to the top. Sometimes I would catch myself looking into the lens to verify the aperture was wide open
Desmolicious wrote:
It’s not. It’s just pull and twist to get it into shooting position. Twist and push to collapse. Just, for me, after I did that once or twice, I just left it in the open position ready to go.
For someone who has never used an M collapsable lens, it's not quite that simple – at least not with the LLL collapsable. With this lens:
The lens when not locked rotates freely and can be locked into one of four positions like the cardinal directions on a compass – but you have to choose the position that will cause the aperture number in use to end up directly at the center mark at the top of the lens. There are two positions that work for this on the LLL lens, and they are 180 degrees from each other. One allows for orange aperture numbers to be visible at the top, the other allows for the white numbers on the other side of the ring to be at the top. So you choose which color to go with. Then there is also incorrect alignment in two positions opposite to these two correction positions – you don't want either of these positions since the aperture marks do not align right.
What makes it a little difficult to figure out at first is you have to pull out the lens slightly to one side of where you want it to end up, extend it, then turn to lock it so that the aperture number lines up only after it's locked. It's not very intuitive to know where you need to extend the lens in order for it to lock into the right position, IMO, at least not until you've gotten used to it.
Oh, and you want to extend and collapse the lens with the focus locked at infinity so you're not fumbling around with all the spinning parts, lol.
The whole collapsible lens sound complicated (finicky), but at the same time intriguing. The mfd keeps me hooked to some degree and the image rendering of course.
Victor Santos wrote:
The whole collapsible lens sound complicated (finicky), but at the same time intriguing. The mfd keeps me hooked to some degree and the image rendering of course.
If the MFD is important, then I'd get this lens. And if you find the collapsing bit complicated, just leave it permanently extended.
