What price would you pay to 'speed up' your lenses?

[arthurking83]

An interesting photographic accessory has been announced BY METABONES (http://www.dpreview.com/news/2013/01/14/metabones-and-caldwell-photographic-annouce-speed-booster-lens-adapter-for-mirrirless-cameras).

I know of the guy, Brian Caldwell, that helped to design the optical system, and he's a top notch engineer, and the 60mm Coastal Optics lens that he also helped to design is a legend amongst it's peers, and those of us interested in broad spectrum photography.

So this focal reducer sounds like an interesting concept for the smaller formats, with a high degree of credibility to boot!

Almost makes me think it's worth me getting a m4/3 or NEX camera just for the hell of it!

Even tho it is a lot of money, $600 doesn't sound too bad for such as device either.

The white paper (http://www.metabones.com/images/metabones/Speed%20Booster%20White%20Paper.pdf) on the adapter also makes for interesting reading, with a few sample images for those of us with shorter attention spans ;)

[jim]

When does the Hasselblad-35mm adaptor come out?

[arthurking83]

When does the Hasselblad-35mm adaptor come out?

Y'know, I was seriously thinking about that, and whether they'd ever do something like that.

I guess they wouldn't, as there are very few MF and larger format lenses that are faster than f/4 .. generally slower.

Unless they designed an adapter for MF to 135 format with even less reduction, ie. less than 0.7x, that would still make your average f/4 MF lens only an f/2.8 lens on the 35mm format.

ie. it's barely worth the effort really.

What this device does, is bring about some equality to the smaller formats .. so a 50mm f/1.2 lens on full frame, acts similarly on the smaller APS-C format, that lens now being equal too 35mm f/0.9.

That is, the DOF will become similarly shallow on the smaller format(when required), and the extra stop of light gathering ability balances out the lower ISO capability of the smaller formats(relative to the larger formats).

[swifty]

This is great news for dual system users such as myself.
The current NEX mount offering makes a lot of sense as the system has great cameras but lacks lenses. And I think NEX E-mount is now open source isn't it? Welcoming for third party developers.
Personally I'm hoping for a 0.5x FF-m43 wide converter. Given the designer's reputation, if they can design and do make one I have confidence it would perform great, but its a big if.
It would basically mean something like an EM5 can back up my D700 negating the need for a backup FF body.
And when weight is an issue I can just take the EM5 and choose from their own selection of small native m43 lenses.
What's also interesting is that a smaller but more efficient sensor can potentially out-perform a larger sensor camera with the same lens, if the increased MTF claims are to be believed. I guess the jury's still out until we see the product ship and get some real world samples.

This would be a perfect product for Canon to make for their EOS-M mirrorless given the massive Canon FF lens lineup and with first party support for things like AF, it'll give that extra bit of confidence.

[ameerat42]

SPEED BOOSTER!!!

Interesting. Pity only for m-less cams at this stage. (Thinking, something like that for MF camera lenses > DSLR?
But I guess there's no market there.)

And how new is it? Their ilk, known as Focal Reducers, have been around for ages to attach to telescopes (2ple of decades that I know of.)

Now, what were you saying about price? I couldn't see one, but I guess it's not too cheap.
Am.

[swifty]

http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2013/01/metabones-magic
Looks promising.

Re: telescope focal reducer. I assume the imager is your eye so you can add optics to a telescope without distance constraints.
Since the sensor is fixed, the task of fitting optics in the flange back distance space would probably be more challenging and hence probably why it's only happening with mirrorless cameras with the omission of the mirrorbox. But probably more importantly mirrorless is the growth product and the business side of things will probably dictate what products gets made.

[ameerat42]

http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2013/01/metabones-magic
Looks promising.

Re: telescope focal reducer. I assume the imager is your eye so you can add optics to a telescope without distance constraints.
Since the sensor is fixed, the task of fitting optics in the flange back distance space would probably be more challenging and hence probably why it's only happening with mirrorless cameras with the omission of the mirrorbox. But probably more importantly mirrorless is the growth product and the business side of things will probably dictate what products gets made.

No, it was designed for astrophotography, though you could use it as a "negative barlow" as well. (A barlow is the name of a telescope teleconverter, after the designer.) You can shift mirrors about in telescopes to a certain extent, so there's not a fixed distance or position of the sensor or film.
Am.

[Rattus79]

Lucky for me, they haven't made a Pentax PK version of this or Mr Rattus Sr would have pinched all my lenses for his NEX 6 already!