Old Manual lenses on Micro 4/3 Camera (Olympus OMD EM-1)

I’ve been big fans of old manual lenses since I using Pentax digital cameras for many years. They cheap, sharp, build like a Tank, and great IQ. My first old manual lenses are Pentax SMC A 200mm F4, the lens are queitly sharp on my K-50 and focus peaking feature are made everything easy.

After many years I still keep the lens eventhough I changed from Pentax to Olympus. “Is it the MFT systems are queitly great?” my first thought when I was brought EM-1 Body, feel quite hesitant in the first time. after using it for weeks, my mind has totally changed. It’s great camera when I paired on Zukio 12-50 EZ, sharp, fast, easy to use & very light. Zuiko 12-50 EZ is a great lens, perform great on the day light, but the IQ is dramatically decreasing when shoot on the night or dark places. It’s not a cheap lens, but affordable when buying it as a kit or buying on second hand.

Buying a Olympus Pro lenses it’s like robbery our wallet, even though the Pro lens are very great. The telephoto Zuiko 300mm F4 PRO are priced $2,499.00 on Amazon (apr 4, 2018) or Rp 35.000.000 on rupiah. It’s not short-term solution for the people (amateur, like me) to creating great photos, but for long-term it’s very good investment (absolutely, for professional photographer). So the best solution for amateur photographer (like me), using old manual lenses, are the best way to practice and creating good wildlife photography.

Since the old manual lenses are 35mm format camera when it using on MFT body, the old manual lenses have 2x factor crop this means a advantage for wildlife photography. Example 200mm focal length on 35mm body camera same as 400mm on MFT!. It’s make the object (animal) more closer.

Here are why old manual lenses are very great choice:

Cheap, absolutely, the price of some old manual lenses are very affdorable, I was bought Pentax SMC A 200mm F4 on Bukalapak.com (indonesia market place), priced Rp 750.000 ($54), Sometimes even less!. And also bought Pentax 50mm f1.7 (Rp 700.000 or $50), it’s extremely sharp lenses, priced only $50 it’s very great lenses when using for potraits. I can say that I have come to very much like Pentax lenses (sample images below), as I find them the very best bang for your buck.
Sharpness, most of old lenses are fix lenses and they sometime have a great IQ. Best way to know, how the performance the old lenses are, is on the forum. I usually read Pentaxforums.com before buying the old one. We can easly know how great they are, based on sharpness, aberrations, bokeh, handling, and value rating.
Crop factor, on the MFT body the Crop factor is 2x, on APS-C format is 1.5x crop factor. More closer to the subject, more easly collecting the image details

Keep in mind, however, that since these lenses are used. Its little bit roll the dice when we buy on online, make sure buying on the trusted sellers, and of course make sure the lens are fungus free, or no fog on the coating surface.

Here some photo that I’ve taken with Pentax SMC A 200mm F4 using Olympus OMD EM-1 body and Fotga adapter PK to M43:

ISO 400 F8 1/320