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| 08-07-2013, 05:32 AM | #1 |
| MTO Lens Question | |
| 08-07-2013, 10:56 AM | #2 |
| 08-07-2013, 08:06 PM | #4 |
| 08-07-2013, 09:35 PM - 1 Like | #5 |
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Welcome to the forums! I have good news for ya. I have an 11CA, and it mounts without any issues on my K-5 iis. All versions of the K-5, as well as the K-7, share the same body, so it will fit on all of them. By the way, in case you don't know this already, the 1000A is the original lens, and the 11CA is a newer, smaller, version. Despite the names, the 1000A has a focal length of 1100mm, while the 11CA is 1000mm. Mine is from 1994. This is the smaller of the two:  | |
| 08-08-2013, 12:34 AM | #6 |
| Thanks a lot! | |
| 08-08-2013, 12:39 AM - 2 Likes | #7 |
 Originally posted by redpit  Thank you all my friends for your replies! Giklab I had seen this webpage but I couldn't tell what kind of camera it was attached to the lens (I think it is a canon body)... Not a Number I was considering the flanged adaptor as an option to give a bit more clerance for the huge lens body as stevebrot very well set it... scratchpaddy Thank you my friend! This is exactly what I was looking for... The picture speaks for itself. I'm also considering to buy the K-5 (not the ii model), so this is good news as you said ;-) I suppose that you have used the common adaptor ring, nothing extraordinary, is that right? Concerning the 1000A and the 11CA lens, I know this strange onomatology and I have both of them and I used them with ZENIT film cameras during the 90s... Do you have any pictures of the K-5-11CA combination to show us? What is your experience form its use? For example @redpit , you should get a notification that I replied to your post  Adam PentaxForums.com Webmaster (Site Usage Guide | Site Help | My Photography)    PentaxForums.com server and development costs are user-supported. You can help cover these costs by donating or purchasing one of our Pentax eBooks. Or, buy your photo gear from our affiliates, Adorama, B&H Photo, KEH, or Topaz Labs, and get FREE Marketplace access - click here to see how! Trusted Pentax retailers:    | |
| 08-08-2013, 07:07 AM | #8 |
| Originally posted by redpit What is your experience form its use?  I've done everything: heavy tripod, mirror up, remote release, and I have yet to get a good picture. At such a long focal length, atmospheric distortions are a real problem. All the pictures I've taken so far were in the city (the hottest in the country), and they were ruined by heat waves coming off the pavement and buildings. The coolest thing I've gotten so far is a video of the heat waves.  My adapter is the common flangeless ring. A flanged one won't cause you any issues with this lens, though. They focus far past infinity, so you won't loose infinity focus even with a flanged adapter. That's the thing about these Russian mirror lenses. Even if you have a body that interferes with it, you could add a short extension tube and still get infinity focus. | |
| 08-09-2013, 02:26 AM | #9 |
| Originally posted by scratchpaddy My experience is that it's really difficult to use. I've done everything: heavy tripod, mirror up, remote release, and I have yet to get a good picture. At such a long focal length, atmospheric distortions are a real problem. All the pictures I've taken so far were in the city (the hottest in the country), and they were ruined by heat waves coming off the pavement and buildings. The coolest thing I've gotten so far is a video of the heat waves. Originally posted by scratchpaddy My adapter is the common flangeless ring. A flanged one won't cause you any issues with this lens, though. They focus far past infinity, so you won't loose infinity focus even with a flanged adapter. That's the thing about these Russian mirror lenses. Even if you have a body that interferes with it, you could add a short extension tube and still get infinity focus. | |
| 09-11-2013, 07:10 AM | #10 |
| 01-04-2015, 07:18 AM - 2 Likes | #11 |
| MTO lens review!
Hello everybody and happy New Year 2015! I feel that this thread has been left “opened” as I ought to give a review based on my experience on the Pentax K5 - MTO lenses combination and an answer if there is any purposefulness in acquiring and using such a lens… First of all I would like to say that I tried to write this reply again last summer but after finishing my text I lost it due to some mishandling during posting along with some photos  so now I know and I write a text that will be transferred afterwards at the Pentaxforums! Since I have some spare time I will take the chance and elaborate a bit more on photography and lifestyle in general from my viewpoint. At first it may seem irrelevant with this thread but you will see that there is a direct relation with the MTO lenses! So I start with something like a disclaimer and my own photographic “philosophy” that met Pentax two years ago and I couldn’t be more happy or lucky about this crossing! This post is for those like me who don’t like to find everything “almost ready to use”, “precooked”, etc. I find it somehow magical that in 2015 there are some people that still have a conversation about old Russian mirror lenses that have little or no value and respect in the “experts’” photographic world today… But for me the MTO 1000A has great sentimental value and Pentax came with its great cameras (and K-5 and K-5iis in this situation) to remind me the pleasure of taking unique photos and moreover it increased that subjective-personal value as the digital photos from the Pentax are highly improved in comparison with my old film shots with a Zenit camera. In fact some of the pictures with some basic post processing (PP) in Photoshop are objectively good ones even for printing in small sizes and in every way UNIQUE! So YES I totally recommend these lenses if you can find it, especially to new photographers and kids who, as in my case, can’t afford expensive super tele-lenses and would like to photograph wildlife, birds, airplanes and remote subjects. I prefer to have a lens today to take photos than save money for buying a lens in 5 years! Getting a cheap lens today will make you a better photographer and you will appreciate and handle the higher quality equipment better when you finally possess it! On the other hand, do not read any further if you are one of those photographers who are obsessed with high tech equipment and started photography with $8.000 primes and FF bodies and when in the near future there will be the capability of shooting with a remote control and everything else left to the machine to decide and adjust, they will still consider the resulting picture as “their achievement” because it happens to be the owners of the equipment (or the robot who took the picture). I was always fond of airplanes and what flies in general! When in 1990 I bought a used MTO 11CA lens from a street market and attached it to a borrowed Zenit camera I was extremely happy that I could finally get some pictures that the subject was filling the frame and you could recognize the type of airplane or kind of bird. A few years later I bought the 1100mm MTO 1000A almost new and I found it even better and more spectacular to use. I have taken thousands of pictures with those 2 lenses and despite the low specifications of the mirror lenses combined with film cameras with a fastest shutter speed of 1/500 and the absence of any form of SR apart from leaning the camera on a stable surface, I got pictures that made me happy, which is why I was engaged in photography in the first place anyway and consider it a hobby! The best thing though is that this period of playing with this manually controlled equipment with so many restrictions (the only counterweight being the bright Greek sun most days of the year!) was the best photography school I could have. In 2012 I went into the digital photography (with Nikon) and although with much better equipment and dioptric lenses I really missed the extraordinary angle of view and reach of the MTO lenses and quite often I wondered how I could use them again and if it would be any good on a DSLR body. After much internet research (which also brought me at this great forum!) I decided to buy the Pentax K-5 and this proved to be the best choice for me! Before moving to some comments and tips on the K-5 & MTO 1000A combination I can only say that having used and compared the D7000 and K-5 made me choose to go on with Pentax for many reasons. This doesn’t mean that the Nikon is a bad camera; it is just that the Pentax is even better and it suits better my needs and my rational. I love the handling, the ergonomics, the professional feeling, the construction and the feeling of robustness, the WR body, the in-body Shake Reduction and the high quality pictures with very good high ISO performance from the K-5 and 5iis. Moreover, I love the ability to use old vintage glass that is really easy to find and affordable and gives to the pictures that “special” touch each lens carries, like a signature. Finally, and I know that many Pentaxians might disagree; I really hate the pace that mainly Nikon and Canon but Sony and other serious players lately change and “upgrade” their equipment! I know that in some cases Pentax and Ricoh may be slow in their responses (as you understand I wait for the super tele-zoom with anxiety!) but I prefer that to investing my money into some equipment that will be replaced within 6 or 12 months! Unless you are a pro and you are earning serious money so you can(?) constantly upgrade your equipment, I feel that in fact this race rather disappoints the amateur and enthusiast photographers than excites them… So I decided to stay with Pentax and keep on mastering and enjoying my equipment until I upgrade to the next level and this upgrade will be a clear step forward to me and everybody else. For example the K-3 replacement will be a camera (according to the Pentax policy up to now) that I will examine as my next buy, as it will be a clear step ahead… The same goes to a FF that besides any objections and reservations it is an important upgrade to APS-C cameras. But enough with the general talking and the reasons I’m a proud Pentaxian now! Let’s move back to the MTO lenses and how they performed on the K-5 and 5iis. I had the chance to play many times with the K-5 & MTO 1000A combination and I use the word play because it really is a joy to use it mainly for 2 reasons: 1. I don’t use it for “work” or where the results are important! It is the opposite of “pixel peeping” and trying to achieve the best picture! It is a real stress buster for me to sit relaxed in my chair on the terrace on a sunny day and just shooting anything that attracts my attention like an airplane high in the sky, birds playing around and trying to make as sharp pictures as I can from landmarks on the mountains that are many miles around me or the moon! 2. It is a real joy when you manage to get good results because they are completely your achievement! The phrase “manual operation” finds its true meaning when it comes to handling this lens! You have to focus as precise as you can and, when you hand hold the lens, to make the proper adjustments in shutter speed and ISO value to get a clear and well-focused picture. But when you make it the reward is big! And then the game begins! The more difficult the subject the more rewarding the results! This game although initially may disappoint new photographers it is a great photography school and while you practice you realize that you start to think and operate like the famous “Pentax green button”! Concerning the handling of the K-5 & MTO 1000A combination, here are some remarks and tips. The MTO 1000A is a quite easy lens to hand hold especially if you are used to tele-lenses and their sizes and weights. It has very large diameter, so it fits the palm very well and it balances well with the K-5 body. I find it easier to hand hold it than the Bigma 50-500 that I hold from the tripod base. The Pentax SR system set on 800mm is great assistance! All you have to do is to keep the shutter speed high and improve your stability when press the shutter button. It is easier than someone might expect. I have taken many 1/400 shots hand holding the lens without any motion blur! A good tripod is very helpful especially for still subjects that are at long distances. You can’t imagine until you see it how much magnification and reach an 1100mm lens on an APS-C camera offers! When using a tripod you can utilize the live view for precise focusing and of course the timer to avoid motion blur. I don’t know if the mirror up function offers something as the resolution and contrast of the lens are too low for a 16MP sensor, but I use it anyway for psychological reasons! Apart from the Pentax SR the green button and the focus confirmation are super aids (congratulations to the camera makers!) and they help minimizing the time to take a shot, which is very helpful at times when shooting animals or birds for example. As a general rule on a sunny day the ISO value is the same or a bit lower (1-2 stops) than the shutter speed I use, but I keep it always lower than 1600. So 1/800 speed with ISO 800 will give plenty of light to your photo (in fact somewhat overexposed picture)! That “1-1” ISO and shutter speed tip is a generic rule to keep in mind, when shooting in the sky the ISO values can stay down to 400 at most and when shooting subjects on the ground level hand holding the camera you will need higher ISO values, but this is where the green button comes in! Because the MTO are dark lenses (f10 and f10.5 for the 1000 and 1100mm respectively) my experience shows that you can add one to two stops in shutter speed after pressing the green button and still have very good light at the resulting photo. As a final remark I can say how amazed I was from the Pentax K-5 low light capabilities and low ISO noise it offers. You can take photos even at the sunset light with high ISO values that can be edited in Photoshop to give very good results. Concerning this final part of photo PP, the biggest issues as anybody can tell are the low resolution and low contrast of such mirror lenses in combination with the high ISO values that are used during capturing. First of all, about the picture quality I can say that when you get a really good picture with K-5 & MTO 1000A combination you can downsize it to 50% and have a really usable-printable photo after PP in Photoshop. Depending on how good your pictures are (in terms of correct focus and lack of motion blur) you can make the basic editing in Photoshop and then downsize them in 25-50% of the original size. You can have usable pictures in the original size if you have used low ISO and tripod or in cases where the lack of high resolution is not an issue! In general though you have to know with what kind of equipment you are dealing with and what to expect. There is no or little comparison with good dioptric lenses, but there is still a great advantage! Very few photographers with other equipment can get the captions you can get with these lenses and at distances where your frame is full the others are still making adjustments and prepare! To finish with post processing, I can say the biggest challenge is the noise reduction but since the resolution of the pictures is not high ALL post processing techniques are easier to implement on these pictures than high resolution pictures where every little mistake is evident at the final photo! In fact I find editing the MTO lenses pictures as an equal joy as when taking those pictures due to the fact that you can exaggerate and still have really natural results! Moreover highlighting a picture that was of poor “specifications” and making it pop is surely more rewarding and pleasant than editing an already great photo! At least in the case of MTO lens pictures you can be totally positive that you have improved a raw photo! All those who are scanning old films and slides surely understand what I mean. Now as I told you, I was going to post some pics from the K-5 & MTO 1000A combination from an airshow I would attend. At that airshow I was able to compare side to side the Nikon D7000 with a really good lens the Sigma 50-500 with the K-5 & MTO1000A. A good friend of mine that was back then a novice photographer with no experience in aviation photography and tele-lenses in general was my partner in this airshow and helped me by using the second combo I was not shooting with, at any given time! I thank her a lot! The idea was to see if the MTO1000A had any value at demanding and difficult situations like an airshow with airplanes passing by in great speeds from various directions with different light, so a manual lens with no aperture control puts many challenges to the user! I will sum up and say I was very satisfied with the results! In fact they were better than expected. The Pentax K-5 is simply awesome camera and my experience in using such dinosaurs like the MTOs on Zenit film cameras surely helped me a lot. The technique I followed was to set the MTO lens at infinity and try to micro-adjust focus while I was following the airplanes and also adjust the shutter speed or ISO at times when shooting in the sun, with the sun in my back or as the sun was setting. It is not easy, but the human brain is a great device and helped me get many good or very good photos! As I told you in the beginning these photos have great value for me because they are really MINE completely manually and laboriously taken! And this is something different and satisfactory. The first day of the show I used the D7000 with the Bigma and took many objectively great pictures. But the joy I had on the second day that I took only the K-5 and the MTO 1000A with me was incomparably greater! I had post one of the photos of that evening and can be seen here: https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/18-monthly-photo-contests/269992-soaring-dutch-f-16-a.html I include some pictures here from that airshow, because there is no good review without any picture. The two double pictures here were taken at the “same” time with the different combos. The first one depicts very well the huge impact the great magnification has on someone that first looks through the viewfinder of the K-5 with the MTO 100A lens. These pictures are jpegs straight from the camera raw files, with no PP at all: The second one is a formation of the Polish Air Force Orlik team coming in from the sun. Both of these pictures have been post processed in Photoshop CS6. Since it is interesting, in my dropbox file I have included the cropped and very slightly magnified D7000+Bigma picture (taken at 380mm or 570mm @ 35mm) to match the same downsized K-5+MTO1000A picture… The conclusions are left to you! The third picture was taken yesterday from my terrace. It was a very cold and cloudy day so I didn’t have much time and this is a quick shot. A pair of sparrows is sitting on the top of a chimney to warm up a bit! (its snow cold weather). The left picture is straight out of the camera (K-5iis, 1/640, ISO1000) while the right one is a ~20% crop and PP of the original: I apologize for my long and tiring post! There is much information in it but if anyone of you would like to know something more I will be more than happy to answer… I conclude by including a link to my dropbox for those of you who would like to see 3 more pictures of that airshow from the K-5 & MTO 1000A combination and the 2 comparison pictures. One of the pictures is not of high quality (the F-16 leaving flares) but still worths keeping for me. I wanted to show you this photo as what is a good picture is objective and subjective at the same time! I have also included a photo of the great champion pilot Francesco Fornabaio I had the privilege and joy to watch performing spectacular aerobatics as a diminutive tribute to him, because as you may know he was lost last September… RIP Francesco you still keep our heads raised high in the sky. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ezck5zlteofnhvf/AADkPL8NqgErWVykzm8zUATha?dl=0 Greetings to everybody, Redpit. Last edited by redpit; 01-04-2015 at 08:44 AM. Reason: corrections | |
| 01-04-2015, 12:43 PM | #13 |
| Mto-1000 | |
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Post #11 by redpit 
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