Originally posted by Fenwoodian Cyberjunkie, it sounds like your quest for your ideal lenses is not yet over. It may take you several more years. But in the end, you too will find the lenses that move you, lenses that you will love more than any other object in your life. Good luck on your quest Cyberjunky; enjoy the ride!
Hahaha, I'm afraid it's a never ending quest.
I'm not just a lens enthusiast, I'm also a collector. I collected large format lenses before going digital-only. Now I don't buy them anymore cause I like to actually try the optics I buy. I have no darkroom anymore cause I moved abroad, so I gave up bellows cameras.
I already had a number of nice Pentax lenses since the late seventies/eighties, including a few A Star's (my favourites), but the number has increased a lot in the last ten years. A few hundreds.
Most have an historical or practical value, or simply I like them for the way they are built.
Trying them I found that I have a strong liking for some very cheap optics, while others are more expensive. There is no rule.
I pixel peep sometimes, mostly just for curiosity, but the quality I appreciate the most is not extreme sharpness. Let's say that from what I understand we have similar tastes...
I like to take portraits. and I like "portrait lenses". Unfortunately I can't post most pictures for privacy reasons.
Mostly I post flowers, cause it's a subject that allows to "shoot for bokeh" and is also a subject not too dissimilar from a portrait of a human being.
I used to have many lenses (also for work, long ago), but I sold them if I had a good reason to do so.
Since I've started collecting them, I practically stopped selling. Each one was acquired for a specific reason, so I find extremely difficult to let them go.
Must be a strange illness
EDIT:
along with Zeiss and Leica lenses, did you ever try to leitax a Zuiko OM?
I am not a connoisseur, but I remember some of them were highly praised at the time.
My personal guess is that the macros should be worth trying. I have no personal experience, though.
Olympus also made incredibly small lenses of very high quality, that today could meet the needs of nature photographers who trek long distances with a backpack. I have just seen on sale a very small 200mm f/5. It has a rather complex optical design (6-elements).
In film times it was too slow in many conditions, now it could be a nice, very cheap solution to keep the bag small.
It's a real pity that Leitax rings leave the innards of the lens exposed. I don't mind to blacken the shiny surfaces, I'm afraid that the lens would eat plenty of dust...