[Tidy]

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Hi everyone,

I am just about to purchase the Pentax Q as I love the little camera & it'll be perfect for taking away on short breaks without having to drag a huge DSLR around, one thing that came to mind is the DOF will be long down to the smaller lens/sensor size, if I mount an old Canon FD 50mm F/1.4 lens using one of the adapters on ebay, will I get a better (shallow) DOF?

Also how good are the adapters? they're terribly cheap & have my alarm bells ringing, I imagine they don't use a mechanical shutter & rely on the electronic shutter in the camera? I'm guessing I'll also have to increase the shutter speed a great deal too?

This is the adapter Canon FD Mount Lens To Pentax Q PQ P/Q Mount Q10 Interchangeable Camera Adapter | eBay

Thanks again & happy shooting.
Jake

[ihasa]

The first thing I'd think about is the 5.5x crop factor which that smaller sensor has. Your lens will have an equivalent (on 35mm film/full frame) focal length of 275mm - turning it into a telephoto!

The Pentax 01 prime lens has an equivalent focal length of 50mm, but it's actual focal length is 8.5mm.

[Tidy]

Hi ihasa, thanks for the reply & explaining that, quite interesting the idea of having a tiny telephoto, just reading through the now Adapted lenses tested on the Q : the reference thread thread & some of the results are brilliant.

[baro-nite]

if I mount an old Canon FD 50mm F/1.4 lens using one of the adapters on ebay, will I get a better (shallow) DOF?

It's hard to compare, because the field of view of that lens is so different going from film to Q. The Q doesn't change the properties of the lens, in the case of a 135-format lens it just crops the image way down. But small sensors are not the best way to get shallow DOF effects; quite the reverse. For example, the 01 prime ihasa mentions is f/1.9 and a normal field of view; you'd get a similar FOV but a much shallower DOF using your 50/1.4 at f/1.9 on film.

The advantage of the Q with adapted 135-format lenses isn't the crop per se, it's the higher resolution and hence increased effective magnification you get from the Q's tiny pixels. Interesting possibilities for extreme macro and extreme telephoto, especially for video. I've been wondering about adapting FD lenses, because as an obsolete mount there should be some relative bargains out there for super-teles and macro lenses.

[Tidy]

Thank you for your helpful feedback, I like the idea of having the small camera & I understand that having a small sensor is required, I am just a little worried about the DOF results compared to my D5000.

I'm a little confused as to how the crop aspect comes into play & works? how does it effect large telephoto lenses such as a 400mm & the results? I love the idea of playing around with different lenses as I've only ever stuck to using kit lenses that are provided with cameras and now I want to explore & feel the Pentax Q would be perfect.

Cheers!

[boriscleto]

If you want to adapt Canon FD you would be much better off getting something like the Olympus E-P1. You can get those for less than $150 and the crop factor is only 2x.

[Tidy]

The Pentax Q is £199 in the UK, but the E-P1 is £350 cheapest, may I ask why a larger crop factor is so bad?

[Tidy]

I need to wait till I can edit my post, but I've just read up about crop factors.

[crewl1]

Here is an example of how a 50mm lens might look when mounted on a Q.
https://www.pentaxforums.com/forums/pentax-q/209474-adapted-lenses-tested-q-r...ml#post2230764

If you go to the first page in that thread you will see an index of other lenses folks have tested on their Q's.

If you do end up buying the Q please contribute your experiences and samples