Strangely Out Of Focus

  

Phoenix, Arizona 

At sunset, a dust storm emerges from the south along the horizon.

NX1  1/13 sec /  ISO 100  / EV +0.3 / 24-bit / Lens: Tokina 28mm - manual

I wanted to test my 80's-vintage Tokina 28-70mm lens that I picked up (as discussed in this blog).  A dust storm was rolling in tonight and I wanted to see what the lens would capture.   What struck me about this photo was that the lens seemed extremely soft and slightly out-of-focus.  In a way, I like 'painterly' feel of the image; and the deep muted earth colors matching both the environment and the city's building colors.

I had to shoot manually, since I adapted this lens to the Samsung NX1. I also need to perform additional focusing tests, to see if I have to compensate for the mount adapter and dial-in the focus.

Adapter: Minolta AF to NX for Tokina Lens

I recently picked-up a 1980's vintage Tokina AF 28-70mm f3.5-4.5 lens at a pawn shop for $19 and was able to adapt it to the Samsung NX1 (Photo Below).  

This particular Tokina lens was built for Minolta cameras with a 'Minolta AF' mount. Therefore to adapt to the NX1, I purchased a  Camkitmate Sony Minolta AF MA Mount Lens To Samsung NX 'adapter' from Amazon in order to provide mounting between the lens and the camera.  

However, when I first received the adapter and mounted the lens, the camera did not recognize that a lens was mounted to the camera.  Apparently the flange thickness for the mount was not sufficient to engage a switch on the camera body to activate that a lens was attached.  

The supplier suggested a hack (fix) to build-up the flange at the contact location using aluminum-adhesive tape.  So I applied three layers of the 0.025" thick of metal tape as shown in the photo below.  

The hack worked and with the camera set in fully manual mode, the lens was recognized and I was able to operate the camera.

Photos to test this lens will be forthcoming, but a few initial test shots show the images to be somewhat soft.  But that may not be a bad thing depending to the desired look of the image.

An information sheet on the Tokina AF 28-70mm lens is provided below.

Only The Dead Become Famous

The good news is I will soon have a collector's item...

Source: DigitalTrends.com

LINK TO ARTICLE AT "DIGITAL TRENDS" 

High ISO with Soft Lens

Lens: Tokina AF f3.5-4.5 28-70mm / Meta: ISO 25600  1/250s  0 EV  manual focus

This photo was an experiment of a very high ISO (25600), interior - daylight. I was testing an 80's vintage Tokina AF f3.5 lens I picked-up in a pawn shop for $19.  The camera was set to manual in order to accommodate the adapter.

I worked this photo in post - slightly adding contrast to bring in the black. Between the sensor (ISO) setting and the lens, the resulting image provides appropriate softness for artistic expression.