What glass are you using with your FS100?

[Bryan McCullough]

I'm about to pull the trigger on one, to add (replace?) my Canon DSLR arsenal. The problem is, I've put a lot of money into EF lenses and there's no great EF solution at the moment. I'd rather put $1,600 towards new lenses like Nikon for the FS100 versus getting a MTF Adapter. But the MTF solution isn't totally out of the picture.

So, after being a Canon guy for the last few years I'm curious what other people are shooting with on the FS100 and if I am starting over with lenses, what's the best path to go down.

Any thoughts? What are you shooting with and what are your favorites?

[Jeff Troiano]

Check out this thread here...

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/sony-avc...t-adapter.html

Shame to not use all that canon glass. I was going to buy all Nikon glass, but since I saw that adapter, I've decided to get canon glass. Just waiting on them to get more in stock.

[Bryan McCullough]

I saw that but couldn't really get an understanding if/when they'd be getting more. I haven't even found anyone that's used one from the first batch.

[Jeff Troiano]

Here's a Vimeo group I follow, and this thread is about that adapter.

CANON EF ADAPTER FOR FS 100 - Sony NEX-FS100 Super 35mm User Group forum on Vimeo

And here's one of their videos, showing the adapter in use.

METABONE/CONURUS ADAPTOR - Sony NEX-FS100 Super 35mm User Group on Vimeo

I've read IS is working good, and aperture control working good.

[Bryan McCullough]

Does anyone know if it's true that you can set aperture on an EF lens on a Canon body, then move the lens to a dumb adaptor on the FS100 and it will maintain the aperture setting you made on the Canon body?

If so I could deal with doing this for a bit while waiting on the Metabones one to be back in stock.

[Jeff Troiano]

Originally Posted by Bryan McCullough

Does anyone know if it's true that you can set aperture on an EF lens on a Canon body, then move the lens to a dumb adaptor on the FS100 and it will maintain the aperture setting you made on the Canon body?

If so I could deal with doing this for a bit while waiting on the Metabones one to be back in stock.

Yes, I believe this is correct.

[Oren Arieli]

I'm a Nikon shooter from back in the day. I've briefly jumped to Canon for the video DSLR, using a Nikon-EOS adapter. The FS-100 has opened up a bunch of new options, but I would recommend holding off on any big investments until you know what you need. Thankfully, you can get cheap adapters and use thousands of older lenses (with aperture rings, metal construction, and long throw focus).

I do mostly corporate work with the FS-100, so I'm not too concerned with the very wide and long telephoto range, but I have them covered anyhow. I'm really enjoying the ability to use cheap older lenses that have unique characteristics. So far, here is what I've been using.
Nikon 50mm f1.8
Nikkor-S 55mm f1.2 (soft wide open, but a beautifully built) - one of my favorites for interviews in smaller rooms.
Accura Diamatic 105mm f2.5. Great for interviews where a tighter shot is needed, and you have the working distance.
Rokinon 85mm f1.4 (recent purchase)
Yashica 70-210 f3.5
Sigma 18-50 f2.8 (focus throw is short, makes it tricky for run & gun work)
Sony 18-55 e-mount (kit lens, good choice for run & gun when light is decent)
Nikon 18-200mm f3.5/5.6 (not parfocal, and variable aperature...not much fun)

What will you be shooting? Are you planning on doing everything from tripod or monopod? Stabilized lenses (especially at the longer range) will be most useful if you're doing anything handheld.

If you haven't already read Shawn Lam's lens shootout, it's a good place to start: http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/info.../index.php#/19

[Simon Spear]

I also came to the FS100 with a pretty large EF lens collection so I probably know your thought processes. The fact that I couldn't use all my EF lenses with controls for Aperture, IS and (spot)AF made me initially hold off purchasing the FS100 and I only made the decision to buy it after the C300 announcement (like many I'd hoped for a Canon FS100 equivalent, at least in pricing!!). I've now owned the FS100 since just before Christmas and I've been using it on shoots over the last three weeks. If you've read the reviews then you'll already know that it definitely has its quirks and believe it or not in some situations I'd still prefer to have a 7D in my hand, but overall it is a great camera and I absolutely love it.

So far I've been using the following lenses:

E Mount
Sony 18-200 kit lens (very impressed with this lens for run and gun)

EF Mount (with manual controls)
Samyang EF 35mm 1.4 (lovely interview lens)
Samyang EF 8mm Fisheye

K Mount
Pentax 50mm 1.7
Pentax 28mm 2.8

I've had the Pentax lenses for years from an old film SLR and the 50mm especially gives a wonderful image. I already owned the Samyang lenses for my 7d's and they are very good lenses for exceptional value. They also make a 14mm 2.8 and a 85mm 1.4 which I'm seriously considering.

I've also looked at old Canon FD lenses which you can pick up cheaply from ebay etc. Lots of different options with dumb adapters.

[Glen Vandermolen]

Since I've never owned a DSLR, I went ahead and bought lenses for the E-mount and the Alpha adapter.

I have the 18-200 kit lens, which I probably use more than any other. I also have the 18-55.
I have an Alpha mount Tamron 17-50 f2.8 zoom. It has the same lens diameter of the 18-200, so they share a variable ND filter, a must-have for any daylight shooting.
I have an Alpha Sony 50mm f1.8 prime. I'm now looking for a wider, fast prime lens.

[Bryan McCullough]

Thanks for all the info so far, it's been very helpful.

Any recommendations for a dumb EF adapter?

[Paul Curtis]

I've been through this thought process and ended up selling my Canon gear.

I think that no matter what you do it's never an ideal solution. You can use electronic adapters to control aperture but focus is the most important thing and Canons aren't ideal for MF. It's not what they were designed for. Unless someone comes up with a fly by wire electronic follow focus you're just going to struggle with focus.

I'm going down two roads, one is pure manual focus primes - everything from contax zeiss, vintage and ranger finder lenses (the FS is unique in that you can put rangefinder lenses on there, some of them are lovely). Primes for me are about speed and look.

The other road is a LA-EA2 adapter and sony zooms. We're waiting for the new firmware but in theory you might get the best of both worlds - electronic iris control and AF. I'm going to get a 16-50 f2.8 which has been recommended for this and see how that pans out. There's also Sony Zeiss 24-70 and 16-35 and 70-200 around too.

Until you try a fully manual focus lens it's difficult to appreciate what a pain fly by wire focus is on the Canons.

The one downside is that you don't get IS. Now whether that's really an issue for you only you know. The photographic style IS isn't ideal for video work but it's better than nothing. Whereas the steady shot style IS on sony lenses really is designed for video.

hope this helps
Paul

[Bruce S. Yarock]

I'm still waiting for the Birger adapter, because I want to be able to use the auto focus feature on my Canon lenses when needed. In the meantime, I'm using the sony kit lens for most of what I do, and for live events, the af comes in handy at times. I also bought the Sony 16mm f2.8, plus the fisheye, and I'm happy with both.
I have a full set of older manual Nikon primes that I used with my Letus ( before I sold it). I also have a Tokina f2.8 24-70 for Nikon, that I sometimes use with the nikon adapter. I haven't used the Nikon primes much because I've been doing a lot of events and shoots where there's no time to swap lenses. And for most of the time, I've been able to get by with the Sony kit lenses.
But I'm really hoping that Birger comes through with their adapter, because I have the Canon
17-55 f2.8
70-200 f2.8 is
50mm f1.4
Tokina 11-16 f2.8
18-135 Canon kit lens
Bruce Yrock

[Keith Moreau]

I too am coming from a Canon DSLR, both 5DMKII and 7D. I recently ordered the Conurus adapter, which supposedly works for aperture as well as IS and the iris controls are from the FS100, which seems to be the most intelligent design. I really don't like th external boxes on the MTF and Birger. Not sure why they felt that was a good idea.

I should get it in a week or so, I'll report my findings.

[Terje Rian]

Originally Posted by Bryan McCullough

Does anyone know if it's true that you can set aperture on an EF lens on a Canon body, then move the lens to a dumb adaptor on the FS100 and it will maintain the aperture setting you made on the Canon body?

If so I could deal with doing this for a bit while waiting on the Metabones one to be back in stock.

Hello Bryan,

I've been using the Sony FS-100 with Canon EF-lenses and a dumb adapter for more than eight months now. It'a a real hassle, but I really don't want to part with my excellent collection of Canon lenses. With some planning it's quite possible to survive with a solution like this. At least for some time. It depends what type of work you do? There's no problem using a Canon body to fix the aperture setting. Just press and hold the DOP button while you remove the lens... I use a Rainbow Image-or-something dumb adapter. I paid like $20-30 for it on ebay. It works just fine. No problems with it so far. I'm still waiting for the Birger Mount or a similar solution to be available. Conorus seems to be a suitable alternative.

Best,
Terje Rian

[Scott Caplan]

RainbowImaging. I use the same adapter. About $20 at Amazon. Cheap enough that I have one on each Canon FD lens.