OM mount Kitstar 200mm f/3.3 on the Sony Alpha 700

The Kitstar 200mm is a lens that I acquired very cheaply on Ebay last year – it was an impulse purchase, really, since I knew very little about the lens other than it had a OM mount, and I was intrigued by its unusual maximum aperture. My intention was to compare it with my much smaller and lighter Olympus OM 200 f/4 prime lens, which I absolutely love. I had used this lens on a OM body last spring, and then put it away, meaning to get back to it sometime.

The Kitstar 200mm is a distinctive lens, easy to recognize. It’s all metal and the rubber covering of the focusing rings is reticulated, instead of being checkered as is usual. Kitstar was the in-house brand of Kit’s Camera and they had their lenses made on contract by various manufacturers, so its hard to tell who the original maker is. The lens is solidly built and comes with a built in hood.

I dont know of any lens makers such as Sigma, Tokina or Tamron who made a f/3.3 200mm prime lens, so who knows? Maybe its a f/3.5 rebadged as f/3.3. Kits Cameras was bought by Ritz Camera, and is part of their family of stores. Since Ritz has it’s own in-house camera brand (Quantaray), the Kitstar lenses are no more.

On the Sony Alpha 700, the 200mm f/3.3 lens becomes equivalent to a 300mm f/3.3 lens – that is really fast for a 300mm, and considering the price I paid for it, about $25 or so, it is a bargain. The weight of the lens makes it tricky to handhold, compared with the Sony 18-200mm (also equivalent to 27-300mm, but much slower, since it only goes to f/6.3 at the 200mm focal length).

Anyway, I could easily mount the lens on the Sony Alpha 700 with the Bower-made Minolta AF to OM adapter and took the lens for a spin. Here are the results. The Alpha 700’s anti-shake capabilites makes hand-holding easier, but it was still a challenge to avoid blurring. The Kitstar 200mm (apparent 300mm lens) has nice bokeh.

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Kitstar 200mm	Kitstar 200mm
Kitstar 200mm	Kitstar 200mm
Kitstar 200mm	Kitstar 200mm
Kitstar 200mm	Kitstar 200mm
Kitstar 200mm	Kitstar 200mm

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Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Kitstar 200mm

Photographed with a Sony Alpha 700 camera body and Kitstar 200mm f/3.3 OM Mount lens- I used a Bower Minolta AF-OM adapter and 72mm Polarizer (67-72mm step-up ring)

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Alphamagic by Ajoy Muralidhar is licensed under a
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text and images © 2007-2008 ajoy muralidhar. all product names, websites, brands and technical data referenced are the copyright or trademark of their respective owners. thank you for visiting alphamagic, have a great day!

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Olympus OM mount lens on Sony A700 – Part II: George Washington Masonic Temple with a Zuiko 35-70mm f/4

I finally got around to visiting the George Washington Masonic temple in Alexandria – it’s a shame that I haven’t been able to get over there, since I work close by – but DC traffic is hard to deal with on any given day. I visited on Martin Luther King Day – since it’s a Holiday, there was very light traffic. However, it was COLD!

It was about 28 F at about 4 pm on Jan 21 – the wind chill must have been much lower, but I was inspired by the previous night’s game between the Giants and the Packers playing in -3F, -24 wind chill. If they can play in such severe weather, why can’t I get out and take a few photographs After all, it would only take about 15 minutes.

This monument has been getting a lot of interest from the tourist crowd since it featured prominently in Nicholas’ Cages thriller “National Treasure” – since then, people have been adding it their itinerary when visiting DC, even though it’s a few miles away. On the bright side, they get to visit old town Alexandria and the cool shops on King Street.

I was using the Zuiko 35-70mm f/4 lens on the Sony A700 with the Bower Minolta AF-OM adapter – The lens is an apparent 52mm-105mm lens on the Sony Alpha, and it’s great for general photography and portraits. It’s also a good lens for Architecture as well – but only if you are able to stand back a reasonable distance.

For street architectural photography, I’d still recommend a 35mm lens ( in the case of the A700, it would have to be a 24mm lens to get the apparent 36mm equivalent). In this case, I lucked out since the temple has a lot of open space around it, even beyond the parking lot. It’s easy enough to get far enough back to get a decent full length shot.

At 4pm however, the front of the Masonic Temple is in shade. The rear and side were nicely illuminated. It’s advisable to go there in the morning hours to get a well illuminated front elevation shot.

GW Masonic Temple, Alexandria, VA

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GW Masonic Temple, VA	GW Masonic Temple, VA
GW Masonic Temple, VA	GW Masonic Temple, VA
GW Masonic Temple, VA	GW Masonic Temple, VA
GW Masonic Temple, VA	GW Masonic Temple, VA

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GW Masonic Temple, Alexandria, VA

GW Masonic Temple, Alexandria, VA

Photographed with a Sony Alpha 700 DSLR and Zuiko 35-70mm f/4 lens with a Bower Minolta AF-OM lens Adapter. ISO 200, 1/125 at f/5.6

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Alphamagic by Ajoy Muralidhar is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
text and images © 2008 ajoy muralidhar. all product names, websites, brands and technical data referenced are the copyright or trademark of their respective owners. thank you for visiting alphamagic, have a great day!

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Olympus OM mount lens on Sony A700 – Part I – Zuiko lenses on Sony Alpha series cameras

A while ago, I had written about a Bower made Minolta AF to OM adapter that I was able to use on my Minolta 800si/Sony Alpha 700 to mount Zuiko and other 3rd party OM mount lenses.

The Bower adapter is actually a weak teleconverter since it has a glass element that permits infinity focus – since I got the A700, I have been checking out all my manual focus prime and zoom lenses – Zuiko, Vivitar, Sigma, Soligor, Panagor and Kiron primes and zooms. Most of them fit on the Alpha 700 without any problems – with the exception of the Zuiko 28mm f/3.5 and the Zuiko 35mm f/2.8 (more on this in another post).

There was a very interesting discussion on the DP Reviews forum regarding the use of manual focus Olympus OM Zuiko lenses on the Sony Alpha series cameras. I had participated in the discussion and shared the information I had about mounting manual focus lenses on the Sony Alpha 700. However, the DP Forum’s website seems to have had a technical failure, and about 5 days worth of forum topics have been lost. All the reply postings have vanished – except for the question itself. Bummer.

I’ll be posting more about Zuiko and OM lenses on the Sony Alpha soon…

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Alphamagic by Ajoy Muralidhar is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
text and images © 2008 ajoy muralidhar. all product names, websites, brands and technical data referenced are the copyright or trademark of their respective owners. thank you for visiting alphamagic, have a great day!

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Soligor 500mm Mirror on Sony Alpha 700

I mounted the Soligor 500mm mirror on the Sony A700 using the Minolta AF-Olympus OM Bower adapter. The Soligor is a T-mount lens, but I’ve been using it with an Olympus T-mount for so long, the ring is hard to get off. I just mounted the Minolta AF mount adapter right on to the lens and then mounted it on the A700.

The light was poor, and since I was shooting in Manual Mode, I was using ISO 200. The slow shutter speed I was using was no help. Even though the image stabilization helps out, I’d recommend that with the 500mm lens, a shutter speed of at least 1/250, even with the anti-shake. The bokeh from the lens did not show the characteristic mirror lens “donut” shape, but that’s because the overcast sky and diffuse light didn’t have any bright spots or highlights.

The pictures aren’t great, but I hope to do better the next time. If we keep in mind that the Soligor C/D 500mm has an apparent focal length of 750mm on the Sony A700, just being able to hand-hold the camera and lens is remarkable. On a bright day with a higher ISO setting, I’m sure that I can get better results.

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Backyard Critters- Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters – Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters- Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters – Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters- Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters- Soligor/Sony A700

Backyard Critters- Soligor/Sony A700

Photographed with a Sony Alpha 700 dSLR and Soligor C/D 500mm f/8 mirror lens 1/80 at f/8, ISO 200m White Balance at Cloudy.

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Alphamagic by Ajoy Muralidhar is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.text and images © 2007-2008 ajoy muralidhar. all product names, websites, brands and technical data referenced are the copyright or trademark of their respective owners. thank you for visiting alphamagic, have a great day!

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