Advice wanted - considering mirrorless second camera

[inkista]

there is also a walimar version so RokiBowYangWali,

I think sticking with RokiBowYang is perhaps enough, since if you add in Walimex, then you'd also have to throw in Vivitar and Phoenix and Pro Optic... Ah... the many names of Samyang.

manual focus makes sense but as i understand it there is no electrinics so i assume it doesn't meter?

No electronics. But my G3 performs stop-down metering just like my Canons. It's not always 100% accurate. But since I'm pulling out a panohead and tripod, I'm typically shooting off a test shot and checking histograms before doing bracketed shots for exposure fusing/HDR.

...i'd like to try a fish eye as i do like the effect but ........ when i shot nikon i kept looking at the 10.5

Yeah, that's a sweet one. Canon had no crop-body equivalent fisheye lens, so when I started shooting 360x180s, I had to go to Sigma. I go the 8mm f/4 (and later upgraded to the f/3.5) circular fisheye. It's a full-frame lens, so on a crop it was sort of halfway between a diagonal and a circular. And I used it nearly exclusively for pano shooting. And it become only a pano lens on my 5DMkII.

When I got the 7.5mm and suddenly had a diagonal fisheye for the first time, I find that I actually pull it out to simply use as a fisheye about as often as I use it for pano shooting. It's a great little lens--surprisingly good corner performance (you expect a fisheye to get mush and CA in the corners, but this one doesn't), and the flare control is phenomenal. For a $300 lens, I really think I got more than my money's worth. The Panasonic may be better, but at half the price, the Rokinon just called to me.

...black or black/silver all other should be banned when you've seen a pink j1 .... shudder

But if you're street shooting...

if i'm buying another zoom its an f2.8. that oly should have been an mft version of the 12-60 f2.8-4.

Well, Oly are rumored to be coming out with a 12-40/2.8. Everyone's been waiting to see what the m.Zuiko counterparts to the Panasonic 12-35/2.8 and 35-100/2.8 are gonna be.

i don't get how olympus can introduce a black version of the 12 and whack the price up.

Yeah, I know. But it's not like they're the only ones doing this kind of thing. Although I find it weirder that a lot of the Oly lenses don't have the bayonet flanges for a hood. And of course, no hood in the box with the lens is annoyingly Canon-like.

[thequacksoflife]

the lack of hoods annoys me too. ok on a 14-42 kit but on a 12f2? it seems wrong when you pay all that money....

yes that 12-40 will be interesting. it may cause panasonic to rethink the price of the 12-35 (there is rumoured to be a 40-150 f2.8. I was in a shop yesterday and they had a 2nd hand 12-35 at a good price..... i exhibited amazing self control......

speaking of which they had a 2nd hand e-p5 body !! someone commented on it and the dealer said they had a few kits and they were really too expensive so it was easier to split them up and sell them as unused second hand.....

when i bought the gx1 the dealer never had a body only and he split a kit. i got the camera at less than body only prices. he said they could sell the lens easily and make more money so we were both winners!!

and this may interest you.

http://admiringlight.com/blog/panaso...lympus-9-18mm/

[inkista]

... speaking of which they had a 2nd hand e-p5 body !! someone commented on it and the dealer said they had a few kits and they were really too expensive so it was easier to split them up and sell them as unused second hand.....
when i bought the gx1 the dealer never had a body only and he split a kit. i got the camera at less than body only prices. he said they could sell the lens easily and make more money so we were both winners!!

Yeah, I remember this was happening with some of the GX1+20/1.7 kits when you couldn't find the 20/1.7 anywhere. Splitting up the kit and selling the body meant you got a bargain deal on the 20/1.7.

and this may interest you.

http://admiringlight.com/blog/panaso...lympus-9-18mm/

That's a good summation of the 7-14 vs. the 9-18. I also find it interesting that the 7-14 only has the purple glow problem on Olympus sensors--I believe the working theory is that the UV/IR cut filter on the sensor is less efficient at the UV end of the spectrum on the Olympus cameras, but far more efficient on the Panasonics. Not a few people are wondering how the 7-14 is going to behave on the GX7.

[inkista]

Going way back upthread when Manfred and I were talking about mirrorless having fewer parts than dSLRs...

... I would love to see a BoM (Bill of Materials) on a DSLR and a mirrorless design to pass judgement on that. If they are comparing a low end mirrorless to a top of the line DSLR, I could see a significant reduction in part count; but much less so if we are doing more of a low end to low end camera comparison....

How about a top-of-the-line mirrorless to a prosumer dSLR? Cicala at Lensrentals tore down an A7R and has side-by-side comparisons with a 5DmkII.

http://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2014...rorless-camera

Man, I love a good teardown.

[lukaswerth]

I don't know about those lenses of yours; it seems to me you were looking for the longest zoom range possible: this is not always a good idea, as you have to make other compromises (weight/size, image quality)

I also don't have a high-quality casual walk-around camera, but was thinking on these lines myself a while ago, and what I would buy, or will if my wallet allows, it this spot continues to itch me, is a Fuji x pro1 - and probably not with zoom lenses.