In June last year I wrote a blog post suggesting the Micro Four Thirds system could become the ultimate tilt-shift system as its lens to sensor distance is short enough that a tilt-shift lens adapter could theoretically be made which would convert any legacy 35mm lens into a tilt shift lens, and you would get the fastest manual focus capability thanks to the mirror less live view.
Now at last, a tilt adapter has been made available for MFT from Adriano Lolli – see here. The tilt can be rotated 360 degrees, and at zero tilt, focus at infinity is still possible.
Forget your expensive Lens Baby lenses, or the extremely expensive Canon or Nikon tilt-shift lenses, if all you need is tilt and not shift, then this relatively inexpensive adapter will convert your existing legacy lenses into tilt lenses for you, and of course, if you have Olympus MFT cameras, you also have image stabilisation to boot!
This adapter should be one very popular adapter for macrophotography and creative work – it seems at present he has versions for Nikon, Contax-Yashica, Leica R, Contarex, and Olympus OM.
It would seem the adapter is not yet available but presumably one could order one?
Perhaps he has a shift adapter on the way as well?
He has a full catalogue here (pdf) – look for item #3107 – current price in 2010 is 136Euro.
I was notified of this adapter by one of my readers who knew I was interested in such things – his source was actually the 43rumors.com website so I add this note to give credit and to remind Four Thirds users of this excellent resource.
Some rumours posted on this site suggest to me:
- Panasonic may create a new Four Thirds dSLR with a hybrid optical/electronic viewfinder system – perhaps EVF when mirror is up, and using their fast contrast detect AF algorithms found in their MFT cameras?
- Olympus may announce a E-P3 in 1st half of 2010 with an in-built EVF – now that would be a very nice evolution of the E-P2!
- new Panasonic sensor coming early 2010 with better high ISO noise and dynamic range – well that’s pretty logical – they wouldn’t do a Canon with their G10 and make it worse now would they?
Nice alert Gary. The m4/3 system is evolving well.
The other thing of interest is the Samsung NX-10 … a full APS-C sized sensor and AMOLED lcd + the camera is smaller than the Panasonic GH-1/GH … unfortunately it uses a proprietary lens mount BUT if nothing else, it should force Panasonic and Olympus to update their Micro 4/3 camera and lens range more quickly !!
The other thing of interest is the Samsung NX-10 … a full APS-C sized sensor and AMOLED lcd + the camera is smaller than the Panasonic GH-1/GH … unfortunately it uses a proprietary lens mount BUT if nothing else, it should force Panasonic and Olympus to update their Micro 4/3 camera and lens range more quickly !!
yes, the nx-10 will provide a bit of competition which will be good.
Nevertheless, I would be surprised if the high ISO capability of the nx-10 is much better than the MFT cameras, and they will be forced to use larger lenses which defeats some of the point behind a compact kit.
Also, they may find as Leica did, a short lens flange distance creates image problems for larger sensors unless you have a special expensive sensor like in the Leica M9.
But as you say, hopefully it will spur on development of MFTs system.
i have googling around and came across Fotodiox Pro shift Lens Adapter have search.
Fantastic Martin, many thanks – that wonderful news deserved a post of its own!
Just seen this. A tilt AND shift lens with dedicated mFT mount.
What you think? (Is it good value? Is it better to buy an adaptor? Likely image quality? etc etc)
Here it is: http://cgi.ebay.com/MC-2-8-35mm-TILT-SHIFT-lens-Olympus-MICRO-4-3-rd-camera_W0QQitemZ170469206702QQcmdZViewItemQQptZCamera_Lenses?hash=item27b0c1aaae#ht_2162wt_939
Regards,
It is great to see third party manufacturers making lenses for Micro Four Thirds, but this 35mm f/2.8 tilt shift lens made in Kiev and selling for $US589 and weighing 900g seems a bit big, heavy and expensive now that tilt and shift adapters are becoming available.
With these adapters, you could pick up a 21mm, 24mm, 35mm and 50mm OM lens and use them all on a tilt adapter as tilt lenses and they would work out much lighter and cheaper.