New SLR or new lens?
 

Hi everyone

I am currently wanting to expand my 35mm film SLR's potential. I have roughly £160 pounds to blow right now and possibly more in the future. There are two options:

1. A new lens for my Leica R3. The only lens I can afford for the moment is a 35-70mm, which is an excellent lens like all Leica lenses but no huge magnification or very wideangle.

2. Buying an Olympus OM-1 for about 50-80 pounds with lens and spending the rest on a nice new telephoto or wideangle. Does anyone know about the durability and optical quality of the Zuiko lenses? Are Leica lenses significantly better-considering the price as well?

Maybe I should be looking at an entirely different camera?

All feedback appreciated

Alex

Alex, you haven't given us any idea of why you are looking to add/change. What do you find you can't do with your current equipment? If you're using Leica stuff, then I don't think it's the technical quality of the kit that's holding back your results.

Alex I have used Zuiko lenses for about 25 years now and the quality and durability in my opinion is excellent, all I would say is do not buy too cheap as some lenses out there have not been looked after and can suffer from fungal growth in them , but as the previous poster points out if you are using Leica kit its going to be hard to beat.

Yes, I certainly have no complaints with the quality of the kit, just the versatility; all I have on my R3 is a 50mm lens, and at a stretch the only other lens I can consider is a 35-70. The reason I am tempted by the OM-system is that there are a huge variety of lenses available for decent prices e.g. 28mm, 35-105, 100-200, 180...

My parents had Olympus cameras, OM1 and OM10. and a couple of lenses although I cannot remember what focal lengths. The quality was excellent.

I have the 28mm f2.8.....standard 50mm f1.8...a very beautiful 85mm f2...and the 135mm f3.5.....great thing about them as well is they all take the same filter 49mm.

Thanks for the input guys. I snapped up a 35-135mm Carl Zeiss Jenazoom for Olympus OM on eBay for 90 pounds delivered. Obviously that means I'm committing to buying an OM-1 body in the future (ffordes have one for 80 pounds in excellent condition). In the longer run I want a 28mm and 2x converter to make the Zeiss into a 70-270mm.

You say the 85mm f2 Zuiko is good? I may buy that too =)

make sure the OM1 has been converted from the old mercury batteries or else you will need to use a light meter...also I believe the OM1 is totally manual no aperture priority unlike the OM2

I believe the correct substitute for the old mercury batteries is the Wein cell 1.35v zinc-air battery, which fills in exactly for the old ones but doesn't last as long.

I'd say forget the t/con. If you're looking at these kind of lenses (non-digital) that go for not a lot of money, you'll be better off buying a lens that has the kind of range you're looking for without need for a t/con. There used to be plenty of lenses in the 70-210 range for film cameras, though I've never looked at Olympus stuff. A 2x t/con will lose you two stops of light and significantly degrade image quality, especially on an old zoom.