Who --wouldn't-- take free glass?

[blockend]

If you had to pick one area where computer design has transformed performance in the last fifteen years, it is cheap zoom lenses. That said, if you work within their limitations, those old 3rd party 70-210 lenses yield perfectly good results. Bad telephoto glass never stopped Miroslav Tichy realising his (slightly dodgy) vision! Shooting black and white will reveal fewer flaws than colour. In the early 1990s I shot a ton of slide film through a Sigma 80-300 wide open because it was so soft and gave exactly the look I was after. Roll with the look and find the right subject, and there's no such thing as a bad lens.

 

[frank]

Um..... who said anything about film?

One best not assume much.

Perfectly fine for digital then!

 

[film_man]

Um..... who said anything about film?

One best not assume much.

I suppose I falsely assumed it would be film related since we're on APUG but what do I know.

 

[Sirius Glass]

You assume correctly as far as I am concerned.

 

[ozphoto]

Considering the penchant the new generation has for Lomography, lens sharpness seems to be in the eye of the beholder; I'm proud to say I used "cheap" non-Canon lenses when I was shooting years ago, though a $3500 300 f2.8 isn't exactly "cheap". (But compared to the Canon version at $7,500, I guess it was.)

I shoot on a 100 year-old, 6x9 folder with a "cheap lens" - the images it produces are wonderful!! It's not the gear you have but how you use it - if you can overcome all the limitations a cheaper lens may have and still produce wonderful images, you're doing it right.

 

[tkamiya]

I like the best and the greatest when it comes to lenses.

Having said that, free stuff is great as well. Nice to have around. Nice to play around with. Nice to use them and see what it does.
Sometimes, "tack sharp" will not produce the best results. Think portrait of middle aged person(s)....

I would not have passed the opportunity OP have had.

I have pretty fast computers here. I still have to work hard to stop myself from picking up servers and workstations from 90s. Why? I dunno....

 

[Theo Sulphate]

You got a lens?

Luxury.

Back when I was a wee lad, we'd give our right arm for a lens with real glass in it, we would. We'd have to use an old wet cardboard tube with cellophane at the ends. We'd be lucky to get a shadowy image through that on a sunny day.