How to choose an effective old lens that you should not miss

Everyone who steps into photography is aware that the equipment needed for photography is quite acrid. Therefore, many people choose to buy old equipment such as lenses. A new lens has relatively high rates, so many people seek to buy old lenses. However, the problem here is how to choose to buy beautiful old lenses, good prices without worrying about quality. If the lens is poor, it will affect the image quality when we take the shot. In this article, we will tell you the top priorities when choosing to buy old lenses.

1.Learn about lens origin:

When you look to buy lenses online, you can find out about seller information. Although phishing when buying and selling lenses is not much, it is better if you try to search the seller's phone number on Google. Although it is not completely certain, it is possible to avoid some risk if the seller is a fraudulent seller of poor quality lenses.

When buying and selling, you should also buy and sell at home and know the address of the seller to return it when the product is at fault. In addition, you should also ask the seller to warranty for about 1 week to try it out.

2. Bring laptop to try lens:

You can take your laptop with you to take a test shot, check the image quality better than just looking at the camera screen. You should try shooting with the sky or something background bright, open the maximum aperture, close the aperture and then check the image quality in turn.

Check the flare and ghost of the lens if possible, with super-tele lenses you should not aim directly at the sun without the eye and camera being affected. Check the definition and compare it with some sample images on the network (of course, it will also depend a bit on the body you are using.

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3. Optical quality inspection:

This is definitely the most important part when buying old lenses. Simply because optical quality is the decisive factor to say the value of the lens.

A simple way for you to do this is to use flash through lenses with different angles. Any damage on the lens can be noticed easily. You can also use natural light sources such as sunlight or strong light sources to see clearly inside the lens.

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Lens surface is dusty

For lenses with scratches on the back of the lens, you should not buy or consider carefully because the scratches on the rear lens significantly affect the image quality. With small scratches in the front lens, you can skip because they will not affect the image quality when used.

If you look under a strong light, you see signs of bamboo mold or roots, so be careful when deciding to buy them. In addition, if the largest lens is opened, the image through the lens is not really clear, but the lens also has signs of deterioration and you should not buy them. With prime lenses with mild bamboo roots, you can consider buying. But with zoom lenses with bamboo or mold roots, it's best not to buy them because it's difficult to clean the lenses inside. Also, you should not plug molded or bamboo roots into your device because there is a small possibility that mold will "spread" to your other lenses.

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Mold inside the lens

Dust is an obvious thing on the lens. If the lens has a little dust inside, it is not a big deal. Because even when you "box" some new lenses, dust can still be mixed inside the lens. But with some high-end lenses that protect and prevent the impact of the weather, if there is too much dust appearing inside, it is very likely that the lens has been removed and re-installed tightly, causing dust to penetrate. You should not buy lenses with such phenomena.

4. Mechanical quality inspection:

In addition to optics, mechanics is also an indispensable part when you buy lenses.

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Check the connection part with the lens

Check the mount section connected to the body : Of course, you should plug the test into your body and try to see if the camera receives the lens normally, try the test and shoot with the lens. If you buy online (and also don't buy old lenses online), you should ask the mount seller that the lens is used because it may not be compatible with your body.

Check the zoom ring : If you buy the zoom tube, try checking and rotating to see if the lens is working smoothly. If the zoom is heavy or hard, it is likely that the lens has fallen or bumped somewhere that the lens is distorted. Some lenses can be easily zoomed in, but some repair lenses will be very expensive.

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Check the aperture : you should plug the lens into your device and then lower the aperture to check. Try to see if any oil is attached to the lens aperture? Are they easy to operate? If the structure of the aperture is perfectly asymmetrical, don't worry because this only happens very rarely on Carl Zeiss or Leica expensive lenses. Also, they do not affect image quality.

Also check that the buttons on the lens body see abnormalities.

5. Check autofocus:

The autofocus capability of different lenses may vary, but even if the lens is autofocused, it needs to work smoothly. Take a test shot and let the closest focus lens to infinity see if it is "stopped" or having problems.

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In addition, some lenses may be misidentified or still called "front-focus" or "back-focus" depending on the situation. With some lens lines like Art's Sigma line, users can adjust by cable. For some lenses that do not support, it is possible due to your lens or camera.

In the end, you should not be too cheap but risking the lens damage. And you should go with your friends so you can have better evaluations.

Refer to the following articles:

1. 10 tips for taking beautiful photos with digital cameras

1. 10 simple photography techniques for impressive photos

1. 9 basic rules of composition in photography

Hope the above article is useful to you!