Big news guys! The Chinese company Zhongyi Optical officially announced the “Lens Turbo” adapter. It’s the cheap alternative of the famous Speed Booster. The Zhongyi Optical company isn’t an unknown company for NEX owners. The company is the maker of the [shoplink 14656 ebay]Mitakon 35mm f/0.95 E-mount lens (they are here on eBay)[/shoplink]. On the picture on top you can see the Pentax to NEX adapter.
How did they avoid to get into a legal dispute with Metabones? The optical design differs and the Lens Turbo has a reduction ration of 0.726 (Speed Booster is 0.71). It’s a manual adapter only while some Speed Booster adapters also support full electronic AF and Aperture control. The Lens Turbo price is set at US$239.
Click on the image to see a large size version of their first Pentax-NEX adapter:
Source:
http://forum.xitek.com/thread-1151810-1-1-2.html
http://forum.xitek.com/thread-1133291-1-1-1.html
95 Responses
love the price..thanks china 🙂 ..ok metabones, can we now have a normal price instead of that ripoff ?
@thex
Quality costs money, if you want the cheap option, buy it, if you want the quality option, be prepared to pay what it costs.
Just buy this if you want it cheap.
Why don’t you go invest thousands of hours into R&D along with who knows how much money along the way, create an assembly line, train workers, pay them, advertise and basically sink a RIDICULOUS amount of money to bring something NOVEL to market and then go give it away at cost or at a slight profit. You’ll only have to sell about 100 million of them to break even – IF some Chinese company doesn’t reverse engineer your design, alter it every so slightly, and then undercut your price by 80% a month or two after you’ve invested millions into the project. But hey, at least people who don’t understand business will be happy with you, right?
nevermind 🙂 Saw comments below. Buy the cheap, less feature-rich version if you’d like 🙂
Why do you care so much what others buy?
Your tirade is extremely funny because Metabones in its own turn didn’t license the camera-lens protocol from either Canon or Sony (despite the fools claim Sony “opened” the mount specs), so actually its Metabones who could be sued
NEX mount is open and the speedbooster is for NEX.
Fool.
Read what Metabones themselves say about “open” specs (at http://www.metabones.com/sony/buy-eos-nex-adapter):
Disclaimer: we are NOT licensed, approved or endorsed by Sony or Canon.
BTW, even SpeedBooster is “for NEX” the EF-NEX version uses Canon EF protocol.
Btw. I was addressing only this: “(despite the fools claim Sony “opened” the mount specs)”
And it is certainly not Canon who would sue Metabones, as the Speedbooster only enlarges their lens market.
Boooe, unfortunately, you are the the fool. The disclaimer you are mentioning merely states that Metabones doesn’t have the licensing. Meanwhile, e-mount specs are available for free.
http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/News/Press/201102/11-018E/index.html
The link you posted contains marketing %CENSORED%. When you get to details… Unfortunately, a person like you is too dumb to read all that, so there’s some highlights:
http://support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp/www/e_mount/en/detail.html
* Application from individuals will be declined.*
* you have to sign NDA *
*a part of expenses related to distribution of the Basic Specifications will be charged to the applicant. *
* Sony doesn’t allow everyone else to make E-mount bodies *
“E-mount” is so open, so Sony just didn’t publish it and Metabones had to reverse engineer it. It’s only %CENSORED% who have never engineered anything can believe E-mount is “open”
Well, I guess it comes down to what you define as “open”. I certainly have no idea what world you live in, if you expect everything to be totally open and free.
– application from individuals will be declined – duh
– NDA – duh
– a part of expenses related to distribution of the Basic Specifications will be charged to the applicant – duh
– Sony doesn’t allow everyone else to make E-mount bodies – duh
Meanwhile, for basically no money and an NDA, every company out there can make lenses or accessories for E-mount. Frankly, sounds quite good to me and I am not sure what do you really expect?
Btw, throwing the word “fool” around doesn’t do much for your argument, in case you haven’t noticed. But, hey, everybody is tough on the net, right?
I live in the world where sane people call this proprietary standard. I don’t have problem with proprietary per se, but with fools calling it open. Apparentlyneither metabones, kenko, fotga, kipon were unable to get “free” specs from Sony. So its “openness” has no effect on 3rd party accessories. Only CZ and Tamron lenses aretc fully supported, but these two are in very close relations with Sony anyway and don’t need that bogus openness
Metabones is not the inventor of such a device, they are used for decades in astronomy.
Then why nobody makes telecompressor for photography before them? There’s Kodak, but the patent didn’t covers SpeedBooster’s “invention”,or has been expired.
Well, there are mirrorless cameras now, with shorter flange distance than DSLRs. So if you’re using SLR lenses, there’s enough room for the adapter to fit in.
If you want to buy this, go ahead, to me, this includes China cheap glass, and it will have impact on your entire image quality no matter how expensive you lens is. Not for me.
metabones is a hong kong company. i’m sure they manufacture in southeast china. this is not exactly a case of china imitating japan or the west.
Are you in the lens manufacturing business or do you just have nothing else to say based on shallow and unfounded opinion?
You get what you pay, that’s the bottom line, look at all copy cat Chinese products. Of course I will keep an eye on this product review, to see the real quality of the glass they put in this thing. It’s the same story when you buy filters, you need to know what quality of the glass you put in front of your expensive glass.
I think that the starting point is to take a look in their lenses and by that you’ll know about their build quality and the quality of their glass.
I’m pretty happy with the Sony 35SEL17 and the Nikon 35/1.8 DX. Both are Chinese-made lenses. DxO gave both high marks as well.
Umm… that should have been SEL35F18.
I doubt it will have the same quality and more over, the main thing about the Metabones Speed Booster is the electronic part as well, so, look at this as a cheaper alternative, but there is probably some compromises.
Amd I don’t feel that Metabones is over charging for the already reviewd quality of the product they are offering.
They are. The SpeedBooster alone (without any electronics, as in Alpa-Nex) sells for about $400, and it has only 4 spherical lenses, i.e. much simpler than any 50/1.4 on the market.
I guess the price will go down eventually.
They are not. If you use cost of materials as a sole factor of price determination, than all lenses are overpriced.
Check how much a high quality teleconverter costs, pls. However, it doesn’t mean I’m happy with the speedbooster price and I’m glad others developing similar products.
Why would they get into a legal dispute with Metabones over this?
Metabones has some patents on their design
Considering that this type of lens has existed for decades, it is likely that Metabones has a very specific patent on a very specific size reducer. Note that this one was made to differ slightly form the Metabones reducer so I don’t see a real legal threat.
I just hope they can spit out a Nikon to Nex version as Metabones has show the output of using one in their white paper but have never actually released on. Probably trying to get the electronics and it is taking more time than expected, but some of us would be happy with a completely manual version. I don’t need electronics that provide snail pace autofocus.
I have Samyang with Nikon mount that has electronic contacts. Very useful for auto-aperture control and EXIF.
Yeah, these are the most important features for me, too 🙂
Now all we need is a Canon EF to M43 and this would be the perfect addition for the BMPC 🙂
That was faster than I expected.
Your lens will now also be faster than expected.
This is beyond awesome as Af was a waste as far as I’m concerned. Hope they make one for A mount. I have a few minolta lenses that I would love to use with this.
Honestly, that’s pretty sh**ty. Don’t support companies who rip off ideas, support the innovators if you’re looking to buy a speed booster. Supporting this kind of crap only disincentivizes companies looking to bring new and unheard of technology to us to be used. IMO, this post/advertisement should be completely removed. But, I’m one who believes people should be rewarded for their hard work, not for stealing ideas – others may see nothing wrong with rewarding stealers/cheaters.
@jb: the idea is pretty basic. It’s a reversed tele converter, in astronomy it’s called a telecompressor. It was just a matter of time before some manufacturer transferred the idea to consumer photography. It’s not like Metabones spent years and years and millions of dollars to invent this concept from scratch. With these cheap manual converters there’s only more incentive for Metabones and the likes to make adapters for more lens mounts with autofocus, aperture control and so on. Maybe a next version that also brings image stabilization to all lenses 🙂
Thanks for the info – I appreciate the education. I thought this was new and novel and I work in an industry heavily impacted by “generic” versions of our products and it SUCKS.
You support monopolies too? May the best product win.
Not sure how much you know about manufacturing in China but most likely what happened is that metabones had their parts made in China & despite any NDA’s & legal agreements the design was simply leaked & sold to another factory, along with the molds, to make exact duplicates. It happens all the time with everything. Good luck disputing it, any legal claim will get nowhere.
If you are lucky the copy will be inferior & word will get out that the copy is junk. If you are unlucky the quality is identical, but just made with extra stock, probably by the same factory in secret. They bought 10 tons of plastic & only used 8 for your product – so they just make more of the same in their spare time.
It’s too early to accuse them of copying Metabones. The optics could be different, and Metabones certainly doesn’t own the general idea behind these focal reducers. It was said that the Kodak patent on this idea just expired recently so it could be that the two companies have begun working on their own as soon as the patent expired.
Ok, good to know. I withdraw my tirade! lol
The Kodak patent doesn’t cover this thing, it applies to reducer which leaves backfocus unaltered (BTW heavy, and of crappy quality anyway)
Even though I like the idea of the speed booster, I just couldnt justify the price for myself. The metabones speed booster is less complex than your average plastic kit lens and yet costs as much as a decent modern lens.
I’ll prolly get one of those if the optical quality is usable. Now I just have to carry around one prime, this and an extension tube and practically got 3 primes for the size of one and 2 adapters. Makes an excellent work around kit.
Don’t you think Metabones deserves some reward for putting some product on the market early? Of course, when more competitors are available price must decrease.
If it really was as good as they say, maybe. But it isnt. I’ve seen couple of real life comparisons between prime+SB and inherently fast lenses like the SLR magic hyperprimes (the real fast ones) and to me and to most others who took part in the discussion, the results of the SB were inferior mainly in terms of bokeh which is critical because that’s one of THE arguments for the SB. Also, the EF version didn’t work with 2(!!) different copies of the 50mm electronically which is quite poor given that the 50mm is the bread and butter lens.
I felt that while for those with lens heritage in one system the SB could be nice, its way too expensive for someone who simply wants one extremely fast lens for occasional AL shooting because for the price of the SB + fast prime, you could just get a super fast prime with better IQ.
And both ways are more expensive that painting bokeh in pirated Photoshop… 🙂
well, that’s where this one comes into play. Instead of spending countless boring hours simulating bokeh in PS (which depending on your shot may require lots of skill), I can do something more enjoyable like actually shooting photographs.
The other major point of course is the one stop advantage. No amount of photoshopping will increase the amount of light captured in your raw file.
well, for what it’s worth, i’m using contax zeiss lenses with a dumb c/y speed booster on my nex-7 and loving it. the IQ has been very good, but the SB does seem to accentuate field curvature, distortion, and corner softness (to what extent I can’t say for sure) on wider lenses.
but it’s not just about IQ i love how the contax lenses handle and feel, ergonomically and mechanically.
Why, oh why do people keep bringing up this ‘Bokeh is worse’ nonsense about the speedbooster? I shoot a CY SB on my NEX 7 and there IS NO CHANGE TO ANY OF MY LENSES BOKEH. If anything, there is simply more of it when you shoot wide open because your lens is now one stop faster and has a narrower depth of field.
And, unlike everyone else on here who just types words about what there cousins boss read about in another forum, I have actual PHOTOS I TOOK to prove it. Here is (again) my Speedbooster folder on Flickr.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8539414@N07/sets/72157633126249795/
My Zeiss Biotar retains is pseudo nisen bokeh and my Yashica Ml’s render the same as they always have. Which is to say, incredibly pleasing.
As for all the comments on price, its been said before. You get what you pay for. The Metabones SB was designed by Brian Caldwell, a well known and well regarded optical engineer with many lens designs and successes under his belt. The glass and coating seems to be of very high quality. Metabones did their homework and made a polished, high quality product dense with metal and glass that is worth the asking price. This cheap knock off product designed to a minimum price point may, and thats a big MAY, compete with the Metabones but I seriously doubt it.
Did Metabones invent this type of product? No. Did they invest a lot of time, effort and money to adapt an existing idea to an existing product line in a high quality way so that a whole new world of possibilities open up to photographers? Yes.
Did they bring back my true and favored focal lenths. Yep. And that is why I sent them 400 bucks of my hard earned money for their awesome new product. Worth every penny, and that is from someone who is USING it, not just reading about it.
If it was such and easy idea how come no one else come up with it. This Chinese company just reversed engineered Metabones design plain and simple. All the R&D was done by the Metabones.
In fact, Olympus patented x2 focal reducer for MFT cameras about 2-3 years ago.
That’s what’s on the 14-35mm f2, right?
The main problem with the product is the opinion Speed Booster cannot be done because of “laws of physics”.
please please PLEASE pretty please make a Konica AR -> NEX version of this adapter. One that works with my 57mm f/1.2 (with it’s huge-ish rear element) and 85mm f/1.8 lenses. That would be awesome.
I just realized it’s pretty useless to use it for my 85mm f/1.8 which basically becomes a 57mm f/1.2 lens then 😛
My biggest fear is that the optical design for a Konica AR mount adapter is harder because of the smaller flange focal distance of the AR mount.
Are they going to make an a-mount to e-mount converter? All those cheap a-mount f/2.8 primes will become f/2. Yes please!!!
Tamfon makes 60mm f2 macro. Its specifically for apsc, excellent quality and CHEAP. Its also as good as any macro lens at any price.
Tamron makes a 60mm f2 macro. Its specifically for apsc, excellent quality and CHEAP. Its also as good as any macro lens at any price.
I saw a picture of the FD 85F1.2 on the Nex7, I have that combo ready in my drawer
You’re a lucky boy;-)
Just happy to see a Pentax version!
PK to NEX…YES!!!!
A Canon FD to Nex could be nice, also a Nikon G!, I hope that the glass is of good quality.
http://forum.xitek.com/pics/201304/2475/247551/247551_1366363763.jpg
Excellent! Metabones has been talking about doing one, but still waiting to see anything from them.
Also, a totally unexpected pleasant surprise that this adapter is actually a bit shorter than the open tube adapter.
Actually… They would have made it longer if they could…
Placing lenses closer to image plane allows for more optical quality…
But, they avoid placing lenses closer than 12-13mm to image plane, to avoid baffles around NEX sensor. After ray fan exists last lens, it must converge at greater angle than without focal reducer. So this backfocus clearance (and reduction factor) determines the amount focal reducer is shorter than lensless tube.
For more optical quality, one would consider removing extra baffles around NEX sensor and use reducer with 8mm backfocus clearance rather than 12 mm
…and it’s getting even better:
http://forum.xitek.com/pics/201304/20312/2031266/2031266_1366368544.jpg
http://forum.xitek.com/pics/201304/2475/247551/247551_1366363667.jpg
…additionally there’s one photo on the 11th follow up page they say it’s the 85mm at f/1.2 where the bokeh quite looks like that: http://i2.xitek.com/forum/pics/201303/2903/290384/290384_1362815885.jpg
I find it very funny and lame some of the above poster have gone mad by seeing this chinese alternative for speedbooster. To me they sound like thy are working for speedbooster or retarded people who hate everyone as long as not american or american company.
One of the poster says dont you think speedbooster deserve some reward for creating such a unique device?!! You mean copying such device and patent t on thier name.
No company deserve respect in my openion. They make product for consumer not because they care about you so much. If they figure it out there no money to be made, you can cry all day long, hell you can try to kill yourself.You know what they dont give dime about you. So hy any company deserve anyones respect? Do you have shares in speedbooster? A product that are already exist and copied by speedbooster and made in china for a cost of no kore than $50 and sell it for $600-700 and call it enovation. Hmm I am glad chinese company competing so aggresively that teach those rip off company a leason.
For the on who said cheap chinese glass in this adapter, perhaps next time when you hold your speedbooster in your hand lower your ego and be a bit more humble since he glass and the adapter itself manufactured in china as well.
Dude I’m not American. I was born and live in Asia. O_O
>dont you think speedbooster deserve some reward for creating such a unique device?!!
NAAH. I meant bringing a new product to market. Their reward is possibility to sell their booster overpriced, before competition comes up.
You should understand, that without Metabones SpeedBoster there might have been no LensTurbo at current price.
I was dreaming about focal reducers SLR-NEX years ago… Metabones made my dream true…
Seeing this test pictures with a Canon FD 85mm 1:1.2L made my day, since an adapter for that lens is especially what I need, nevertheless they should definetly include a tripod mount.
Well, I will look forward to comparisons if Metabone’s optics might deserve paying nearly four times the price plus waiting for their so far only considered FD version, but if not I’ll go for the Lens Turbo, since this isn’t a totally new market where one should reward innovation, it’s standard optics finally brought to newer lens mounts and therefore competition is welcome.
People had these ideas for very long. Probably the only reason why no major manufacturer has picked this up is because it may have a negative impact on high grade gear sales that is typically required to get the shallow DOF and the one stop advantage.
I just hope that it remains sharp enough in the center, provided one uses a decent lens while also avoiding swirly bokeh. Still waiting to see some portraits with demanding background like a forest or something.
We’ll only really know if it’s a bargain when it starts shipping and we see the tests online. So I won’t be buying one until early users have given it the thumbs up.
This company are not copying Metabones technology as optical reducers have been around in other forms. However they are probably copying them by joining the market which was brought to their attention by the introduction of the speed booster which they probably hadn’t thought about.
Some people are saying how expensive the Metabones is. What I think are incredibly expensive are lens filters. One piece of flat treated glass. No shaping required, installing into a barrel with focusing abilities and another five or six pieces of glass, irises, bayonet mounts etc. Imagine how much a lens would cost based on the cost of filter glass.
+1
I look forward to more tests of the FD version! I have a 55mm FL prime I would love to use in a more native focal length, as well as some other FD lenses
Since most of my full frame lenses are PK mount I will get it to use on my VG900 in APS-C mode. Metabones Speed Booster is only for Canon EF mount with m4/3rds coming.
If Metabones can release a Minolta MD SB for NEX for $399 before this launches, I’ll get the Metabones for sure.
It is quite arrogant to immediately assume a Chinese product is an American copy. The speed booster IS NOT an innovation, the idea has been around for decades.
Admin, I think it is a mistake to call this “cheap” as in the headline, $249 isn’t easy to come for most people. I think you meant to say “cheaper” Chinese alternative….
Yay! Now A-mount adapter please– to boost that slow STF lens.
Why don’t we ask Sony to make a focal reducer?
And reducers for specific lenses could be of greater IQ
++i
This would make more sense with Fuji. Sony will probably push FF forward.
Interesting to see the pictures : I hadn’t appreciated that this lets the adaptors be shorter too – that would be another nice benefit.
But bokeh would be the key for me, more than sharpness; I’ll wait for some reviews and maybe a Minolta MD version.
Hey, wasn’t it posted as $119 or something yesterday? That was cheap… $249 is still up there.
Yep sorry. That price is valid only for the Bejing show. After that price will go back to normal to $249.
It’s nice to see them targeting other mounts. The Pentax mount should be quite popular. I am suspect of the quality. Their 35/0.95 lens is not the most impressive, per the sample images. I understand the price is low, but there is no point in spending money on garbage.
Legal disputes?
who friggen cares about international copyright. The whole thing is a farce. Who gave the USA the right to enforce their own laws onto other countries?
The patent industry is a complete money making farce. Especially the USA where any international companies are severely disadvantaged in USA courts. Wonder why Samsung managed to protect themselves in nearly every country except the USA?
Theres a very grey line between inspiration, ingenuity, originality and blatant copying.
Metabones confirmed to me in an email that they are doing a Canon FD – NEX speed booster. This is the email i got:
“Hi, Bjorn,
Yes! We will launch FD speed booster at next half-year…PLs wait….
Pls pay attention on our website later….
Thank you!
Alex
GBI Ltd”
I hope they don’t take long before releasing a MFT version!