Pentax lens on Canon body question . . .

Has anybody here any experiences to share about fitting Pentax K mount lenses to a Canon EF/EF-S mount body?

The reason I ask is that I have been offered a low mileage Canon 40D body + grip at a very reasonable price. My eventual aim is to acquire a Canon MP-E 65mm 1:2.8 macro lens which will be the only Canon lens I buy for it.

So I'm wondering if some or all of my Pentax lens collection can be used with one of the various adapters that are available, some of which give AF confirmation, some not.

I'm not switching to Canon, I'm just curious to find out how a 1:1 - 5:1 macro lens performs as I've seen some encouraging images taken with it, albeit on a much higher spec. body.

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream

I think you can fit almost any SLR lens on a Canon body because of the short register distance and wide mount. You'd just need an adaptor.

http://forum.mflenses.com/userpix/20104/big_27_screen7_1.jpg

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Regards,
Dan

https://www.flickr.com/photos/honourabletyr/

SRB-Griturn are the place for adapters - almost anything for a price.

Can the Canon macro lens not be fitted to a Pentax body? The canon body you mention isn't all that great, so you'll be putting a tremendous lens on a relatively poor camera. I would be concerned that it was wasting the quality of the lens. A Pentax macro on a Pentax body would be much better. Or indeed the canon macro on a Pentax body, or a better Canon body than the one mentioned.

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Best regards, John

Are you not sure you are thinking of the 400D rather than the 40D John?

The 40D teamed up with a MP-E 65 lens and twin flash would make a fantastic macro rig. Infact there is someone on AVforums who uses this exact setup and regularly gets published in various magazines.

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. My Flickr

You would essentially be playing the canon macro on an extension tube mounting it on a K mount as it has a longer register distance. You would lose infinity focus and all other features including aperture control as it is an electronic aperture lens.

The 40D is no worse a camera than the K10D. Our wedding photog shot with a 5D MKii and a 40D backup.

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Regards,
Dan

https://www.flickr.com/photos/honourabletyr/

Well I'm no Canon expert, so I'm happy to be corrected.

I think I'd still try to keep to one system if possible and if the lens is a real cracker look for an adapter to use it on a Pentax body.

However, if it's a dedicated macro set up it won't be as potentially confusing as say trying to shoot a wedding using two different marques at the same time.

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Best regards, John

John, I think that Canon lenses are of a larger diameter than the Pentax mount which might make marrying a C lens to a P body somewhat challenging. The 40D is actually a very good camera with a 10Mp CMOS sensor, live view. My son produces some really good work with his 30D, and the 40D is better.

The lens I mention produces images having up to 5x magnification, which is what I'm interested in. It would be a dedicated macro setup and as such, losing infinity focus is no issue.

Apart from the Unicorn like FA* 200mm macro lens, I think I have all the Pentax macro lenses I'm likely to use. I've produced some very good (IMHO)macro images and yes, further magnification can be obtained with tubes/bellows, but it is a bit of a pain.

This is only really an experiment and may all come to nothing.

Thanks for all your replies. I'd really like to hear from somebody who's actually used Pentax lenses on a Canon body, but maybe none here are brave enough

I'm thinking that MF and stop down is necessary, which would rule out using the DA lenses as they have no aperture ring. We'll see.

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream

Peter
Why not a Pentax 100 or a Tamron macro and extension tubes,wont this give 2-3x life size?

I stand to be corrected though

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regards
Roy

Pentax K3 gripped,and some lenses
https://www.flickr.com/photos/pentaxroy/

my pbase gallery

Yes, I saw those yesterday Gareth, thanks.

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream

Yes it does Roy, but it's not in one relatively small and neat solution.

Perhaps somebody (Stefan) knows the maths to work out the magnification for any given extension? I feel a drawing coming on

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream

I've had some feedback to the same question on another forum from Pentax users who have tried this. The bottom line is, it doesn't work very well, manual focus only, and stop down metering is a pain (we have the green button, Canon users don't).

I'm not sure I'll bother going this route.

Thanks all for your replies.

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Peter E Smith

My flickr Photostream