M42 lens adapted to Sony alpha

[jojo*2823*]

Hi - I'm a newbie looking for some advice. I bought a Helios 44M M42 lens as I was looking to experiment with a large aperture and not yet wanting to spend a fortune on equipment. Anyway I have a Sony A390 and I bought a mount adaptor to get the lens to fit. However, I keep getting a no lens attached error message on the camera even when it is switched to manual focus mode.

Is there anyway around this or have I wasted my time? Maybe I should have gone a different route.

Any advice appreciated. Thanks

[inkista]

Are you shooting in full manual (M mode)? Reading here, it says that the lens check is only off if you're in M mode. You could also check your custom functions, or get a chipped adapter ring.

[nathanbarlow]

I do adpating as my main way of photography. Love the old lenses aesthetics now.

Anyways you have to do it in completely Manual mode. All you want the camera to be doing is being a light meter, and taking the shot. Everything else will rely on your understanding of how photography works.

I havent used a chipped adapter, as the non-chipped ones work fine with my Canon dSLR. So all my adapter is - is a machined ring that has m42 rings inside and the Canon EOS fitment on the outside. I can put a picture up if you need.

Key thing I found is that you need a lens which has the option of choosing Auto or Manual for the aperture, otherwise you're stuck with shooting wide open all the time (found this out the hardway buying an Auto aperture only wideangle lens for landscapes which i can only use at f4 - not the best aperture for landscapes haha)

My canon in fully Manual mode reports the aperture as 00, but changing the shutterspeed, iso, and aperture (on the lens) does change the light meter reading. Works fine, just not as "brain-free" as modern lenses. Good way to learn though!

Good luck

[inkista]

Nathan, he's shooting an Alpha. It's not like our Canons. When you put a non-reporting lens onto an Alpha, it refuses to take the shot. You can de-activate the lens check on some of the higher-end cameras with a custom function, but on the lower-end ones, it looks like the only way to turn the check off is to be in M mode.

And you know, you CAN use Av mode, as well as M on a Canon EOS with a manual focus adapted lens. So full Manual is not the ONLY way to go.

For the wide-open issue--check to see if the lens has a DoF preview button on it. That's how my Olympus OM lenses can be stopped down to the set aperture for use, if the adapter ring doesn't have the retaining pin to keep that button pressed all the time.