[js2]

So this is a 102 year old lens mounted on modern Canon DSLR. Obviously it requires an adapter to physically mate the two.

Not to take anything away from that, but I thought I'd point out that you can mount 50 year old Nikon lenses on modern Nikon DSLRs, no adapter required, due to Nikon's commitment to the F-mount it introduced in 1959:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikon_F-mount

[jacobolus]

> So this is a 102 year old lens mounted on modern Canon DSLR

Isn’t that precisely what is suggested by the title?

Also, this isn’t any “adapter”:

> My friend, a Russian lens technician, who loves nothing more than to frankenstein equipment [...] called me into his store in NYC. [...] He found in a box of random parts, hidden inside anther lens this gem. A circa 1908 (possibly earlier) 35mm lens. Still functioning, mostly brass, and not nearly as much dust or fungus as one would think after sitting in a box for over a hundred years. This lens is a piece of film history people, and at this point rare beyond words. So i say to him, “Wow... what do you have in mind?” He smiles, and says (in the thickest Russian accent you can imagine) “I can make this fit EF you know....” My eye twinkled, and then 6 nail-biting hours later, he had it finished. My Russian lens technician is a mad scientist and he took what sounded like an angle grinder to the lens to make it clear the flange distance and the mirror.... This lens’s value is unclear. It’s sort of on loan. It’s the only lens of its kind on a 5D... or any digital for that matter.

[stinkytaco]

Article also specifies the type of lens:

>This is a circa 1908 Wollensak 35mm F5.0 Cine-Velostigmat hand cranked cinema camera lens

Which is not a Canon lens.

In other words, he probably should have read the article.

[js2]

I read the link and I wasn't denigrating it at all. I was just trying to point out that it reminded me of the Nikon F-Mount which has been a very durable mount.

For many photographers, lenses are the most expensive part of the camera system and it's nice that Nikon has kept their camera bodies backwards compatible with their lenses for 50 years. It is also largely forward compatible (allowing modern Nikon lenses to be used on older Nikon cameras).

[jacobolus]

It’s pretty fun that for all the technological camera changes we’ve seen in 100 years, the optical core of these systems is pretty much the same: a lens with a shutter whose image circle covers (in the most popular case) a 24×36 mm rectangle.

[borism]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-mount

T-mount beats F-mount by 2 years. It's not as elegant as F-mount, but it's very simple - essentially a screw.

I use it with adapter to attach my Nikon DSLR to a telescope.