The Canon 85mm Serenar f/1.9 LTM Lens on the Streets of Bangkok and Berlin

[@markwiemels]

New Sub. You had me in 20 seconds. What a fun video, KZbin needs more characters. Just keep uploading.

[@WolfgangWhyte]

Agreed! Nobody else spins "febrile phantasms" into reviews that are fun to watch. There's a lot of great photographer/educators on KZbin, but too many of their vids leave me with that feeling you get in the midst of a car accident: frozen with stale calm while the seconds turn to hours as you slide towards the big truck... but not Mark. I'd go so far as to say that the next time I'm in a car accident, if I had my druthers, I'd like him to be driving 😋

[@patternsinsand]

Thanks for the comment, Mark. Love your videos too. They get me hankering after low cost lenses for my Z6 and I appreciate your honest and professional delivery.

[@patternsinsand]

@@WolfgangWhyte I'm much better driving a camera than a car - just ask my family.

[@WolfgangWhyte]

@@patternsinsand At least the camera never asks, "Are we there yet?" 😂

[@dav1dax]

I need this music in my life

[@robdido]

Jinx. As soon as it came up that one of the people at the table was my fav too. Reminds me of a famous painting. A keeper.. bangcock was delightfully delirious but Berlin was bong on.. and you did it with a mask fogging you up.. this lens is in my cart.. right up my 170mm Allen Key

[@patternsinsand]

Thanks, Rob. Lots of photographers talk about atmosphere in their photos, never thought brain fog would yield good results.

[@WolfgangWhyte]

Since you asked, near the end, if I stumbled across this video because I had a passing interest in that lens, I have to confess, I had never heard of the lens before, but stopped by to watch because I enjoy your presentation. That I also learned about the lens this past 26 minutes is just a bonus 😉 Lovely bokeh, I must admit.

[@patternsinsand]

Thanks for watching. Yes, that Bokeh is stunning and the low element count gives the in-focus areas plenty of pop if you can get it right.

[@zeroequalsthree8649]

I have a Takumar 85mm 1.9 that I've been like "do I need this?" but your video inspired me to slap it on my pen e-pl2 and roam around the local station here in suburbia western Japan this eve... Neat stuff!

[@patternsinsand]

If my video can inspire you go out taking and take photos then I'm a happy man.

[@bernardkealey6449]

As you dropped “febrile phantasms of photographic forays” I thought you were going to loop back to your earlier catholic comment,,,,, The editing of Bangkok night was excellent; between the off focus vid and the soundscape, was very very fever dream. Bravo. I loved all the Bangkok shots; bangers, indeed. The spy-esque parking garage would have been a top choice for me, maybe just as such an almost jarringly counterpoint to the neon (which were great). No, I don’t have that lens. If I could get my old man’s FED fixed I’d consider it for that, but this vid has almost made me fire up the eBay monster and look at that Olympus… me, who hates digital because the bloody menus drive me insane,,, Pleased you seem to have bounced back from the cooties; hope there’s no long leg brain drag for you.

[@patternsinsand]

Thanks for the comment, Bernard. Bangkok was surreal. I backed off the catholic criticism for fear of burning in hell.

[@aiherzen]

Glad you're ok Mark. I'm just here for the alliteration.

[@patternsinsand]

@@aiherzen I might throw a few spoonerisms into the next video

[@DanielVictor-cf1mh]

thank god i'm not the only pervert who does tele street photography.. anyway thanks for the video. as always top notch

[@patternsinsand]

Best form of social distancing. Thanks for watching.

[@iainmc9859]

Okay, feel free to ignore this question that I've been pondering for at least the last year. Has the Golden Age of Street Photography gone (probably reaching its demise in about 1982), or am I just looking back with a pair of Kodacolor tinted specs ? Are we living in a uni-culture post-modernist dystopia. Granted Bangkok and Berlin looked very different ... but they are probably cultural extremes on opposite sides of the globe. Don't worry, you aren't the first and you won't be the last person coming back from Bangkok with a dose of something 🤧🤪😷

[@patternsinsand]

Good point. I've definitely witnessed how cities have become more homogeneous and it's getting difficult to avoid all of the McDonalds and Starbucks signs around the world. But I'm starting to appreciate that even in familiar places there are photographic opportunities. We're never going to be able to recapture 1970s New York but maybe we just need to get some perspective. And the post-modernist dystopia is still cool :)

[@Old-School-Liberal]

Was Nikon still making these lenses for Canon back then?

[@patternsinsand]

Nikon did make LTM lenses around that time, though I suspect they were really thinking about competing with Leica glass rather than Canon. Check out my review of the 5cm/50mm f/1.4 SC LTM from Nikon. I know they also made an 85mm f/2. Probably very expensive. Thanks for the question and for watching.

[@thedarkslide]

I love my Pen F, I got two (silver and black). But the video footage it produces is just atrocious.

[@patternsinsand]

It's an Olympus. Definitely geared towards stills. While I don't hate the colours and appreciate the stabilization, I wouldn't want to try to do much editing with the footage, given the bitrate/codec and limited frame and resolution options. As you can see, though, the gopro is an atrocious low-light shooter (should have turned the stabilization off because it just makes the footage jittery). Thanks for the comment.

[@ginoredden]

​@@patternsinsandI thought the jittery footage was intentional when you said the night turned into a fever dream. Between that and the flicker from the LED lights, I was like "I feel uncomfortable but intrigued."

[@patternsinsand]

@@ginoredden No, that was just the framing and the camera movement that was the result of the fever. The GoPro's stabilization puts the jitters in itself. Agreed, this is one instance where it works.

[@hunson3396]

great pictures and video, really like to see what you capture

[@patternsinsand]

Thanks for the kind comment.