I use vintage lenses on an apsc (crop sensor camera).
I’ve always used them in a point, focus, then shoot method.
(I use a second hand 70d, with lens adapter that flashes purple when focus is hit)
This was fine for things that didn’t move, posed or buildings, or when I stopped the lens down to f8 or f11 for landscapes, etc.

Slightest bit of movement when taking the picture, either by me or the subject, blurred.

For video, not much use either, I’ve got a second hand focus puller (a big wheel) but need focus rings for each lens, then you have no stabilisation, so never the best.
I’ve just tended to stick with my cheap second hand ultrasonic lenses, this way I have focus, which is hit and miss, but generally ok.

Then I picked up a second hand 5d mark II (couldn’t afford a 5d mark III)
Full frame it might be, but once again the lenses used were mostly autofocus cheap ones, instead of using the vintage ones, so the range was not much good.
Of course, video was an option (I only shoot in HD, not 4k or anything above), but again no stabe and the vintage lenses were hard to focus pull, which just seem to add movement.

So I came away from video and concentrated on photography more, over the last few weeks/months.

Again, I had the movement blur unless it was a building or other stationary object.

I started to wonder, how it was that back in the days of film cameras, how did they get sharp pictures?
They had no auto focus, they used expensive film, in fact no auto settings, so how did they get sharp pictures most of the time?

I watched numerous videos, all to no avail.
I, as I often do, left this interest while real life took over.
Recently I caught some videos online of POV (point of view) street photography.
One such photographer, Eduardo Ortiz particularly caught my eye, especially the video he posted (linked below).

I started wondering, how he sets the camera up so he can just point and shoot?
From here I looked at another POV street photography video, with Eduardo being questioned by another photographer.

Total eye-opener, as I then moved on to “Zone focusing”

I can set up a manual, vintage lens, using the lens’ markings, that set a ‘zone’ which enables me to point and shoot the camera and not have to use any auto focus, at all!
Wow! Mind blown!

Full manual settings on the camera, so I set the shutter speed and aperture, then set the camera to auto ISO and bingo!
Sharp shots on manual, vintage lenses, that don’t need me to pull focus or adapt the lens to auto focus.
Eradicating all those blurred shots!

Then I hit another problem, re: the canon 5d mk II
The auto ISO only goes as high as 400.
With my indoor, low-light testing, this was next to useless, as my test shots were blurry due to the shutter speed being too low.
(I asked canon about this – no reply)
I’m guessing that older canon cameras were not officially adapted for vintage lenses, so although a firmware update increased the ISO for video, photography stayed at ISO400.

This is where the new mirrorless canon cameras differ.
Canon produce their own lens adapters for these models, so I picked up an old R6 to test vintage lenses on.
Hey presto, even in low-light situations, now the auto ISO works like a dream with the vintage lenses, with the zone focusing set from a small distance to infinity, I don’t have to focus, I can now just frame a picture and shoot!

I am so happy now using vintage lenses and zone focusing them (read up on it, it’s really easy to do!)
I can now use vintage lenses for regular photography.
So my next venture will be to test out zone focusing shorter distances, then moving to longer prime vintage lenses and zone focusing, then moving on to zone focusing vintage lenses while filming.
Will I still need to pull focus manually?
Will the auto ISO hold up?
Using a gimbal, will it be stable enough footage?
What about handheld?

Zone focusing has opened up a whole new field of opportunity to use my vintage lenses.
I’ll let you know my findings…