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Jonathan-Mac said:
I agree entirely. The 55mm is much nicer than the 50/1.4 in my opinion and I have sold three Takumar 50/1.4s as I prefer the 55mm. I had a K version but it wasn't very sharp so I sold it.
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I've got both the M42 SMC Takumar version and the "SMC Takumar" first-generation K-mount version, found at local sales.

Admittedly, the M42 version has sat in storage for years because it didn't grab me when I first tested it; I should probably pull it out again. The "SMC Takumar" (Pentax-K seems to be a common nickname to contrast with the later "Pentax-M" [-A, -F] naming convention) I've had for a bit more than a year, and it's been... nice, but hasn't grabbed me by the throat and demanded I use it. ^^;;

20230313-SDIM4720.jpg
  • 1/320 sec
  • Pattern
  • ISO 100

Sigma fp, Pentax-K 55/1.8

20230313-SDIM4738.jpg
  • 1/400 sec
  • Pattern
  • ISO 100


One thing I noticed, going back through these pics... I had several that looked decently sharp at normal web sizes, but were soft at 100%. This one, though, was pretty sharp at 100%. I wonder if it's an issue with focus peaking not being an accurate guide with this lens unless you use magnification when manual focusing? I've noticed several lenses that peak misleadingly at zero magnification.
 
Oíche said:
And I thought I was a 28mm nutter owning 7 of them one time :⁠-⁠)
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Hah. :) Well, I've picked up a number of them as part of an estate sale camera bag bundle over the years... at one point I did a comparison shoot with six of them: https://flic.kr/s/aHsmPnCCuW That was before I got my current favorite, the Vivitar (Kiron) f/2.5.

I do have a couple of Vivitar 28's that didn't impress me when I did initial test shots, so they ended up buried in storage; I should probably bring them back out at some point. I also have a copy of the Series 1 f/1.9, but it hasn't impressed me either:

20210922-P9223496.jpg
  • Vivitar S1 28/1.9
  • 28.0 mm
  • ƒ/1.89999997616
  • 1/1250 sec
  • Pattern
  • ISO 200

Olympus E-M1 Mk II, Vivitar Series 1 28/1.9

20210925-P9253537.jpg
  • Vivitar S1 28/1.9
  • 28.0 mm
  • ƒ/1.89999997616
  • 1/125 sec
  • Pattern
  • ISO 200


20210929-P9293788.jpg
  • Vivitar S1 28/1.9
  • 28.0 mm
  • ƒ/1.89999997616
  • 1/1000 sec
  • Pattern
  • ISO 200

That said, the barrel is loose and rocks a little from side to side, so I'm not at all confident the optics are properly aligned. I sent it to a repair shop for service, but it wasn't much improved when it came back, so not sure what's going on with it.
 
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robin0112358 said:
Since ye are talking about these lenses, I should confess to being the author of the Great Vivitar 28mm Bestiary, which I compiled with the help of folk over on the Pentax Forum. As such I have at least nine different 28mm manual lenses for Pentax mounts (TX, M42, K, KA). Six of these are Vivitars.

If you are looking at f/2 aperture there are a few choices. In M42 there is a Komine and two Kiron variants that are branded Vivitar. In K Mount there is a Komine and three Kiron variants. For KA there is only a single Komine (which is identical otherwise to the K lens).

There is also a Kino Precision lens, made by Kiron. It's very similar to the Vivitar offerings. And finally the famous Vivitar Series 1 28mm f/1.9 made by Tokina, available in both M42 and K-mount.

I haven't used any of these on my Panasonic body, since I am somewhat fixated on Zeiss lenses. Including the Zeiss collaboration SMS Pentax 28mm f/2, which is my current lens of choice in this focal range. But once spring comes, I can see myself doing a comparison.
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I thought you might be :)

It's not that 28mm is a particular favourite focal length for me, more that they are very common and easy to come by. I've bought and sold, or skipped entirely, quite a number of 28mms that have crossed my path since I started but the f/2 versions I've kept since I find they perform pretty well for their age and they're more prestigious than their slower kin. I also paid well below what they usually go for, including the SMC "K" Zeiss collaboration which of course is the best 28mm I've used.

Since we're on the subject, here are a couple of comparison shots of the size. The first is of the two Vivitar f/2s and the Pentax f/2, the second is the Komine f/2 compared to the f/2.8.

51700335254_49ba388ce9_b.jpg
IMG_4040 by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr

52378516911_d4f1626430_b.jpg
Vivitar (Komine) MC Close Focus f/2.8 (left) and f/2 (right) by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
 
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I had the M42 28mm f2.8 Close Focus version too as you have photographed beside the Komine f2 version I still have. It was quite nice too as this was taken with it on Pentax K,-30 APSC. I think I got £13 for it on Ebay :rolleyes:
_IGP4859.jpg
  • PENTAX - PENTAX K-30
  • 1/125 sec
  • Center-Weighted Average
  • Manual exposure
  • ISO 100
 
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Oíche said:
And I thought I was a 28mm nutter owning 7 of them one time :⁠-⁠)

I now only own the Vivitar f2 Close Focus and the K28 f3.5

I also have a K24 f3.5 which is quite rare but you probably own that too.

I know that F2 Zeiss collaboration well, very exotic indeed in Pentax land going for around £500 or so a while back.
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I would like to try the SMC Pentax 28/3.5 but it does seem excessive buying another! Everything I've seen indicates that it's a good lens.

For my eye 28mm is as wide as I like to go before perspective distortion becomes an issue. I might get something super wide for special effects, but 24mm leaves me cold. Not sure why digital lens lines tend to provide that AOV but not 28mm. I consider this a mistake.
 
Jonathan-Mac said:
I also paid well below what they usually go for, including the SMC "K" Zeiss collaboration which of course is the best 28mm I've used.
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There's little doubt it's the best 28mm ever made for a certain use case: wide open environmental portraiture and video. There could be a better (or more appropriate) 28mm lens when edge-to-edge quality is needed for landscapes. The size is definitely off-putting compared to other lenses of its generation.

The Zeiss 28/2.8 is also well regarded. Maybe some day I will be a crazy person and buy that for comparison.

Being in Ireland I never get a good deal on a lens but pay market value.
 
Travis Butler said:
Admittedly, the M42 version has sat in storage for years because it didn't grab me when I first tested it; I should probably pull it out again. The "SMC Takumar" (Pentax-K seems to be a common nickname to contrast with the later "Pentax-M" [-A, -F] naming convention) I've had for a bit more than a year, and it's been... nice, but hasn't grabbed me by the throat and demanded I use it. ^^;;
Click to expand...
To be clear, Takumars are M42 screw mount while the so-called K line are the first generation of Pentax K-mount and are not branded Takumar. Optical formulas change between each generation for the most part, though several M lenses have the same recipe as their A counterparts. This doesn't always guarantee identical performance.
 
robin0112358 said:
To be clear, Takumars are M42 screw mount while the so-called K line are the first generation of Pentax K-mount and are not branded Takumar. Optical formulas change between each generation for the most part, though several M lenses have the same recipe as their A counterparts. This doesn't always guarantee identical performance.
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No, Pentax did continue the 'Takumar' branding into the K-mount era, typically for their lower-end lens line. For example, while there's a well-regarded 'SMC Pentax' (my bad, I misremembered 'SMC Pentax' as 'SMC Takumar') 135/2.5 in the first generation of K-mount lenses, there's also a lower-end 'Takumar (Bayonet)' K-mount 135/2.5 that I'm actually somewhat fond of. https://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/Pentax-Takumar-135mm-F2.5-Bayonet-Lens.html
 
robin0112358 said:
I would like to try the SMC Pentax 28/3.5 but it does seem excessive buying another! Everything I've seen indicates that it's a good lens.
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I can't remember using the K28 f3.5 much but I'll try it on the S5ii if I ever receive it.
robin0112358 said:
For my eye 28mm is as wide as I like to go before perspective distortion becomes an issue. I might get something super wide for special effects, but 24mm leaves me cold. Not sure why digital lens lines tend to provide that AOV but not 28mm. I consider this a mistake.
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I can't remember using this much either but I liked looking through the MX film camera viewfinder with it.

The reason for the non usage of both K28 and K24 was probably buying the DA 20-40 f2.8 - f4 Ltd which was the DA set of Ltd primes and better than both these legacy lenses, for APSC only obviously even if it was somewhat useable from 23-37mm on FF.

In the end I might sell both K's towards more L-mount lenses but I'll try them again first.
 
The K 28/2 is very nice wide open to isolate a subject, as long as that subject is in the centre where the lens is deadly sharp (see the first ever image posted in this thread). Outside of the centre it's not so sharp.

This is a 100% crop of one of the first photos I took with the K 28/2, on my Fujifilm X-T20 wide open. It left me astounded, partly at the sharpness and partly that I'd managed to focus it perfectly.

51141459779_6ce28ac234_b.jpg
Lúa (crop) by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr

Stopped down it's also an excellent performer but the K 28/3.5 is excellent from wide open so if you don't need faster than f/3.5 then it makes absolutely no sense to get the faster lens - it's much bigger and heavier and costs around seven times as much at normal market rate.

Continuing on the topic of 28mms, I took this at the Disney on ice show at the weekend with the Vivitar 28/2.8 Komine, at f/4. It seems to be a pretty good performer.

53521408493_8206d48bb8_b.jpg
Disney on ice by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
 
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robin0112358 said:
I would like to try the SMC Pentax 28/3.5 but it does seem excessive buying another! Everything I've seen indicates that it's a good lens.

For my eye 28mm is as wide as I like to go before perspective distortion becomes an issue. I might get something super wide for special effects, but 24mm leaves me cold. Not sure why digital lens lines tend to provide that AOV but not 28mm. I consider this a mistake.
Click to expand...
For a long time I considered 28mm "just right" for wide angle and 24mm a bit too much. However, using the 24mm field of view and having that easily available firstly on the Pentax DA 16-85mm and now on the Sigma 24-70/2.8 and 24/2 have changed my mind and I now prefer the 24mm field of view. I think using ever wider lenses increases the feeling that you need wider - the more you have the more you want. For a long time I almost never used anything wider than a 24mm and now I sometimes find myself thinking that the wide end of the 16-35/4 is not quite wide enough...
 
I've inherited a number of a Pentax SMC lenses from my late grandfather:

2x 28mm F3.5 (different versions)
50mm F1.8
55mm F1.7
135mm F3.5
200mm F4

I endeavour to post some pictures with my S5II when I've got the adapter and played around with the lenses
 
Silverwings said:
I've inherited a number of a Pentax SMC lenses from my late grandfather:

2x 28mm F3.5 (different versions)
50mm F1.8
55mm F1.7
135mm F3.5
200mm F4

I endeavour to post some pictures with my S5II when I've got the adapter and played around with the lenses
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The 28mms must be K and M - the K is bigger and heavier but much better. You've got the maximum apertures of the 50 and 55mm lenses switched - both after very good lenses. The 135mm isn't great wide open but fine stopped down a bit. The 200mm if it's the M then you can expect some chromatic aberrations wide open, if it's not the M then it'll be much better.
 
Jonathan-Mac said:
The 28mms must be K and M - the K is bigger and heavier but much better. You've got the maximum apertures of the 50 and 55mm lenses switched - both after very good lenses. The 135mm isn't great wide open but fine stopped down a bit. The 200mm if it's the M then you can expect some chromatic aberrations wide open, if it's not the M then it'll be much better.
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Yeah you are quite right, the 50 and 55 are opposite to what I said. It appears the 55mm/f1.8 are particularly nice lenses judging by reviews I've seen.

The 200mm is the non-M but it does appear to suffer with some fungus in the front lens, as does the 55mm. All the others look clean.

They all seem in good working order with smooth aperture and focus, testimony to the build quality considering they are 40+ years old I guess.
 
I've done a bit of searching online and it seems relatively straight forward to clean the fungus off the front lenses of my 200 and 55mm. I'll get on the case!
 
Silverwings said:
I've done a bit of searching online and it seems relatively straight forward to clean the fungus off the front lenses of my 200 and 55mm. I'll get on the case!
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You need a lens tool to slot into the ring notches and unscrew the retainer rings, I used to do loads of this stuff right down to the delicate aperture blades, however never a Pentax lens. I have 2x of the 135 f3.5, the 200 f4 and both 50 f1.7 and 55 f1.8. A long time since I used them, the 55 was too long for APSC but I now have the S5ii only 5 days old so looking forward to trying them with the excellent MF tools in S5ii.

I remember using extension tubes on both 135 and 200 for some flower photography. I used the 200 for monochrome landscape film photography but haven't looked at the negatives in years. I never got around to printing them and also never bought a scanner as the good ones were expensive.

The M50 f1.7 is soft and dreamy wide open which can be nice for that look and super sharp stopped down. The 55 has a different look to it, possibly more interesting and I may actually try it later on the S5ii.

Unfortunately it's too early for nice flowers, only snowdrops and I don't have any unless I go to parks.
 
My M 50/1.7 is a bit soft wide open but less so than most vintage 50s and I wouldn't call it dreamy, The 55/1.8 I had was much softer but others have told me theirs were sharp, so I put it down to sample variation.
 
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