Playing With Lenses: September 2019

Monday, 30 September 2019

Big Bad Lens: Bushnell Div. of Baush & Lomb f=28mm 1:2.8 Automatic

Cost: $19 (average market price unknown)

Sometimes you just by a lens like you buy a book... just by the cover or on the looks of the lens itself. This one looked interesting, with a solid metal build, fairly large for a 28mm of that era (rather small for a current 28mm lens) and again of the well know prestige brand of Bushnell Div. of Baush & Lomb, known for high quality rifle scopes, binoculars, etc...

As Bushnell Div. of Baush & Lomb never made lenses themselves, and it states on the lens that it was manufactured in Japan, this one was probably produced in Japan by Tamron or Tokina. With a little of research, I suspect the lens was made by Tokina, as they have a very similar looking lens with the same specs and the same era.

The solid metal build has, aside from a sense of quality, a nice weight that makes it pleasing to handle. And it comes on top with very smooth focus and aperture rings, probably as smooth as when it was new. This copy also had a nice patina with a little "wear".

Image quality was good. Not superb, but good enough to take nice pictures. Average sharpness, nice colors, little color fringing, etc... Not a champion of a lens, but still a good runner-up. I hesitated a little, but then decide to actually keep it in my collection. It's definitely is a "feel good" lens.

Lens Specification:

Focal Length: 28mm
Maximum Aperture: F2.8
Minimum Aperture: F16
Image Format: 35mm
Lens Mount: MD
Optics: ?
Blades: 8
Focussing: Manual
Minimum Focus: 30cm
Filter Size: 58mm
Weight: 312g
Length: 55-58mm
Production: around 1970
Serial Number: 7707846
Made in: Japan

More information on: Bushnell Corporation

Samples:

1/400s - ISO100 - Handheld

1/250s - ISO100 - Handheld

1/160s - ISO320 - Handheld

1/200s - ISO100 - Handheld

1/250s - ISO100 - Handheld

1/125s - ISO6400 - Handheld

1/40s - ISO6400 - Handheld

1/160s - ISO1000 - Handheld

Sunday, 8 September 2019

A sleeper lens: SMC Pentax-F F4-5.6 35-80mm

Cost: 14.99$ (average market price $19.86)

Some describe it as the worst Pentax lens ever made, and recommend to go for the sharper SMC Pentax-F 35-70 instead. However, I actually liked this lens. The fact that this lens was made in Taiwan, instead of Japan as normal for Pentax lenses, might point to a lesser average quality, or at least more variation in quality. But either I got lucky, or I just liked the image quality of this lens.

I found it to be reasonable sharp for a base zoom lens of this era, and the colors are nicely saturated, with good contrast. I also liked it when shooting in black and white.

The negative is more on how to use this lens as a manual lens. I'm sure that when used on a Pentax camera with auto-focus, this is a non-issue, but when used manually on my Sony, the focus is ring is very narrow, and very stiff. Not what I would expect from Pentax. But heck, the pictures were good, but I would not try this on fast moving objects.

In a nutshell, it's not a bad lens, and at a cost of less then $15, I would call this a sleeper lens. Not very well known, with a bad reputation, but when you find a good copy, not that bad at all. A keeper...

To combat partial reflection, Pentax developed chemical coatings for the lens surfaces with minimum light loss. SMC is "a remarkable seven-layer lens coating process that cuts the reflection ratio down to just 0.2% per lens surface. The result is a dramatic improvement in both color fidelity and brightness and the elimination of flare and ghost images."
SMC was patented and first applied in 1971, when Pentax was still making screw mount equipment. The multi-coated lens lines changed from Takumar and Super-Takumar to Super-Multi-Coated Takumar and later on to SMC Takumar. SMC Pentax was used for the newly introduced K-mount lenses. Pentax's SMC is still today considered as one of the best lens coatings on the market.

Lens Specification:

Focal Length: 35-80mm
Maximum Aperture: F4-5.6
Minimum Aperture: F22-32
Image Format: 35mm
Lens Mount: PK
Optics: 7 elements, 6 groups
Blades: 6
Focussing: Auto (on Pentax)
Minimum Focus: 40cm
Filter Size: 49mm
Weight: 185g
Length: 56-72mm
Production: 1994 to 1990
Serial Number: 4466707
Made in: Taiwan

More information on Pentax