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SMC PENTAX & ZUIKO 50MM F1.4
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PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 12:16 am    Post subject: SMC PENTAX & ZUIKO 50MM F1.4 Reply with quote

Hello everyone.
I want to ask which lens is sharper?
SMC PENTAX-M 50MM F1.4
OLYMPUS ZUIKO 50MM F1.4
Can anyone give me a comment?
Thank you very much!
(Gear SONY A7II)



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PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 9:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

They'll both do great stopped down (being almost perfect around F5.6 for all-around sharpness), they'll both be weak (but not unusable, I use them often at F1.4) wide open with some glow and busy bokeh at longer distances. I think differences aren't big enough to call one lens better, but maybe someone compared them side to side. I don't think sharpness will be the biggest difference here and I suspect copy variation will play the biggest factor here since they are otherwise pretty close. There's also difference between newer versions of Zuiko and older one (G. Zuiko). I'd go for the one without the G, with MC in its name or without (all versions after G. Zuiko have the newer coating, they just dropped the MC lettering).


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 9:21 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've had both lenses in the past, but I never compared them side to side. If I remember correctly, the Pentax had so-so corner performance, but good contrast and colors. In general, most Pentax-m lenses didn't impress me all that much. They did definitely cut a few corners compared to their older 'K' series.

I had a later multi coated version of the Olympus 50/1.4 ; If you ask me, its quality is a notch above the Pentax-M. I don't know about the single coated version, but as the pentax is multicoated, the multi coated version of the Zuiko is probably the best choice. But again, I never did a side to side comparison.


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:26 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

for sharpness look at their 50mm 1.8/1.7 contemporaries. 1.4 lenses in such a compact design are never going to be sharp wide open. It is part of their charm.


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

D1N0 wrote:
for sharpness look at their 50mm 1.8/1.7 contemporaries. 1.4 lenses in such a compact design are never going to be sharp wide open. It is part of their charm.


I recently read somewhere a quite extensive test of multiple standard lenses. They said the Zuiko 1.8 would have won easily in terms of sharpness if you don't consider f/11 and f/16. So, if you don't stop down too much, maybe a good contestant?


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Maybe some macro 50's perform even better. Some do very well at infinity focus as well.


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

D1N0 wrote:
Maybe some macro 50's perform even better. Some do very well at infinity focus as well.


In that case, the Nikkor 55/2.8 could be a very good and affordable option.


PostPosted: Thu Oct 28, 2021 10:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

If it was between the Zukio MC and the SMC K 50/1.4 it would be a tie, pick one and be happy, but with an SMC M vs the Zukio MC, I would pick the Zukio.

I was unimpressed with the SMC M vs the K, I'm not surprised since the whole purpose with the M series is to reduce cost.
The Zukio has nice vivid colours and has goo correction of coma which is why I used it for night shooting along with my OM 21/3.5 MC.
My current favourite night lens is my Voigtlander VM 15 v3.


PostPosted: Fri Oct 29, 2021 7:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dejan wrote:
They'll both do great stopped down (being almost perfect around F5.6 for all-around sharpness), they'll both be weak (but not unusable, I use them often at F1.4) wide open with some glow and busy bokeh at longer distances. I think differences aren't big enough to call one lens better, but maybe someone compared them side to side. I don't think sharpness will be the biggest difference here and I suspect copy variation will play the biggest factor here since they are otherwise pretty close. There's also difference between newer versions of Zuiko and older one (G. Zuiko). I'd go for the one without the G, with MC in its name or without (all versions after G. Zuiko have the newer coating, they just dropped the MC lettering).


I plan to stop using these two lenses, I will move on to learn about the KONICA 50MM F1.4.
What do you think about this lens?


PostPosted: Fri Oct 29, 2021 10:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lightshow wrote:
If it was between the Zukio MC and the SMC K 50/1.4 it would be a tie, pick one and be happy, but with an SMC M vs the Zukio MC, I would pick the Zukio.

I was unimpressed with the SMC M vs the K, I'm not surprised since the whole purpose with the M series is to reduce cost.
The Zukio has nice vivid colours and has goo correction of coma which is why I used it for night shooting along with my OM 21/3.5 MC.
My current favourite night lens is my Voigtlander VM 15 v3.


The M-series was mainly a size reduction effort. Build quality is still very good. Mass market demanded it. Apart from some plastic body 50mm F2 kit lenses (some made in Taiwan, but not all) all M-series primes are very well built. Some IQ and or brightness was sacrificed because of the small size.


PostPosted: Fri Oct 29, 2021 11:11 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

D1N0 wrote:
1.4 lenses in such a compact design are never going to be sharp wide open. It is part of their charm.


It doesn't depend on te size. Most of the 1.4 of that era are quite soft wide-open. And if you take the earlier designs (Rokkor 58/1.4, Hexanon 57/1.4) they are even softer and not conmact at all.
If we talk about the compactness, it is hard to beat Mamiya E and CS series.


PostPosted: Fri Oct 29, 2021 11:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Sure


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 7:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

D1N0 wrote:
Lightshow wrote:
If it was between the Zukio MC and the SMC K 50/1.4 it would be a tie, pick one and be happy, but with an SMC M vs the Zukio MC, I would pick the Zukio.

I was unimpressed with the SMC M vs the K, I'm not surprised since the whole purpose with the M series is to reduce cost.
The Zukio has nice vivid colours and has goo correction of coma which is why I used it for night shooting along with my OM 21/3.5 MC.
My current favourite night lens is my Voigtlander VM 15 v3.


The M-series was mainly a size reduction effort. Build quality is still very good. Mass market demanded it. Apart from some plastic body 50mm F2 kit lenses (some made in Taiwan, but not all) all M-series primes are very well built. Some IQ and or brightness was sacrificed because of the small size.


That's not my experience, the whole market was reducing weight, Minolta moved to MD, Canon moved to nFD, Yashica moved to ML, I think Nikon moved to the E series, I'm not as familiar with this time period as I generally avoid all lenses from this period because they all feel like cheap plastic garbage.

My understanding is that when Pentax transitioned to K mount, they put in extra effort and expense into the K lens line to entice the M42 crowd to abandon their beloved screw mount, and for the most part they did.
The M's were mainly a cost reduction effort with an added weight reduction that the whole market seemed to be doing which was basically using more plastic.
I don't think the M series was perceived to be built as good as the K series, I think the cuts were a bit too deep, the A series seems to address the optics with the addition of the A* line which generally restored their reputation for quality optics, there was 1 M* and 9 A* lenses.


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 7:48 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lightshow wrote:
D1N0 wrote:
Lightshow wrote:
If it was between the Zukio MC and the SMC K 50/1.4 it would be a tie, pick one and be happy, but with an SMC M vs the Zukio MC, I would pick the Zukio.

I was unimpressed with the SMC M vs the K, I'm not surprised since the whole purpose with the M series is to reduce cost.
The Zukio has nice vivid colours and has goo correction of coma which is why I used it for night shooting along with my OM 21/3.5 MC.
My current favourite night lens is my Voigtlander VM 15 v3.


The M-series was mainly a size reduction effort. Build quality is still very good. Mass market demanded it. Apart from some plastic body 50mm F2 kit lenses (some made in Taiwan, but not all) all M-series primes are very well built. Some IQ and or brightness was sacrificed because of the small size.


That's not my experience, the whole market was reducing weight, Minolta moved to MD, Canon moved to nFD, Yashica moved to ML, I think Nikon moved to the E series, I'm not as familiar with this time period as I generally avoid all lenses from this period because they all feel like cheap plastic garbage.

My understanding is that when Pentax transitioned to K mount, they put in extra effort and expense into the K lens line to entice the M42 crowd to abandon their beloved screw mount, and for the most part they did.
The M's were mainly a cost reduction effort with an added weight reduction that the whole market seemed to be doing which was basically using more plastic.
I don't think the M series was perceived to be built as good as the K series, I think the cuts were a bit too deep, the A series seems to address the optics with the addition of the A* line which generally restored their reputation for quality optics, there was 1 M* and 9 A* lenses.


Yeah, competing manufacturers cut costs mainly by reducing build quality, but Pentax unfortunately cut on the quality of the optics as well. The A* line were high end optics, but I guess what the consumer wanted is good optics at an affordable price.


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 9:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

There are some excellent optics among the Pentax-M line from my experience.
Some that I have shot that I can heartily recommend are:
All SMC Pentax-M:
30mm f2.8 Excellent (Apologies, this is a K lens, not an M)
35mm f2.8 Very Good
50mm f1.4 Excellent
150mm f3.5 Very Good
35-70mm f2.8-? Very Good - I have had excellent results with this on film
75-150mm f4 Excellent
80-200mm f4.5 Very Good

I'm sure that there are others as well. One good thing about these lenses is the unwarranted perception of "lesser quality" as it has kept their prices low by comparison with others.
Here are a couple of random images from Pentax-M lenses

35mm f2.8
#1


50mm f1.4
#2


30mm f2.8
#3


35-70mm f2.8-
#4


150mm f3.5
#5


Last edited by Oldhand on Sun Oct 31, 2021 12:08 pm; edited 1 time in total


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 9:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm sure there are. I'm certainly willing to try a few of them out in the future.


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 9:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

In answer to the original question regarding the 50mm f1.4 Pentax-M, here are some more images from it.
I can recommend it.
Tom



#1


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#3


#4


PostPosted: Sun Oct 31, 2021 5:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I have a late Super-Multi-Coated Takumar 50mm f/1.4 M42 which is excellent. My main normal Zuiko is the 50mm f/1.8 late "Made In Japan" 5,195,8xxm which is also excellent. Since the SMC Takumar is so good I never bothered with the Zuiko 50mm f/1.4 and instead got the 55mm f/1.2 Zuiko which does the job at 1.2 when needed. Honestly, I rarely use the 55mm f/1.2 since I mostly photograph in good daylight nowadays and I don't do many portraits that I need to blur the background.


PostPosted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 8:26 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Regardless of sharp I’d probably take the Pentax as I’m not a fan of the colour rendition of OM glass.


PostPosted: Tue Nov 02, 2021 8:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Lightshow wrote:
I think Nikon moved to the E series, I'm not as familiar with this time period as I generally avoid all lenses from this period because they all feel like cheap plastic garbage.


I think, the Nikon's answer was Ai/Ai-s series. They are pretty compact. E-series was rather answer to Minolta's budget Celtic line and the third party manufacturers.
Even Konica at the end of the manual era tried to do compact cheap lenses like 40mm f1.8 and 50mm f1.8.