Mirage (Korean make) 200/3.5 M42 - thanks Peter !

[luisalegria]

Peter (member peterqd) sent me this very curious and rather handsome lens from England -



Its a "Mirage" which is certainly a merchants trademark. After some examination it was found to have a tiny "Made in Korea" by the lens mount, so obviously its not a Japanese product. I had to open the thing to switch it to manual operation (I just put an aluminum tube over the inside portion of the stop-down pin, to keep the internal mechanism depressed), and the design reminded me a lot of Sigmas of the period, almost certainly mid-late 1970's, but possibly into the 1980's - there were still screw mount cameras being made in the 1980's !

The maker may be any of the Korean Chaebol (trading/industrial conglomerates), perhaps the ancestor of Samyang/Phoenix. The Koreans typically copied or licensed a Japanese design (and they are still at it). I did recently see a late model Kominar 135, in Fujica bayonet, which had a very close stylistic resemblance to this. Komine seems to have supplied a lot of lenses in Fujica mount just before they gave up on the consumer lens business. Perhaps Komine licensed its designs to a Korean company ? If so, it was in the 1980's, as the Fujica bayonet was introduced in 1980.

In any case, this is a very conventional M42 auto-only lens without any aperture linkages or other fripperies, obviously something intended for the cheap end of the SLR market. Given that, its quite honestly and solidly made. There is a problem with this one as it does not give infinity focus confirm on my K100D, but seems to with my other Pentaxes. Perhaps its just barely short of infinity ?

Performance is mixed. It is quite soft wide open, the sort of dreamy portrait effect is quite easy to get at f/3.5 with this one, if thats what you're looking for. By f/5.6 it is quite sharp. This is one of those lenses that seems to snap quickly into focus with the K100. I don't understand why some lenses are easier to focus than others, but its so. This one is certainly easy to work with. It has no vices otherwise, though contrast isn't as high as some.

These first three are at f/3.5 - most of the rest are at f/8 or so.



















The bird -



crop -

[yalcinaydin]

Quite sharp at f:8.
Fast snapping into focus is a really interesting thing

[LucisPictor]

It seems that even "noname" lenses can have their own character.
This 200 produces sharp pics when stopped down and a kind of dreamy soft effect when wide open. I like that.
If you about this, you can use it.

[peterqd]

Wow, Luis, I want it back! Seriously, I knew if anybody could get any decent pictures from this lens, you could. We hardly ever have enough light to use f8 Seems to have quite a nice bokeh too.

[patrickh]

Luis I swear you could make the proverbial bottle behave well


patrickh

[Attila]

Louis is a gold maker...

[asfethan]

I have propably a newer version. Numeric marks are red instead of green. I have that version you have too and if I compare front elements it looks like the newer has coating. The newer one is named Mirage Auto Reflex.

Some photos I shot today are bellow (f was between f/4 and f/5.6 but I didn't noted this info for each photo).









PS: I still have some troubles with MF because my K3 focusing screen is held by customs. I can't wait when it will be mounted on my DSLR and focusing became easier.

[luisalegria]

I have a split image screen for my K30 now, but to tell the truth it does not help very much.
Part of the problem was perhaps unrealistic expectations. I thought it could help focus sharply where there is very shallow depth of field - such as closeups with this type of lens (200/3.5) wide open, or a 50/1.4.
The mounting requires careful adjustment of thickness of the shims, and the shallower the depth of field the more accurate the shim thickness needs to be. Worse, there is a tiny bit of variability of thickness when one snaps the screen and shim back in place, and this actually makes a difference when dealing with the DOF of a 50/1.4 closeup.

Under those circumstances the auto focus confirm is just as accurate, or inaccurate.

I was doing about as well with the old screen because I was used to it, and could almost smell when it was correct.

Maybe I should get a plain groundglass screen.

[asfethan]

That's interesting opinion. I read a lot of "pros" about focusing screen with split circle and micro prism so I decided to obtain one because I'm using old MF lenses only. I don't have big expectations cause I expect it will help me a bit just like TENPA 1.36x magnify viewfinder. With this little pieces together I'll hope my hit-to-miss ratio will improve about 20-40%.

Can you explain me please how is ground glass working or about what is it?

[luisalegria]

The original screen on DSLR's and the replacement screens with split image or microprism have the rest of the screen treated to increase brightness and illuminate the screen evenly, generally some variety of fresnel. It is not truly a good projection of the image that lands on the sensor and it does not really give an image with proper areas in or out of focus.

A groundglass screen resolves a projected image much closer to what the image or film sees. It is much dimmer and not evenly illuminated - the bright area seems to move as you move your eye. Groundglass is what was traditionally used for focusing on large format cameras and early SLR's, like Exaktas.

On MF or LF cameras often a fresnel is added to the groundglass (stacked on top) to brighten it and even the illumination, but of course this is harder to do on a DSLR screen. Some old 35mm screens, like on Exaktas, were curved to even the illumination. But Exakta type screens are too thick to use as replacements on DSLRs. A plain groundglass would be worth trying I think.

[asfethan]

Hmm, this thing is very interesting for me. Thanks for the explanation. Last part to resolve is where can I get some ground glass screen for my Canon EOS 20D.

[luisalegria]

These guys have plain groundglass for some models (most Pentax models).

http://www.focusingscreen.com/

I have never tried these. I was just thinking I might do it.

[asfethan]

I ordered that K3 FS from them. Well I hope you will share your thoughts in case you decide to change and use it.

[KhanX]

Stunt image, very hard to see pictures from this lens. Thanks for sharing.

[woodrim]

It looks good, Luis. Will it jump to the front of your 200mm lenses, or rest somewhere else?

[luisalegria]

This is from a while ago. I still have it.
Its not a great lens. Wide open it is more artistic than precise. Depends what you are in the mood for. Its usable stopped down.
My go-to 200s right now are a preset Tamron and a Takumar.