Worst M42 lens

[trev]

Generally what is considered to be the worst M42 prime lens, and why?

[Lightshow]

One that is out of alignment.
I should be less cryptic: Generally, none are horrendously bad unless something is wrong with it.
Which begs the question, why? did you buy a terrible lens and wish to confirm?
Then there is your point of view, one photographers junk lens is an artists favorite tool.

[blotafton]

Makinon primes and zooms haha!

[Gerald]

The worst M42 lens is the CZJ Flektogon 17mm F2.8. I could never take a decent picture with that lens.

[miran]

[luisalegria]

Ditto Miran.

Possibly the worst old lenses are most third party retrofocus wides, from the 1960s.
Doesnt matter what mount, many of course were M42, even more were t-mount presets, but they came in all sorts of mounts. They almost all have dreadful corners.
Even some quite good makers products suffered from that.
Technology has improved a lot.

That said, they are usually sharp in the center at reasonable apertures and you can of course take excellent pictures with them.

[Excalibur]

Well I haven't come across a bad M42 lens yet and would suggest maybe they were better made before joe public had more money in the 1960's and photography become more popular and all the third party firms jumped on the band wagon and started churning out bayonet lenses. Maybe some of the crappy bayonet lenses also made a M42 version and those M42 lenses got a bad name.....of course it's only my opinion from the UK in the 1960's as in the US they had a higher standard of living and my view might be narrow minded and wrong.

[Pancolart]

I think early Samyang 5 elements 2.8/28mm is one of the worst primes. http://m42lens.com/m42-lens-database/329-revuenon-auto-revuenon-28mm-f-2-8-22

[luisalegria]

The explosion in third party lenses came in the 1960s.
There was a foretaste of this in the late 1950s.
But its in the 1960s when all the usual suspects, Tamron, Tokina, Kino, and the rest started churning out presets in large numbers. By 1965-67 I think most of them were using t-mounts.

In the US at least these were ubiquitous.

Anyway, I'll modify what I said above - I have a non- interchangable mount preset M42 Vemar-brand 100-200/5.6 zoom that is truly foul. Dont know who made it but I suspect Itoh. I dont know if it was born that way, but I suspect it was.
Some very early zooms really arent bad, like the Tamrons, but some others ...

[papasito]

I think that the worst lens I had was the Zoomar 36-82 f/2,8 for Voigtlander Mount.

Specially at 36 mm.

There is a 24/2,8 lens, Makinon I guess, wow, I could not beleave what I was seen when watched the pics taken with it.

In M42 I never had lenses so worst.

[littleearth]

The Meyer Domiplan 50mm f2.8 !

[visualopsins]

[Marek]

Remember testing M42 Enna Munchen Tele Ennalyt 240mm once. Being relatively compact and rocket-looking, the lens still optically sucked, and it sucked hard. Like many other lenses, that item eventually ended up in China, both world's treasure island and rubbish can for vintage lenses

[BurstMox]

[woodrim]

[papasito]

[leemik]

no such thing as a bad lens.. only bad photographers

[jamaeolus]

I vote the Bittco Super Vemar 135mm 2.8 in zebra. Even stopped down on a tripod I could not get anything resembling a sharp image. Second place goes to the domiplan. I must try a different version though as the one I have is a late really plasticky (emphasis on "icky") thing that is a pathetic excuse for industrial design.

[miran]

For some reason I feel really tempted to get me a Domiplan. Is it really that bad?

[Excalibur]

H'mm are you guys saying your observation\views are from use on a film or digi camera. There is one thing for sure a crap old\older lens, say for sharpness, on a film camera won't get any better on a digi if it does then it's not the lens but electronic wizardry.

[luisalegria]

Those zebra Super Vemar 135/2.8's always seemed quite nice to me.
They are the Nissin/Sankors rebranded.
Sample variation?

[visualopsins]

I have a Vemar 2.8/135 with missing diaphragm that is quite good wide open...will have to do some digging to find it & show proof...

[calvin83]

By polishing/removing/reversing the lens elements, you can turn any lens into a bad lens.

[Pancolart]

[planet.groove]