Good 135mm lens

[ian_hills]

<p>Hi all,<br>

I'm looking for a good (but not too expensive) 135mm lens for my Pentax K-1000<br>

All thoughts welcome.</p>

[jean_yves_mead]

<p>Hard to beat the Pentax 135mm f/3.5 SMC-M. Small, light, sharp, and usually pretty cheap. It even

comes with its own built-in sliding hood.</p>

 

<p>There are plenty of user reviews of it <a href="http://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/SMC-Pentax-M-135mm-F3.5-Lens.html">here</a>.</p>

[Jochen_S]

<p>I'm sad to tell: I haven't encountered a "bad" one yet. They seem all quite decent and the K100 takes old plain k-mount for which a lot of 3rd party 135mms were offered. - There should be something in the $20 range in your reach.<br>

Here I have a late acquired Pentax A f2.8. It did look pretty new but once a aperture blade came loose and the others got jammed. - A local independent repairman could fix that. My F f2.8 looks worse but works great - I don't recommend the AF lenses for the K 1000 though.<br>

I also have a f2.8 "Revuenon" which looks like a rebadged "Raynox" that worked hard during my film days looks really used and took pleasing pictures. I grabbed a barely used but early dropped "Porst" with unusable filter thread for small change at a flea market. <br>

Sorry for my unscientific rambling. I did a shootout from my balcony when I got my *istD new and haven't repeated that on my k20D. Porst & Revue used to be house brands of the 2 bigger German consumer photo retail chains who had their stuff made in back then inexpensive Japan or bulk ordered East German Practika gear with their label on it.<br>

If there is any bearable hassle approach to provide you with test images or their results let me know. <br>

Back in my first round I used just a general impression of the neighbor roof to come to the conclusion that my early FA 100m f2.8 seemed my best / reference lens. The 135mm primes appeared pretty close IQ wise. - My zooms obviously worse and the inexpensive 400mm f6.3s also "not good".<br>

I have no clue what you are going for. For me the k1000 (&such) was a walk around / press camera to take handheld pictures. I usually loaded ISO 200 no name slides or ISO 400+x negative film and my images appeared most of the time limited by film grain. - If you have a decent tripod with ballhead in the field and a set of powerful strobes at home you can of course use the slowest film on the market pull it another f-stop in ultra finegrain developer and spot more lens flaws on your poster prints... I never had the focusing skills to shoot at f2.8 with confidence I would hit my subject's front eye with the shallow DOF plane. - Doing a portrait at 1.5m f2.8 means 2cm DOF f5.6 provides at least 4cm with f8 I'd be more confident to hit. YMMV, maybe you are after those really tricky shots and consider film still cheap enough to not mind half a roll of spray & pray.<br>

I'll stick to "just grab something with k-mount" as shopping advice. - I really don't suggest getting fooled by Carl Zeiss Jena's fancy name and starting to adapt an m42 lens on the k1000. You'll loose the automatic stopping down for exposure will have to do that by hand, which makes focusing way harder, giving you and the subject more time to move OOF. I also suggest to keep your hands of the Pentax A 100mm f2.8 macro. - It might be killer glass, but the focus throw makes it hard to use around infinity. </p>

[BelaMolnar]

<p>135mm lenses easy to made, most of those focal lengths are sharp lenses, Nikon or Canon or Pentax.<br>

I have several 135mm lens, f3.5, several of the f2.8, the oldest is a 50 years old Nikkor-Q lens NON AI, & AI concerted and AI-S, a f2 AI-S. Last weekend walk out to the beaches and used the oldest 135 only on the Nikon Df. All images very sharp and good colors.<br>

Bay the cheapest Pentax, I would prefer the f2.8 and go shooting. Excellent focal length for many subject.</p><div></div>

[BelaMolnar]

<p>Nikkor-Q 135/2.8</p><div></div>

[BelaMolnar]

<p>An other image of the Nikkor-Q 135/2.8</p><div></div>

[todd_phillips3]

<p>I really like my Tak-K 135/2.5 which I bought for $40, and there seems to be a fairly abundant supply out there...</p>

<p>http://www.pentaxforums.com/lensreviews/Pentax-Takumar-135mm-F2.5-Bayonet-Lens.html</p>

[MattB.Net]

<p>I used to have a Pentax-M 135/2.5 and it was a beautiful lens. I still regret parting with it (although it funded the purchase of my beloved DA 15 so I don't regret that part). It was great with film on my ME Super especially. <br>

You have to be willing to do green button metering with digital which could be an issue. It forces you to slow down which can be good or bad depending on circumstances. <br>

Now I have a Sears 135/2.8 with macro that I picked up for $40 on eBay. It's an A series lens so metering is more intuitive and the optics are decent, especially for the money. The macro feature is junk IMO and I never use it. Some like the "glow" but to me it's just lack of clarity. I like it for portraiture and long landscapes.<br>

Here are a couple of samples from the Sears on my K-5:<br>

3 vertical shots stitched<br>

<a title="IMGP2744-Edit by Matt Burt, on Flickr" href=" src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7330/11508085095_c710af6007.jpg" alt="IMGP2744-Edit" width="500" height="282" /></a><br>

a portrait, also with a K-5<br>

<a title="IMGP3703 by Matt Burt, on Flickr" href=" src="https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8348/8196318059_93db322c3b.jpg" alt="IMGP3703" width="353" height="500" /></a><br>

.<br>

I've earned some money with the Sears, so it's been a great value for me. </p>

[JDMvW]

<p>As the others say, almost any 135mm made <em><strong>in the K mount</strong></em> will work well. The best of them even spectacularly well.<br>

The Takumars are very nice, but even the generic lenses from the period will do well. There are so many options that I wouldn't even consider adapting M42 lenses.<br>

I've found the Spiratone automatic 135mm f/2.8s to be especially good, as well. </p>

[jean_yves_mead]

<p>Eh, F mount works just as well:<br>

 

<a href="

src="https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3301/3593921307_18ab9981d7.jpg" width="500" height="500"/></a>

<br>

<small>(Not really)</small></p>