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Pentax SMC DA* Series 50-135mm f/2.8 ED IF SDM Telephoto Zoom Lens for Pentax and Digital SLR Cameras
Amazon.com Price: Too low to display (as of 2010-07-29 23:34:24 GMT) Product prices and availability are accurate as of the date/time indicated and are subject to change. Any price and availability information displayed on Amazon.com at the time of purchase will apply to the purchase of this product.
Product Description
Product Details
Video Reviews
Customer Reviews
Now more on the 2nd copy, the lens is well built but I find the hood's inner part that attaches to the lens a bit thin, prone to cracking but it will not affect attaching to the lens or actual performance but it is an obvious weak point when compared to the rest of the lens but no worse than most other lens hoods. The lens is made of composites but feels good, not cheap plastics and the build is tight. The weight is obviously all the glass elements inside and this lens has more heft that it would seem for it's size, you would be advised to have a grip on your K20D/K10D to balance the weight. The weight is just right with the grip to also balance on a tripod, the center of gravity will be right before the lens mount and makes perfect balance hand held as well.
Optically I was a bit worried at fist due to the first copy being bad and I gave the 2nd copy a real workout. On test targets it was obvious the lens is very sharp, a tad sharper than my 70mm limited with the exception of 135mm F2.8, it's ok in the center but soft corners that sharpen up at F4, at F5.6 to F11 this lens really shines at all focal lengths. I have not noticed too much bad Ca's or any purpling with my 2nd copy either.
AF speed tho could be better, it's not the typical Pentax slow af syndrome but the lens has a very very long travel from mix to infinity to focus, point to point focusing is decent but slower than the 40mm limited or the 70 ( which happen to be among the fastest focusing lenses on any Pentax ). The Af will track an aircraft in flight well enough and thats good enough for me. In low light it does hunt less than I would expect and the accuracy ( on the 2nd copy ) is perfect and consistent. Sdm is quiet and works as advertised, the focus ring does not turn with af and will turn both past min and max, the friction in the ring does make it good to manually focus but so far the af is more accurate than me trying to focus manually and I am normally good manually focusing.
One word of warning, this lens needs to be shot with a shutter above 1/200 sec, even with the SR on ( and it does work ) hand held. You can see the difference very obviously as the lens is sharp enough to spot the difference. The resolving power is greater than my eyes can do as it picks up the texture on white paper and fine details in text I would only see with a macro lens, these details are lost ( tho the shot is sharp! ) when shooting under 1/125 even with flash and sr if hand held. This is my reasoning at least and this is not a macro lens, we're talking regular focus distances here.
One thing I have noticed on both copies is that focusing between 1 and 1.25m the bokeh is, well just strange, not bad but not great either, beyond 1.5m it's butter smooth right to infinity.
This lens is overall one of the best zooms I have used on any system, it is a little soft 135mm wide open and the plastic hood is a bit cheap but the rest ( of the 2nd copy ) is up to par with it's price. This lens is also related to the tokina 50-135 but while they may get a tripod mount, we get sdm ( usm, hsm sw or what ever, all the same ) and weather sealing, that if it is as good as the K20d's well done weather sealing makes this a very good outdoor/unfavorable weather shooting package. Tho I would be just a little concerned with the lens in drop/kick/knock situations but most zooms are prone to misalignment in that situation, here is where a prime would be better. I will get a chance to have this lens tested against a canon 70-200L soon but I think the Pentax will hold it's ground against it, The Nikon 70-200 F2.8 vr is as sharp to 135mm but that lens is 2x the price of the 50-135 and not sealed! So there is my diatribe about the Pentax 50-135mm F2.8, I will add more as I get to play with this lens more.
This lens produces the most VIVID, SHARPEST, CLEANEST, and most importantly, 3-D feel pictures I have ever seen.
Mt. FUJI picture is an excellent example. I took that one on a bullet travel at 150 mph yet it came out as sharp as it can be at ISO 100.
Get this lens now and enjoy take picures with it. You will be hooked.
Image quality of a prime throughout its zoom range.
Convenience of a zoom.
Looks and feels like a pro lens
SDM focus is very quiet
Cons:
Size (relative to primes, tiny compared to 70-200mm f/2.8)
Flare when shooting at point light sources (lamps, etc)
SDM focus is a little slow
Who should buy the 50-135mm? Anyone looking for prime like rendering from a zoom that doesn't mind its largish size. Avoid the lens if you don't want to stand out like a sore thumb. It garners a lot of attention and everyone asks me if I am a pro photographer.
Ideal for portraiture, and subject isolation with its short telephoto focal length and fast f/2.8 aperture.
This zoom performs as well as most primes from 50-135mm and renders about as good too. It is as sharp as my SMC Pentax F 50mm f/1.4, from f/2.8, and a little sharper in the corners than the prime, with similar rendering. Easily my favorite lens.
The lens is susceptible to flare when shooting at point light sources (not washout, but the kind of flare where you see reflections of internal lens elements). The SDM focus is not particularly fast, but accurate and near silent.
Pros:
-The optic is excellent. Color rendition, contrast, focus accuracy is as good as it gets.
-Silent focus (I don't think it is faster than non SDM lenses, but it's much more quite and that's a delight!)
-Construction wise is really sturdy and the fact that is weather sealed is a plus.
-The focusing ring does not turn when the auto focus is engaged.
-Manual/Auto focus clutch is easy to slide, plus you have the "Quick Shift Focus" mechanism of all Pentax DA lenses.
Cons/room to improve
- Minimum focus distance (1 Meter/ 3.3 foot) There's definitely room for improvement!!
- Focal length is a little short, but you should weight if it would be a problem or not for you. (A 50-150mm would have been nice).
- Lens is a tad heavy and does not have a tripod collar like its counter part Tokina!(not that I need a tripod collar, but it would have been a nice add on)
All in all an excellent performance and excellent value for the price. I'm really happy for having it. If you get to buy it, remember to get a good multi-coated UV filter to protect it.
Cheers!
This lens is great. Before I purchased I had a Pentax K10D, 18-55mm kit, and FA 100mm macro.
Build: 9/10
Although this IS a DA* lens, don't assume this lens is made of solid metal, although this is not a bad thing at all. About 80% of the lens is covered by the soft, rubbery rings and the only part that isn't made of rubber is the golden DA* ring, green DA indicator ring at the bottom, and the medium between the MF ring and zoom ring. Don't make this a deciding factor though, because this lens is made of real high quality plastics and most of it is in rubber anyways.
Auto-focus Performance: 9/10
The AF is relatively quiet compared to my other lenses, but it is about the same speed as them. In broad day light this lens is a dream to use, even in low light it works pretty well (it will accurately AF in a room that has about 2 80 watt+ light bulbs but anything less bright the lens will not accurately AF but this is a problem with MOST if not ALL lenses). The lens basically has the speed of the FA 100mm on focus limiter and the quietness of Canon USM. The SDM sound is comparable to the Sony 70-200mmG lens just for reference, speedwise and sound wise.
Manual Focus Performance: 8.5/10
The MF ring is very smooth and slightly damped and about equivalent to my macro lens (although not as precise due to the clamp that exists on that lens). It is not comparable to the old K/M/A/M42 lenses that have extremely damped rings, but compared to the Canon and Sigma 70-200mm f/2.8 lenses, this is about the same or better (according to user).
General Usage 9.5/10
I spent a lot of time debating whether to get this lens or the Sigma 70-200mm. After 5 months of constantly working I had enough money to finally purchase one of the lenses. For shooting events (in-door or outdoor), weddings, or in-door sports, this lens is a dream. Even the 50mm isn't wide enough for me sometimes (That's why I am going to purchase a used 35mm f/2) To be honest, if you compare 50mm to 70mm, I don't even know how I would survive. The 50-70mm is REALLY useful. For shooting outdoor sports or where you can't get real close, the 70-200mm lenses might suit you better, but even 200mm isn't really long enough for sports or birding and adding a TC would make them really bad quality (although from the Tamron TC shots that is subjective). The Sigma performs much softer at 200mm and especially with the 1.4X TC.
Also remember this lens weighs only about 1.5 lbs (700 grams) and about 1.7lbs (800grams) with hood on. The 70-200mm lenses weigh about 3 lbs (1300 grams). This lens, although quite big with hood on, is just small enough to where it doesn't scare your subjects. If this lens was any bigger width wise or length wise, some subjects would freak out and some of your pictures might look artificial. For those of you that don't know if you can or can't handle the weight, I recommend going to [...] and renting a 50-135mm AND 70-200mm for 3 or 7 days and see if you can handle the weight/ focal lengths. For most 135mm won't be long enough for wild life or out door sports, but at the same time, 70mm might be too much for indoor/ out door events and weddings.
Another awesome quality of this lens is the weather sealing. At first I was extremely skeptical of the weather sealing until a unfortunate turn of events forced me to use this lens under the rain. In the end, it was STILL working with no water ANYWHERE. I don't suggest putting this under a faucet or waterfall though because the weather seals can only handle light/medium rain, dust storms, snow, and sand. Anything more extreme will allow sand to scratch your elements, water to ruin the AF motor and cause fungus/mold, or make your elements "misty". This is also a big plus over the third party offerings (although they aren't bad at all from the images I have seen)
Image Quality: 10/10
Now this is where the lens REALLY shines. It is sharp as my macro lens even when it is set to f/5.6 and my 50-135mm is wide open (even more contrasty too!). If you stop it down it gets even MORE sharp, although there isn't enough head room because f/2.8 is already near perfectly sharp. The photozone review of this lens isn't great, but from user reviews and other online reviews, I can agree with them. This lens is unbeatable IQ wise.
Overall: 9.7/10
I'd say the only reason this lens isn't perfect is because of the rather small FL range. If this lens was 50-200mm f/2.8 OR a 35mm-135mm f/2.8, it would be perfect, but that would make it super expensive (the Olympus 50-200mm f/2.8-3.5 variant of that is about $1500 and it isn't even f/2.8 at 200mm). If you love to shoot portraits, weddings, events, or indoor sports, I can highly recommend this lens.
While higher in price than conventional Pentax lenses, this lens is a tremendous value compared to the premium lenses by Canon and Nikon.
By the way, great service from Amazon! This is the place to buy photo gear once you know what you want!
Although I have five other lenses this one is on my camera 75 per cent of the time
im using this lens for outside glamour and portrait photography
As has been said, the SDM focusing motor is quiet, but certainly no faster on my K20D. The fault lies with the camera, though, not the lens, I think. We'll see if the K-7 improves AF speed and accuracy as claimed.
A little more at the far end would have been nice, but keeping it at 135 allows them to make this lens much more compact than the ~70-200 offerings of the competition. I want to pair it with a good 1.4x teleconverter and see how it does as a 70-200 f4 lens.
I've spent most of the day today testing this lens with my K-7D. I've tested vs some of the best digital lenses that Pentax makes and this lens is a standout. At 50mm it may be just a slight bit less sharp than the 40mm f/2.8 limited but at the same settings it's a slight bit sharper than the 50mm f/1.4 FA lens. The photos from this lens are amazing. It is well worth the money.
It's big and it's heavy, and attached to the K-7D one has a brick solid combination. The build quality is excellent. I've had no problem with sluggish AF as some have mentioned and the focus is fast and silent. The focus and zoom rings are large and easily turned with no zoom drift as some have complained about with other Pentax zooms. Today as I tested this lens outdoors it was raining all day. Not to worry. With the weather proofing of this lens and camera combination, I had no concerns and no troubles. I just wiped the whole rig off with a towel when I was done.
I highly recommend this lens.
After fitting this onto my K10d the first thing I noticed was the near silent focusing, the speed is not noticeably faster, but it is definitely very very quiet.
Photos from wide open are just as good as smaller apertures and I am very happy with the results I have gotten from this lens, clean and sharp images.
Overall very worthwhile purchase and I am very glad to have it
Tags: 50135mm • cameras • digital • f2.8 • lens • pentax • series • telephoto • zoom