| Author: | | Veteran Member Registered: February, 2007 Location: Phoenix Posts: 1,056
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: April 11, 2007 | Recommended | Price: $70.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Image quality, compact | | Cons: | Build quality | |
I bought this lens after reading about its great optical and build quality. What gives??? While it does indeed produce wonderfully sharp images, its build quality is terrible compared to K and M series lenses. The barrel is cheap plastic, and the aperture ring is jerky and imprecise. In fact, the construction is exactly like the A 50/2 which regularly gets disparaged for its cheap build.
Sorry, I don't mean to speak ill of a lens that takes such great pictures, but in the hand it just can't compare to a Takumar, K or M series lens. I'll keep it for the convenience of the "A" setting, but I think I'll pick up an M 50/1.7 for the better construction.
| | | | | | | Veteran Member Registered: September, 2006 Location: San Francisco, CA Posts: 431 | | Review Date: March 8, 2007 | Recommended | Price: $25.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Fast, Clean Bokeh, Build, Image Quality/Sharpness | | Cons: | | |
The build quality of this lens is excellent. Image quality and sharpness is top notch as well, which is expected of most primes. Focusing is smooth and relatively easy to handle; and the fast aperture comes in handy for those low light conditions. Bokeh is beautiful (but that can be subjective) - overall a wonderful lens for a great price (luckily I picked one up before the recent price hike of old Pentax glass after the release of the K10D).
| | | | | Senior Member Registered: September, 2006 Location: Ottawa, ON Posts: 134 | | Review Date: February 24, 2007 | Recommended | Price: $45.00
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Build, smooth focus, speed, sharpness, small size, beauty, ... | | Cons: | No AF (duh!) | |
My first pentax prime (and second lens) -- bought third or fourth hand (at least) for about 35€.
This is a great lens. No doubt one of the great Pentax primes.
Quite fast. Focusing ring feels wonderful. Very sharp. Great colour with a little je-ne-sais-quoi that I never could find in the FA 50/1.4.
Very highly recommended if you can get your hands on one.
I sold mine as redundant when I got the FA 50/1.4 and have been regretting it ever since.
BTW this lens made it as one of the "great 50mm lenses" according to the Online Photographer's Mike Johnston:
http://theonlinephotographer.blogspot.com/2007/02/great-50mm-lenses.html
For that kind of price it can't be beat.
| | | | | Senior Member Registered: November, 2006 Location: San Diego, California Posts: 115 | | Review Date: February 4, 2007 | Recommended | Price: $75.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Sharp, Very small, | | Cons: | | |
This lens is a gem. It's very small, but has great focusing mechanism. It compares very well with my FA50/1.4
| | | | | | | Veteran Member Registered: September, 2006 Location: West Chester, PA Posts: 1,420 | | Review Date: January 8, 2007 | Recommended | Price: $40.00
| Rating: 7 |
| Pros: | Build quality, smooth focus, small size, sharpness | | Cons: | Bokeh not as refined as the faster 50s | |
I found this lens to be fun to use, with a nice smooth focus throw. Images were sharp enough for me at any aperture.
I sold this lens only because I got the FA50/1.4 which (in addition to auto-focus) has subtly better (smoother) bokeh to my tastes.
| | | | | Veteran Member Registered: September, 2006 Location: Melbourne, Australia Posts: 1,308 | | Review Date: January 8, 2007 | Recommended
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Great MF feel, solid build, bright enough | | Cons: | | |
This is a great little manual lens.. Very compact and very sturdy metal build, the manual focus has a great feel to it..
You can pick this lens up fairly cheap as obviously a lot of them were made, worthwhile if you an't afford the AF couterparts or like the feel of a manual lens.
| | | | | Senior Member Registered: December, 2006 Location: Charlotte, NC Posts: 199 | | Review Date: January 7, 2007 | Recommended
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Extremely Sharp, Produce Great Color Range | | Cons: | Focus can be a hassle sometime | |
I love this lens! You must find it !
| | | | | Senior Member Registered: November, 2006 Location: Sechelt, B.C. Posts: 229 | | Review Date: January 7, 2007 | Recommended
| Rating: 8 |
| Pros: | Extremely sharp through the entire aperature range, solid build | | Cons: | Only manual focus, can be hard to find. | |
This 50mm might just be one of the better 50mm lenses ever made. Despite it's age, this lens consistently performs with lenses made currently, and outperforms many of them. Even wide open, this lens gets great sharpness on your focal point, and is fantastic for close-up portrait work.
The drawback being that it does not have auto-focus. This can become frustrating if trying to use it in instances where you need quick focus, or situations that require more speed. However, this is more of a situational con, and certainly not something that should cause hesitation on its purchase. It's best to know what to use a lens for, and when to use it, rather than try to force a lens into a use it isn't built for.
If you're an old-school shooter, love to have manual control, or just simply like the look that old lenses give your camera, the A-50mm f/1.7 is a must-have.
Of course, finding one is another challenge, and the cost seems to be rising on the ones that do come up. My opinion, however, is that it is worth every penny.
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