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Takumar 200mm F3.5 Review RSS Feed

Takumar 200mm F3.5

Sharpness 
 9.5
Aberrations 
 8.7
Bokeh 
 9.7
Handling 
 8.7
Value 
 9.9
Reviews Views Date of last review
30 156,095 Sun June 4, 2023
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Recommended By Average Price Average User Rating
100% of reviewers $91.32 9.40
Takumar 200mm F3.5

Takumar 200mm F3.5
supersize
Takumar 200mm F3.5
supersize

Description:
This is the fastest of the 200mm screwmount lenses. Consequently it weighed more (850g with tripod mount) than the slower versions and also had a larger filter diameter (67mm).

Takumar 200mm F3.5
© www.pentaxforums.com, sharable with attribution
Image Format
Full-frame / 35mm film
Lens Mount
M42
Aperture Ring
Yes
Diaphragm
Preset, 18 blades
Optics
4 elements, 4 groups
Mount Variant
M42 Plain
Check camera compatibility
Max. Aperture
F3.5
Min. Aperture
F22
Focusing
Manual
Min. Focus
270 cm
Max. Magnification
0.09x
Filter Size
67 mm
Internal Focus
No
Field of View (Diag. / Horiz.)

APS-C: 8.2 ° / 6.9 °
Full frame: 12 ° / 10 °
Hood
Case
Lens Cap
Coating
Weather Sealing
No
Other Features
Tripod Mount
Diam x Length
Weight
925 g
w/ Hood: +75g
w/ Tripod Foot: +120g
Production Years
1958 to 1965
Engraved Name
Takumar 1:3.5/200
Product Code
338, 43380
Reviews
User reviews
Variants

Two versions of different cosmetic design, otherwise identical

Features:
Manual FocusAperture RingFull-Frame SupportAdapter needed for DSLRsDiscontinued
Price History:



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New Member

Registered: June, 2021
Posts: 21
Review Date: June 4, 2023 Recommended | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: Super sharp, lovely bokeh
Cons: weight
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 7    Value: 10    Camera Used: pentax k5ii   

Wonder ful lens, inherited it a few years ago, just getting around to reviewing it. Lovely creamy bokeh, and fairly sharp wide open as can be seen below, even at 100 percent crop. pics taken on my k5ii. The tripod collar can collide with the prism housing when unscrewing the lens if you are leaving the adaptor in, but taking them out together and unscrewing the adaptor after solves that issue.

Mine came with a leather case which is very useful for carrying, also came ith the origional lens cap and screw on lens hood, which is necessary when in the sunlight.

Overall a great lens, lovely to shoot with if not a tad heavy



pentax k5ii at ISO 1600 and either f3.5 or stopped down a stop or two, i cant quite remember



   
New Member

Registered: February, 2019
Posts: 10

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: May 1, 2022 Recommended | Price: $150.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: Sharp, beautiful bokeh from the 18 bladed iris, build quality
Cons: Heavy
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 7    Value: 9   

This is a well built lens, a testament to fantastic lens manufacturing of its time. The lens renders sharp images with soft, rounded, beautiful bokeh throughout the aperture range because of its generous 18 bladed diaphragm. Not many lenses of its time, or even in the modern lineup can boast of that. It is a very well built lens and as such it is heavy. Make sure not to drop it on the floor. You will need a new floor. And it is a bit unwieldy for handheld work mounted in front of modern nimble mirrorless cameras. But if you can manage to hold it steady, you will be rewarded. I shot the photo of a cement factory handheld at dusk with this lens.


   
Site Supporter

Registered: May, 2014
Location: Minnesota
Posts: 2,034

3 users found this helpful
Review Date: June 9, 2021 Recommended | Price: $125.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: Very sharp
Cons: Heavy, cumbersome
Sharpness: 10    Aberrations: 9    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 5    Value: 10    Camera Used: Pentax K-5 IIs   

I'm not much of a super-tele lens fan, but they are good to have around in case you want to get into wild-life photography, or sports from a distance. One of the great thing about these lenses is the Bokeh that is very easy to produce. I had this lens since 2014, but have just decided to review it for some reason. I hope my memory is not failing me, but honestly this lens is as impressive as the positive reviews given it. It took me a while to finally find one on the used market. This is a 1960's lens and there are not that many copies still available at least in good shape. I purchased mine from a seller in Japan and don't quite remember how much I paid for it. I think it cost me less than $200, but more than $100 ?

Not only was this lens hard to find, so where the on-line reviews ! I could only go by what the reviewers said on this Forum. In any case, my first impressions were how bulky and heavy this lens was compared to my other Takumar/Pentax lenses. Not the type of lens one would take out for birding without a sturdy tripod. My copy was in pretty good condition (considering the age) with no fungus, scratches, or separation. However, the focusing ring was kind of floppy. This was my first time using a 'Preset' lens, so I had to Google-it to find out how to use it.

My copy came with a tripod-mount, but as I soon realized, this mount depending on its position, could easily scratch the front facing of your camera if you are not careful when attaching or detaching the lens. As a matter of fact, I managed to put a small scratch on the front of the viewfinder on my Pentax K-5 IIs which left me reeling for a while. After "permanently" removing the tripod-mount and using a little touch-up paint I was ready to go out and take some pictures with this lens.

Actually, as heavy as this lens is, if you bump up the shutter-speed dial to past 1/1000, you can hand-hold this lens with minor difficulties. I brought along a tripod, but realized I did not really need it. Looking at the pictures after I got home that day, I had some real keepers. As simple as this lens is (4 elements/4 groups), it takes amazingly sharp contrasty pictures. Even if my main subject was yards away, it appeared sharp as if I applied the Sharpen-Edges function on it in Photoshop ! You got to give credit to the designers of this lens since back then, they were no computer models and other technology to work with !

The colors were wonderful also ! Just your typical Pentax/Takumar colors ... This 200 mm lens is actually a 300 mm on my cropped K-5 IIs, which makes it even harder to hand-hold so keep that in mind ! I think the in-body stabilization of the Pentax K-5 had a great part in my getting some decent shots though. I would love to try out this lens on a Full Frame.

Getting used to Preset focusing took a little time to get used to, but after a while it became a breeze. No sense hitting the DOF button with this lens, since the Preset function sort of let you see what you get. Overall, I highly recommend this lens if you don't mind the size, the weight and manual focusing. It comes with internal focusing so you don't have to worry about a tube jutting out of your camera like with other lenses. The distortions are minimal if any and like I said, the colors are great and natural looking.
   
Site Supporter

Registered: December, 2020
Location: Seattle, Minneapolis, Chicago
Posts: 39

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: March 15, 2021 Recommended | Price: $85.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: sharpness, bokeh, build
Cons: CA
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 9    Value: 10    Camera Used: K-1   

This lens is HUGE. I've really come to love these preset lenses, and this was no exception. I don't own anything more....substantial than this piece of metal and glass. The focus throw seems almost infinite at times and my copy is quite rough. I sometimes turn the adapter out of my body trying to focus this monster. It's in the same place as several of my other older Takumars. Beat to hell, but optically adequate, if not exceptional. This is a lens that takes practice, and some getting used to if you want consistent keepers. I had not been shooting anything over 90mm until I acquired this lens, so there was a bit of a learning curve for me. Telephoto certainly takes more concentration and awareness of your own existence and movements. The Pentax K-1's IBS gives you a lot of wiggle room on shutter speeds though. I'd say this is one of my favorite lenses, but I'm still not great at telephoto work.

So, moving on to the images which shall speak for themselves.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/lordawesome/albums/72157715830792431
   
Loyal Site Supporter

Registered: November, 2017
Location: Minnesota
Posts: 2,978

3 users found this helpful
Review Date: December 12, 2019 Recommended | Rating: 8 

 
Pros: No diffraction spikes
Cons: coma at the open end

One of our forum members offered me the opportunity to take his copy of this lens for a spin doing astrophotography and compare it to another well regarded old 200mm lens for astrophotography the S-M-C 200mm F/4 Takumar. After about a week of having it I finally had a clear night. As it is now bitterly cold I wanted to have perform a fair test so both lenses were left in my unheated garage all day and then brought outside in the real cold (-7F) while I set up so that they were fully at temperature when I began shooting.

The review focuses only on using this lens for astrophotography. I did not use this lens for any thing else as others have covered it in depth.

The test:
Proper infinity focus was achieved using a bahtinov mask with both lenses and was checked several times while shooting to make sure that it didn't get off.
Each was shot wide open and at each click on the aperture ring to f/22.
Exposure for each shot was 10s (astro tracer), and ISO 100
All images were developed in Rawtherapee and exposure compensation was done to normalize each shot to f/4 brightness.
In RawTherapee the demosaicing method used was RDC after initially seeing coma from the 200/3.5 at f/3.5, f/4, and f/4.8 (I think that is the click between f/4 and f/5.6 on this lens) as the RDC method produces better round stars and will clean up the coma rather nicely.

The first thing I noticed about this lens is that it focused farther past infinity than my S-M-C 200. I'm not complaining just something I noticed.

On the plus side for this lens on stopping down the lens the starburst diffraction spikes produced by most lenses are almost nonexistent. If you look closely they are there but they are very faint and very small. For astrophotography I consider this to be a good thing and is from the 18 blades used which is why everyone like the bokeh from this lens as well. I thought this lens would do this and doesn't disappoint.

Another thing the 200/3.5 has over the S-M-C 200/4 is that wide open the bright points of the stars is smaller than with the 200/4 so it does provide a sharper image wide open. However unlike the 200/4 the 200/3.5 does produce coma on all of the stars so if stacking images shot wide open this will need to either be cleaned up or you will have to develop using something like RawTherapee first using the RDC method but I am unsure how that will affect other things in astrophotographs so this may not be desirable. The coma is gone at f/5.6.

From testing both the S-M-C 200/4 and this 200/3.5 really want to be run at f/5.6 for astrophotography. This appears to be the point at which both lenses enter their best which they maintain until f/11 on my K-3 at which point diffraction starts bloating stars again. As both of these lenses don't need much stopping down and peak at about the exact same point I would consider them very good especially considering their age.

However in this range my S-M-C 200/4 produces every so slightly sharper (smaller) stars by a handful of pixels, seriously I am consistently seeing only a 1-2 pixel size difference but the 200/4 is always the smaller one. This requires a bright star as the dim ones are all basically the same size and the one that I was using was Procyon which is the 8th brightest star in the night sky in the northern hemisphere. This seems like something that would fall in the sample variation category so if you are deciding based off of this point don't.

While I did test at f-stops higher than f/11 it really only made thing worse and it was purely an academic exercise for completeness.

One other test I did do was to see how well the images I shot stacked. I used all of the normalized .tif files that were exported from TawTherapee and had DeepSkyStacker (DSS) stack 100% of them. The goal here was to see if there were any substantial differences in the geometric distortion between the 2 lenses. I got a clean stack and the trails that I saw were the same in the middle of the image and along the sides and corners and were the same length as those in each of the original frames from imperfect tracking from astrotracer. Granted I kept the star Procyon mostly in the center of the frame and would recompose every 3 or 4 shots so there wasn't a lot of drift. However getting a clean stack from 2 lenses with different optical designs seems to indicate that they are both very well corrected geometrically with an APS-C camera.

In closing I would have a hard time picking one that is better than the other but for those who need an answer I would say that the 200/3.5 is better but only slightly for astrophotography. If you need it you get acceptable results wide open, it doesn't purple fringe, but you will have coma wide open. Wide open the 200/3.5 Takumar is sharper than the S-M-C 200/4 as well even with the coma. Stopping it down to its sweet spot at f/5.6, the same as the S-M-C 200/4 you have basically the same sharpness but lack the diffraction spikes. You can avoid the diffraction spikes with the S-M-C 200/4 but that would require creating an aperture mask or use a step down ring which is just one more thing fool around with. Because of that I would take the 200/3.5 Takumar over my S-M-C 200/4. If you believe I am being harsh on this lens astrophotography is harsh and shows every issue a lens has. It performed better than other lenses I own that are very good in more normal circumstances like the D FA 100/2.8 WR Macro, and the Vivitar Series 1 135/2.3. It is not as good at astrophotography as my Sigma 300 f/4 APO Macro but that lens is a lot newer with fancy glass, and none of them hold a candle to my SMC A* 400/2.8 but that lens is in its own category.
   
Pentaxian

Registered: July, 2012
Posts: 928

9 users found this helpful
Review Date: October 30, 2018 Recommended | Price: $150.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Beautiful bokeh, sharp, colours
Cons: Weight/length, long MFD

The Takumar 200/3.5 is one of the most respected M42 lenses ever made. It’s highly rated by Pentaxians who own the lens, and has also been discovered by other camera groups. See for example, this from a Fuji fan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdv_NFWDSYA

I was keen to see what all the fuss was about, and used the lens every day for a month to try it out.

First of all, 200mm is not everyone’s favourite focal length for primes; too short for real tele-photos, too long for more intimate close ups. Zoom lenses are more useful. Being tied to a 200mm for a whole month looks like a tricky challenge.

However, this lens is constantly entertaining, and surprisingly versatile in terms of the range of potential compositions and different styles. I used it quite a lot as a surrogate fast fifty with narrow dof, but it works well at all focal lengths, for portraits and landscapes and beyond.

The lens produces sharp images with beautiful bokeh wide open, and is even sharper stopped down. The 18 blades, of course, help to produce gorgeously smooth bokeh/bokeh balls at all stops. Colour rendering and saturation is excellent, and the relatively simple 4 element design lets the light straight in!

After the initial shock of lugging round a heavy, long beast (see photo below), I got used to it, and appreciated how solidly the lens is built. I also got used to the 2.5 meters plus MFD – it didn’t turn out to be as big a limitation as I thought it would be.

And some other comments on the lens:
  • The preset mechanism is a joy to use. Some other preset lenses have fiddly little dials at the front. The Tak 200/3.5’s dials are huge in comparison and perfectly positioned.
  • It needs a deep hood, to improve contrast, and on the K-1 there are signs of limited vignetting on occasions. But it’s not really a problem.
  • The focus mechanism feels good, but it’s not an easy lens to try and track/focus on birds in flight, for instance – it’s a big and slow manual focus effort.
  • The colours are among the most accurate of all my M42 lenses – I didn’t need to do much colour adjustment.
  • There’s a reason why the lens was designed with a tripod collar. A tripod is not absolutely essential for closer-ups, but it definitely makes a difference for infinity shots. The lens gets progressively sharper stopped down to around f11, as I found taking moon shots. At slower speeds, any camera/lens movement really distracts from the sharpness, especially on a sensor as sensitive as the K-1.
  • The K-1 green button metering with this lens is erratic. With some other old lenses, the necessary +/- ev compensation is quite consistent. With this lens, the adjustments were less clear, so shot-by-shot manual trial and error metering is required.
  • The rendering of the lens is very good IMO. However, I did notice during pp’ing that the images showed signs of stress faster than some other old lenses, such as banding and extra noise. This reduced the amount of heavy handed pp’ing I could do to the images. With my Helios 44-2, to take one example, I can really push underexposed images before problems become obvious. So you need to try to get the exposures right first time.
  • I also own a Takumar 200/4, and although I haven’t done head-to-head shots, I feel the 200/3.5 is in a different class – better images and better to use.

In conclusion, an excellent, best-in-class M42 lens. It's not cheap, and prices have been rising recently, but it's worth it for the build quality, IQ and those fabulous 18 blades. You may not use it a great deal – it’s hardly an easy walk around lens – but when you do, I think you’ll be impressed.

You can see my photos from the lens in this album: https://www.flickr.com/photos/95859572@N06/albums/72157696097654780









….and some special bokeh effects, including a spirograph....

   
Site Supporter

Registered: August, 2013
Posts: 13

5 users found this helpful
Review Date: September 24, 2018 Recommended | Price: $130.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Build Quality, IQ, and ease of use
Cons: None,
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 9    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: Canon 5DSR   

Please be merciful but I think that I have to first state that I am a dreaded Canon shooter.

When I first got back into photography I found myself with a very small budget for lenses with an insatiable appetite for a fast lens. My search for a fast yet affordable portrait type prime lead me to the old Pentax legacy glass, the first piece I purchased was a SMC 50mm f/1.4 M. It was a beautiful and very functional lens but I kept reading about the older Super Takumar 50mm f/1.4 lenses, one of iteration of which was rumored to be the "Zeiss Killer". Well, before long I was able to acquire a Super Tak and have been in love with these lenses ever since, so much so that I own about 25 unique lenses from the 50's to the early 70's from the 17mm f/4 to the 300mm f/5.6. So, I guess that I must qualify this review with the fact that I am somewhat biased by my love for these lenses. I think it important also to understand that I write this review from the perspective that I am reviewing a lens that is almost 60 years old and not a new contemporary lens.

The build quality of these lenses is just amazing, the fact that it is a preset with 18 aperture blades will just blow your mind the first time that you ever see one. It also makes for excellent bokeh.

I find the image quality of this lens to be excellent given its age and the technology used at the time of its manufacture. This lens has only 4 elements in 4 groups but I have found the quality of the image to be consistently usable when shooting both near and far. I use this lens on Canon bodies which is also a reason that I began collecting the old Pentax legacy lenses as they are so easily adapted to the Canon EOS body with a simple adapter. I think it important that if you can get an adapter with focus confirm that you do so, also I suggest using live view focus peaking (live view enlargement) to insure the best manual focus.

There is a bit of fringing and CA but again, this is a lens that was produced prior to the advanced lens coating of today, I find these issues to not be a major concern when using this lens. I also find that when using these old lenses on at least Canon bodies and probably others that as you stop the lens down you will need to make EV adjustments as most adapters are telling your camera that you are shooting at an f/stop other than what you are actually shooting at, the good news is that you will learn a bit about the exposure triangle. I generally use these lenses in either the AV or M setting on my camera.

Below are some sample pics of the lens and a pic of my dog that I took for this review. The wider image of the dog is the full shot and has been downsized for posting to the web, the closeup is simply a 100% crop of the wider shot taken before the downsizing.

If you are considering the purchase of this lens then you must share in the affinity that many of us have with these old lenses, my suggestion to you is stop considering and go ahead and pull the trigger, you won't be disappointed.



   
Forum Member

Registered: February, 2016
Location: Moab, Utah
Posts: 90

3 users found this helpful
Review Date: June 24, 2017 Recommended | Price: $175.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Bokeh, Colors, Sharpness in that order
Cons: weight
Sharpness: 10    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: Sony a7ii, A7s, a7sii   

The most unique 200mm lens I know and One of if not the very best lenses from Pentax ever as far as image quality. As good or better bokeh than the M* 300mm f4 lens. Colors might be better. 18 aperture blades gives the most gorgeous bokeh, especially in combination with the huge 4 elements of glass. It's eye-catching by itself. This lens can't be compared to the 200mm f4 macro, or anything else that was not specifically designed for bokeh. It also can't be compared to the 200mm f2.5, which, in my opinion is inferior to this lens. They're different lenses. The 200mm f2.5 might be sharper, but the 200mm 3.5 offers a distinctly cleaner image. The A* 200mm 2.8 is a different lens. I have not tried it. This one does not focus as close and is not as fast, but offers fewer elements rendering, more aperture blades, and an ever so slightly lighter weight than the A*. Hence, why I chose this lens over the A*. For cinema use, the preset aperture is nice and smooth. I use it for stopping down to where I want to shoot at with stills too.

It's sharp wide open, like most moderately fast lenses, and gets razor sharp by f4.5 or so. Mine loses sharpness again about f13, but there's not much change throughout. Crisp and tons of fine contrast details.

There can be slight fringing on backlighting, and the M* is probably more flare resistant than this with a hood, but it's not an issue by any means. It has a single layer coating and I think it's the right amount. The amount of light that comes through this lens is brilliant.

It's big and even heavier than it looks from all the lead in the glass. Ironically, it's a little longer than the M* 300mm f4, but slightly smaller in diameter. They're roughly the same size, and they also seem to share similar rendering qualities. If this lens has a downside, it's the size and weight. Almost any 200mm is smaller. This is not your lightweight traveling lens, this is your model on a beach and going to blow her away with how awesome you make her look lens. It's not for Grandma's portrait though because it's way too sharp and you'll see every wrinkle and blemish - she won't like it. My copy is very scratched up with heavy brassing all over it and still focuses, f-stops, like any of the best Pentax lenses. The glass and coatings show no usage, but mine was cared for.

This lens is a bargain. You simply cannot find a modern equivalent. If they did it would cost a fortune. The phrase, "They don't make them like they used to" applies in every sense here. IF you are lucky enough to find one, buy it.

I use this lens along with the Takumar 500mm f4.5, which renders very similarly to this 200mm 3.5. They look to be a very similar optical design as well.
   
New Member

Registered: December, 2016
Posts: 22

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: February 18, 2017 Recommended | Price: $100.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Sharp even at wide open, pre-selection aperture, bright, cheap
Cons: Heavy, long, some abberation visible, hard to catch sharpness, it's m42 so it's take a few minutes to change the lense, long minimum sharp distance
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 7    Value: 10    Camera Used: Pentax k-70   

Good lense for the difficult conditions. The fact its for m42 make it harder to quickly change for another lense.
It's heavy, it's long, it's preety big... but it's sharp, colorfull and bright. Fully useful even wide open!
So what do you need more from the lense?

So if you don't want to spend 2x more money for Sonnar 200mm f/2.8 ( and it's twice heavier ) Takumar will be best option.

25% of full image f/3.5:



Here's some tests ( 50% of jpg, no any post processing added )

f3.5 - if you crop image you'll see it's a little soft


f4 - it's sharper but hold on...


f5 - ...even sharper... but wait for it...



f5.6 - ta daaam! that's razor sharp!



f8 well... this going insane


f10

f11

f16 weird spots are my dirty sensor & long exposure

f22 weird spots are my dirty sensor & long exposure
   
Pentaxian

Registered: December, 2016
Location: London
Posts: 1,079
Review Date: December 22, 2016 Recommended | Price: $24.73 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Very good results even with a converter
Cons: Heavy
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 9    Bokeh: 9    Handling: 9    Value: 10    Camera Used: Nikon D50   

I played with one of these in September, using it on a Nikon D50 with an adapter that includes a lens to allow it to focus to infinity. Results were pretty good, better than a real Nikon-fit zoom at 200mm. For some reason it worked with the converter much better than most lenses I've tried. I'm not 100% sure of the price because it was part of a job lot of a Spotmatic 1000 and four Takumar and SMC Takumar lenses (28, 50, 135 and 200mm) I bought very cheaply, and can't now remember how the individual lenses were costed. I think £20 but I'm not 100% sure. It was missing the tripod mount, which was one of the things that bought the price down.

Ivy, distance about 15 ft., 1/250th f8.

   
New Member

Registered: June, 2015
Location: Bern
Posts: 1

3 users found this helpful
Review Date: December 15, 2015 Recommended | Price: $50.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: sharpness, colors, built quality
Cons: nothing
Sharpness: 10    Aberrations: 9    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: Canon 5D Mk1   

I was very surprised. The picture needs no comment , i think (-:
The sharpness is ... what can i say ...
Right click for full resolution: Weight 2500 Px.

Takumar 3.5 / 200mm @ f4.5

   
Loyal Site Supportaxian

Registered: September, 2013
Location: Texas
Posts: 503

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: March 21, 2015 Recommended | Price: $85.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: Glorious Bokeh, Character, '3-D' look, Value
Cons: weight, size, balance without foot.

Character, character, character! Just as many other reviewers have noted, the Glorious Bokeh is just right. Long and a bit heavy, with outstanding build quality, it can be a bit taxing to carry about. It has good transmittance despite the earlier type glass coatings due to the low number of elements. The foot is highly recommended, as it can be hard to balance on a tripod without.

Much recommended, and an excellent value despite its limitations.
   
New Member

Registered: November, 2014
Posts: 1

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: November 22, 2014 Recommended | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: mind bending Bokeh
Cons: wish they made it today
Sharpness: 10    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: spotmatic , 5d mark 3   

I just which this lens would be made today the sharpness and image from it are not of this world the bokeh is just amazing the focus is very long travel 360 degrees both makes it precis , use it for films and blows my mind every time.....
   
Senior Member

Registered: March, 2010
Location: Texas
Posts: 195

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: September 20, 2014 Recommended | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Sharp, colors, clear, clean images, build and handling
Cons: none of note

This lens rates a 10 because its one of the best Takumar lenses and a near perfect telephoto. It handles well, at portraits it's the best, and it is for general use just about the sharpest lens around. It gets more comments about sharpness than any other lens I have, all positive in that regard. The character of the images it produces are uniquely beautiful time and time again. Great color and bokeh. It's not a close focus lens, but, on tubes it remains very sharp and becomes a macro like tele of good quality, but, at the expense of some light. Other than the fact it's not close focus, it's really hard to find a fault. PF has never been a problem for me with this lens and I feel confident using it open and way stopped down for landscapes. An all around great 200!
   
New Member

Registered: July, 2013
Location: Ancona - Marche - Italy
Posts: 6

2 users found this helpful
Review Date: September 12, 2014 Recommended | Price: $100.00 | Rating: 10 

 
Pros: Color rendition, sharp, unique bokeh, built quality, preset
Cons: A bit heavy, but for me it's an advantage because it gives stability
Sharpness: 10    Aberrations: 10    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: K-5   

Here is another excellent lens. Build quality is typical of Takumar... solid like a tank (and heavy like a tank).
The optical quality is fantastic... very very sharp... and the bokeh - with 18 blades - are amazing at almost any aperture. Moreover the color rendering, typical of other time, produces marvelous images. Perfect for exclusive portraits.

Despite his age my copy is in excellent condition, looks brand new, almost unbelievable. I love this old Takumar lenses

PENTAX K-5 + Takumar 200 f3.5 @ f3.5



PENTAX K-5 + Takumar 200 f3.5 @ f3.5


The photos was resized to 600px... for more details see my Pentax Gellery: http://www.pentaxphotogallery.com/artists/Toonik
Add Review of Takumar 200mm F3.5



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