| Author: | | New Member Registered: January, 2024 Posts: 24 | | Review Date: February 26, 2024 | Recommended | Price: $315.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Good Image Quality at f2, Affordable Price | | Cons: | | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 9
Value: 9
Camera Used: k1
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Purchased a used one on KEH. This lens is very good. It has nearly zero chromatic aberration, and it is sharp from center to edges. Tested on astrophotography in the city and produces nice, round stars.
 
Update: Here are tests for f/2. Sharp+nice bokeh.
 | | | | | | | Site Supporter Registered: July, 2017 Location: Cinco de Mayo Posts: 793 | | Review Date: June 9, 2023 | Recommended | Price: $499.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | KA mount, Bokeh, sharp wide open, no CA. | | Cons: | Focus ring get stiff with time (need some warming to get smooth) | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 9
Value: 10
Camera Used: K1, DS2
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I really like this lens too much.
From the Pentax-D FA 100mm F2.8 Macro WR I was used to shot above f2.8 to avoid the CA, but in this lens the CA is not a problem even wide open. DOF is the problem: nail the focus is easy but there is always a chance to miss it and realize when looking the picture in a big screen.
When Pentax released the new HD Pentax-D FA 100mm F2.8 ED AW Macro and I read that the CA was gone wide open, of course, I'm planning to get it 'cos the CA absent + AF bonus.
Anyway, reasons why I going to keep this lens: creamy Bokeh + very sharp + no CA wide open.
Pentax DS@f2.8
Pentax DS@f2.0
Pentax K1@f2.8
 | | | | | New Member Registered: July, 2013 Posts: 2 | | Review Date: February 28, 2023 | Recommended | Price: $450.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharp, fast aperture, aperture ring | | Cons: | Stiff focus ring, sloppy hood fit, some mount play | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 9
Handling: 4
Value: 9
Camera Used: K-50, K70
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I finally bought this lens after mulling it over for a very long time. It's reputation is legend, and initial frames show that it is a cut above my Pentax glass...if you can nail the focus. Not easy, even for someone raised on manual film cameras. The ring is exceedingly difficult to rotate; you won't be taking many candid snapshots with this beast. I'm looking forward to getting it out with the Astrotracer and verifying its sky rendering magic. I'm glad Samyang hasn't dropped this model in favor of autofocus, as it keeps the price of this high performer within reach of serious hobbyists.
| | | | | New Member Registered: December, 2014 Posts: 6
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: October 17, 2022 | Recommended | Price: None indicated
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | | | Cons: | | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 8
Value: 10
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This is currently my favorite sports lens. Yes, a manual focus for sports. Though in my case the sport is cross country so I set the body of my k70 to catch on focus, frame my shot and set my desired focal distance and just wait for the runners to run through my target as I hold down the shutter. I get amazingly sharp pictures every time. Also use it as a portrait lens. The fact that Pentax has focus confirmation and catch on focus makes these manual lens so much easier to use in these types of situations and expands the ability to use this in scenarios you wouldn’t normally think of for a manual focus. Takes sharp pictures fully open, combined with the color and bokeh this lens produces it makes me appear to be a much better photographer than I actually am. The manual focus certainly does limit its utility but for situations where it is appropriate I get amazingly better shots than any of my other lenses, some of it is the lens itself and some of it I’m sure is the fact that the manual focus forces me to slow down and compose my shots a little more carefully vs falling into then temptation to just point and shoot.
| | | | | | | Loyal Site Supporter Registered: February, 2019 Location: Illinois Posts: 21
4 users found this helpful
| | Review Date: December 29, 2021 | Recommended | Price: $477.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharp, Fast, Great for Astrophotography, Lightweight for Astro | | Cons: | Lot's of focus creep with temperature changes, (that might be pretty standard across all lenses) | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 9
Value: 10
Camera Used: Pentax K1 Mark II
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I use this lens almost entirely for astrophotography. It is a very strong performer, and has been very useful in helping me create worthwhile wide-field photos while learning the craft. I would recommend this lens to anyone starting out with a star tracker, and wanting to transition from nightscapes to deep sky. It is also quite usable with Astrotracer, since it is so fast. I've been able to get 20s exposures without trailing, and as fast as this lens is, that is more than enough light gathering to get good photos of beginner targets such as Pleiades, Orion, Nebula, etc when the frames are aligned and stacked. With an entry-level tracker, (like the Star Adventurer), you can achieve professional quality photos of nebulae in the center of the frame. Obviously, star quality is not going to be good enough in the corners to compete with a telescope and a field flattener, but there is a reason there are so many images taken with this lens on Astrobin. It is a fantastic wide-field option.
I have done some limited portrait work with the Samyang 135mm f/2. It's sharpness always surprises me. I'm pretty convinced it would be worth the cost of admission just for portraits, even if it didn't have an even more demanding usage case in that it excels at. It is probably heavy, I guess, for portraits. I don't know if it is sufficiently heavy for it to be a con. One day I'll take it out on a hiking trip and force myself to shelve my wide angles, and we will see how I feel about the weight. I mean, I'm lugging around a dang K1, so...
 | | | | | Loyal Site Supporter Registered: November, 2017 Location: Minnesota Posts: 2,982
3 users found this helpful
| | Review Date: January 4, 2021 | Recommended | Price: $499.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | sharp, great astro lens | | Cons: | none | |
Well I finally went out since it was something that resembled clear apart from the humidity that we have been having the past week. With the humidity and the the moon I didn't chase anything worth while but instead went and decided to figure out the Samyang/Rokinon 135mm f/2 UMC and put it through its paces. Before this I had just been blindly running it at 2.8 having never really spent the time to do a good and proper test of it. This review only focuses on using this lens for astro.
Others have rated this lens very high for use in astrophotography and given that my reference lens to compare it will be my SMC A* 400mm f/2.8 ED [IF] which is the best astro I owned before getting this one. If you must know I would still consider the SMC A* 400 f/2.8 ED [IF] to be the better astro lens but this lens is definitely worthy of being able to be compared in the same class. In the back of my mind I also was thinking about the Laowa 12mm f/2.8 Zero-D which is another great astro leans and I would put 135/2 UMC ahead of the 12/2.8 which again is a great slab of glass for astro.
So I left it out in the garage for the afternoon after snowshoeing through so it could come down to temp so I wouldn't have to deal with that while out. I went out to a reasonably dark area since the almost fog and fog has been bad for the last week or so and in my backyard there isn't much visible at present because of it and the fact that it is a bright bortle 8.
As usual when doing these things I started wide open with an ISO and exposure length with astrotracer that doesn't show trailing or show tons of light pollution. The resulted in the first shot being ISO 200, f/2, and 20s. From there I would stop the lens down 1/3rd a stop and increase the ISO by 1/3rd a stop. I carefully focused and verified focus using a bahtinov mask. The camera used for this test was my K-3.
First impressions in looking at the first shot at f/2 is that it does have some slight coma, possibly a bit more wide open than the SMC A* 400/2.8 does wide open. The stars show very little bloat and if there is color fringing it may be 1 pixel at most so I wouldn't fret that. However it does have substantial vignetting when wide open where it even shows up in frames that show a dark sky.
The noticeable vignetting with a dark sky goes away once you get the lens stopped down to f/2.8. Also at f/2.8 the stars have shrunk to their smallest size but like with other great lenses this really only results in change in diameter of 2 pixels. At this point the lens still shows coma for stars in the corners and along the edges. However for most cases this shouldn't be a problem as it is very small coma that is slightly less than the SMC A* 400/2.8 at 2.8. However like with the SMC A* 400/2.8 when I say coma I mean it is slight being only a handful of pixels (3-4 in the corners) in size and it requires pixel peeping to see.
It isn't until the lens reaches f/4 that the coma fully goes away. Because I happened to take a picture of the light pollution of my city there is still some vignetting that shows up in bright uniformly illuminated scenes in the corners but it is no where near as bad as it is at f/2 and shouldn't be a problem for most astro shooting.
All in all this is a very good astro lens and going forward I will probably run it at f/2.8. Comparing it to the SMC A* 400/2.8 for astro seemed reasonable given how highly regarded Samyang/Rokinon 135/2.8 UMC is and I would put it in the same class as the SMC A* 400/2.8. I would say there are very few lenses that are this good for astro. I would still say the SMC A* 400/2.8 is better but not by much however finding one of those is rather difficult. The SMC A* 400/2.8 gets better faster and doesn't vignette wide open which is why I say it is still better. The SMC A* 400/2.8 also gets perfect at the lower f-stop of 3.5 instead of 4 for the 135/2 UMC. The take away is that both of these lenses are absolutely phenomenal lenses for astro shooting and when looking at the differences you are counting pixels. Being that there is a substantial difference in focal length it is not a choice of one over the other only a reference point for what to expect result wise. If you are looking for a rather inexpensive starter lens for astro this would be a great place to start. If you like astro and don't have one of these lenses just buy it and be pleased with the results it pull out of the sky.
| | | | | Veteran Member Registered: November, 2014 Posts: 366 | | Review Date: July 16, 2020 | Recommended | Price: $450.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharp, Bokeh, CA control, handling, everything! | | Cons: | Weight too much for a long hike | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 10
Value: 10
Camera Used: Pentax K3
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I want to weld it on my K3! A joy to use with the battery grip to help balance it. The manual focus is smooth and the A setting on the aperture ring allows Hyper Program and Hyper Manual. I am surprised how easy it is to capture incredibly sharp, in focus shots manually or with catch in focus. And with Astrotracer it is ideal! A perfect lens for Comet Neowise!
| | | | | New Member Registered: January, 2019 Posts: 14 | | Review Date: March 13, 2020 | Recommended | Price: $290.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | | | Cons: | | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 10
Value: 10
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A fantastic lens !
Definitely sharper than SMC Pentax K 135 / 2.5.
Very sharp from F2. Virtually free of defects.
The photo below was taken without a tripod. ISO 800, f 2.0
ISO 100, f 2.0 Minimally sharp RAW
ISO 100 f 8.0
 | | | | | Site Supporter Registered: June, 2013 Location: Montreal, Canada Posts: 573
5 users found this helpful
| | Review Date: November 29, 2019 | Recommended | Price: $500.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Tack sharp from f/2.0, very little CA | | Cons: | heavy | |
Using it almost entirely for astronomy. Being an f/2 lens it records faint nebulosities even with the short exposure times the astrotracer allows. It could easily be called an "astrograph". The lens is sharp corner to corner even at f/2.0. A dream lens, especially considering the price.
Stack of 18 X 30 s iso 800 @f/2.0. K-5 with astrotracer.
Pleiades with comet Wirtanen in December 2018
 | | | | | Pentaxian Registered: June, 2011 Posts: 485 | | Review Date: November 17, 2019 | Recommended | Price: $330.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | super sharp, large aperture, good build quality | | Cons: | Nothing that I have ran into yet. | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 10
Value: 10
Camera Used: Pentax K-1
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I'm not surprised to have come here to review this lens and see that it is one of the highest rated lenses by Pentax forum members. This lens is the most impressive lens I have ever shot with, and that's pretty awesome for a sub $500 lens.
I bought this lens specifically to use with astrotracer to up my astrophotography game. It's incredible. At f2 it is sharp and the stars look great. Still practicing my own game, but the lens itself isn't holding me back, that's for sure. I shot the andromeda galaxy for the first time with this lens, and for a newbie like me, I think it turned out pretty good.
When I don't have time for astro shoots (most of the time) I have used this lens for portraits of my family. It blows me away. The rendition, the sharpness at f2, the ease of manual focusing. Clearly a winner for that use case as well.
I have shot some landscape with it, but not very much. Performed well there as you would expect. I'm more of a wide angle person when it comes to landscapes, but maybe I need to challenge myself a little more and start trying out this focal length.
If you already know that you would like this focal length/aperture for whatever it is you're doing, and can live with manual focus, then I would not hesitate to recommend this lens.
| | | | | Forum Member Registered: December, 2018 Location: Telemark Posts: 86 | | Review Date: April 6, 2019 | Recommended | Price: $580.00
| Rating: N/A |
| Pros: | Sharpness, Bokeh | | Cons: | Too neutral colors? | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 8
Handling: 9
Value: 10
Camera Used: Pentax K-1
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The sharpest of my many lenses for Pentax K-1. Sharper than other Samyang/Rokinon-lenses too.
| | | | | Forum Member Registered: December, 2018 Location: California Posts: 103 | | Review Date: March 29, 2019 | Recommended | Price: $409.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharp, Bokeh, great design | | Cons: | None | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 10
Value: 9
Camera Used: K-1
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I wanted to see how sharp this lens really was after reading some crazy good reviews. now it is perfect in a lot of ways and the only negatives I could find are that the colors wash out in direct light, and that the front element is pretty big.
I'll let the pics do the talking
This is a crop of a pic taken in portrait orientation
This is pixel shifted and it's just about the sharpest edge to edge image I've taken
 | | | | | Site Supporter Registered: September, 2015 Location: Berlin Posts: 128 | | Review Date: August 28, 2018 | Recommended | Price: $350.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Bokeh, sharpness even at F2, IQ, looks professional | | Cons: | heavy | |
I love Shooting with this lens. It Always Looks professional when using the Hood.
I got the lens cheap - used but in mint condition.
The Image Quality is awesome , even at F2 its sharp from Center to the edges.
I sold my Tamron 90mm F2.8 SP Macro 1:1 because the samyang is much sharper in my eyes (and the tamron is an Incredible lens). Also digital zoom into macro is as sharp as the Tamron !
For Portrait you can use the full aperture range from F2 to F22.
I also have the Pentax-A 135mm F2.8 and its Image Quality is galaxies away from the samyang.
Cons:
-Its a Tank... its just heavy. Thats why its not easy to handle it when shooting. You need a smooth handling, good control and short exposure Times (easy cause you can shoot with F2!!!). But If you train it a bit You will love this lens. Shooting The Moon is possible but its better to use a tripod for it.
-No Autofocus... If you Need it, its a probem. I love Shooting in Manual, cause it Always Looks professional  . If you Need Autofocus for your Portrait you can use the Pentax AF 1,7x Adapter and pre-focus on the lens and use autofocus via the Adapter. It works properly together and IQ is not getting bad.
I shooted Moon and Mars at the last Bloodmoon in July 2018. (using the Pentax-AF 1,7x Adapter).
All in All; Get this lens.
It is a jewel (I cant think that the Pentax 135mm F1.8 will be better. The Porst 135mm F1.8 is miles away from the samyang)
Greetings
| | | | | New Member Registered: May, 2017 Posts: 6
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: April 5, 2018 | Recommended | Price: $400.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Super sharp, great colours and lovely bokeh | | Cons: | None | | Sharpness: 10
Aberrations: 10
Bokeh: 10
Handling: 9
Value: 10
Camera Used: K-1
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I do a lot of family portraits and subject isolation shots. I have and still will be using the 77mm limited and 100 mm WR macro for this work but wanted something a little longer with reduced DoF for subject isolation and some creative work. I can't fault this lens it's sharper than anything else I own and the bokeh is wonderful. I'm not finding any problems with manually focusing either, I use the audible spot focus point to confirm focus and even at f2 I'm finding this works well.
You can check out a range of my shots with this lens and the K-1 here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/84429093@N08/albums/72157689267539520 | | | | | Site Supporter Registered: February, 2013 Location: Bay Area/Peninsula, CA Posts: 99 | | Review Date: October 15, 2017 | Recommended | Price: $449.00
| Rating: 10 |
| Pros: | Sharpness, CA, handling | | Cons: | Hood (barely a gripe) | |
The lens is off-the-charts great, my go-to for portraits and faux macros and probably my favorite lens. I will gladly take a hike away from my subject to use it vs. the FA 77 on the K-1 for portraits. The 0.8 m minimum focus distance is a nice bonus for a telephoto and makes it useful for shots that would otherwise require macro. Sharp from wide open, CA and PF virtually absent.
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