Pentaxian Registered: April, 2009 Location: Madrid, Spain Posts: 10,910
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: April 1, 2022 | Recommended | Price: $30.00
| Rating: 6 |
| Pros: | Well built, decent zoom range | | Cons: | Heavy, not the sharpest lens, difficult manual focus, slow and unsure autofocus | | Sharpness: 6
Aberrations: 6
Bokeh: 8
Handling: 7
Value: 7
Camera Used: K-3
Focusing: 4
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I got this lens for a good price with the hope of using it as a general purpose zoom on film, combined with a fast fifty for lower light and shallow depth of field. This lens is very well built, with a heavy, solid feel to it, though it's not that big. The zooming action is nice and tight and it doesn't extend too much at the telephoto end.
Manual focus is difficult due to the focusing ring having an extremely narrow range of movement, perhaps as little as 15 degrees from closest focus to infinity. Auto-focus is noisy and can fail to lock quite frequently, which is irritating.
Image quality is OK but nothing exceptional and the corners, even on APS-C, are not sharp at all until stopped down significantly, f/8 or so. In the centre it's fairly sharp from wide open. Colours and bokeh are good and contrast is OK.
The weight makes this lens a problem as a walkabout. Combined with an SFXn and AA-battery grip (instead of the standard lithium grip) the total package is 1.3kg, which is a lot for a film setup. The not-fantastic image quality mean that it's not very flexible as it needs to be stopped down. These two factors lead me to sell it as, though not a bad lens, it wasn't going to give me what I wanted from it.
I did shoot a whole roll with it on that SFXn but I haven't developed or scanned it yet.
A picture of the lens with the aforementioned SFXn:
Pentax SFXn & Tokina 28-105mm f/3.5-4.5 AF Aspherical by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
And a few sample images:
Palm by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
Flowers by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
Rose by Jonathan MacDonald, on Flickr
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New Member Registered: November, 2013 Posts: 14 | | Review Date: August 9, 2021 | Recommended | Price: $80.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | sharp lens | | Cons: | some visible CAs in the corners | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 8
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 10
Value: 9
Camera Used: k-5 k200d k-x fuji xe1 + x-t100
Focusing: 9
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++ If you stop down to f 11 very sharp in the center 
+ corners are fairly sharp, even with f11, especially at 28mm 
+ CAs are well controlled a few overlighted/overexposed, scarecely visble in the edges 
O/+ CAs are sometimes visible in the corners if exposure will be a few underlighted/underexposed or in the shadows
++ for portraits highly recommended, even wide open 
++ macro shootings using a 36 mm macro ring at 105 mm and with f 11 very sharp 
for street photography, architecture, landscapes you must sharpen with Photoshop after exposure and use a tripod and 1/2 to 1 value overlighted/overexposed
recommended with 8.5 Ppoints | |
New Member Registered: July, 2018 Posts: 1
1 user found this helpful
| | Review Date: November 17, 2020 | Recommended | Price: $125.00
| Rating: 9 |
| Pros: | Sharpness, colours | | Cons: | none yet | | Sharpness: 9
Aberrations: 9
Bokeh: 9
Handling: 8
Value: 9
Camera Used: K-1
Focusing: 9
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Like the best of the Tokinas, this lens is sharpish wide open and only gets sharper. Colours are exceptional. Its light and compact on a K-1. It has a little distortion, but average for a 28-105mm.
The distortion correction profile is very close to the Pentax D FA 28-105mm and in most circumstances you could use that. If that isn't close enough you probably need a prime anyway. Close to the D FA optically, you might need to try them side by side to see which is better. The colour of the Tokina would be hard to surpass.
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