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Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5 Review RSS Feed

Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5

Sharpness 
 7.9
Aberrations 
 7.3
Bokeh 
 7.8
Handling 
 8.8
Value 
 8.1
Reviews Views Date of last review
11 147,785 Mon August 29, 2022
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Recommended By Average Price Average User Rating
64% of reviewers $29.23 7.09
Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5

Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5
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Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5
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Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5
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Vivitar / Panagor (Kiron 22xxxxx) 28mm F2.5
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Description:
Kiron (Kino optical) made these distinctive "stovepipe" f2.5 aperture 28mm wide angles for Vivitar. Four M42 variants with 22xxxx serials are listed in this blog - M12, M13 (pics 3, 4), M14, M15; M21 is almost certainly also one but doesn't have the 22xxx serial, and there is one K mount - K14 (similar pic 1 - konica mount).
Not to be confused with the tokina made 37xxx serials 28mm f2.5.
Can also be found as a Panagor, with PK mount (pic 2).
Note these can have the extended aperture lever guard that prevents the lens from mounting on DSLR's. The guard needs to be trimmed with eg a dremel, as discussed in this thread and this thread.

Focal length: 28mm
Aperture: F2.5 - F22, half stop clicks.
Iris: 6 blades;
Focus: CFD ~ 1' /0.3m; focus throw ~ 300°; rotation - anti-pentax.
Filter Diameter: 62 mm (M11, M12, M14, M21) / 67mm (M13, K14, panagor);
weight: ~ 340g (panagor - PK mount), ~315g (M13);
elements / groups: unknown

Review of "M12" by Radojuva.
Mount Type: M42 Screwmount
Price History:



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Sort Reviews by: Date | Author | Rating | Recommendation | Likes (Descending) Showing Reviews 1-11 of 11
Pentaxian

Registered: December, 2007
Location: In the most populated state... state of denial
Posts: 1,848
Review Date: August 29, 2022 Recommended | Price: $25.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: image quality, construction,
Cons: Weight, CA wide open
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 7    Bokeh: 9    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: Spotmatic   

This is for the M12 version of the above list (Kiron 62mm diameter)

Very sharp in the center even wide open, nice color rendition and image quality, little vignetting, good construction.

Never saw any CA until I tried it in a DSLR (K5-IIs), there is purple fringe wide open but is gone by f/5.6
   
New Member

Registered: May, 2020
Posts: 1
Review Date: October 25, 2020 Recommended | Price: $85.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: very sharp, beautiful colors
Cons: chromatic abberation wide open
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 10    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: Canon F1   

Excellent lens for the money, extremely high build quality, coated front element, flare is controlled very well. nice and contrasty colors. a hidden gem from Vivitar.
   
Junior Member

Registered: February, 2020
Location: Houston, Texas
Posts: 31

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: March 15, 2020 Recommended | Price: $10.00 | Rating: 8 

 
Pros: Tank Like build
Cons: Vulnerable Front element
Sharpness: 8    Aberrations: 6    Bokeh: 8    Handling: 8    Value: 10    Camera Used: Canon T3i   

Lens has a very solid build. Very large for a 28mm, comparable to most 135s, I'm starting to prefer it compared to something more dainty. The front glass is more vulnerable so I usually have a uv filter on. Focus throw is very long at 270 degrees, and 90 degrees from 1 meter to 1.5 meters. Soft at 2.5, sharpens up at 4.

   
Loyal Site Supporter

Registered: February, 2014
Location: Pennsylvania
Posts: 2,698
Review Date: December 10, 2019 Not Recommended | Price: $25.00 | Rating: 6 

 
Pros: Solid glass and metal, Smooth focusing
Cons: Poor IQ on digital, heavy, not sharp until f8
Sharpness: 5    Aberrations: 7    Bokeh: 7    Handling: 7    Value: 5    Camera Used: K-5, K-3   

My copy is M42 screw mount and is in basically new condition. The lens is very heavy, in fact too heavy for a 28mm f2.5 lens. It’s made of very thick machined metal and finished quite nicely. The Focusing action is very smooth and heavily dampened giving. Unfortunately, I can’t say a whole lot more positive about this lens,

Optically, this lens is just plain poor at f2.5 and f4 gaining only a bit of sharpness and IQ by f5.6. Heavy vignetting is also present at f2.5 . Close-up Performance is acceptable starting at f5.6 as long as the subject is centered in the frame. Distant subjects require f8 or better yet f11 to produce a reasonably useable image with APS-C format DSLRs. I’m sure Film performance is more forgiving, but I’m not going to waste my money to find out. Even fine lens manufacturers like Kino Precision (Kiron) make some optical dogs, this is one of them.
   
New Member

Registered: May, 2012
Posts: 2
Review Date: June 14, 2017 Recommended | Price: $21.00 | Rating: 9 

 
Pros: sharp, contrasty, nice colours
Cons: none
Sharpness: 9    Aberrations: 8    Bokeh: 9    Handling: 9    Camera Used: Sony A7R   

On flickr I saw a wonderful tropical beach photographed with this lens. Rendering was flawless. I could reproduce this kind of rendering, wonderful bokeh on top. A shot into the sun resulted in some dim white flares of limited extension, which could have been cleared from the picture easily. Handling is excellent.
Ok my Contax Zeiss Distagon 28mm 2.8 is a tiny bit sharper and shows even less flares but is 8 times more expensive used (about 160 €).
   
New Member

Registered: April, 2013
Posts: 3
Review Date: April 12, 2015 Recommended | Price: $40.00 | Rating: 8 

 
Pros: Cheap, faults of FF eliminated on APSC
Cons: Heavy
Sharpness: 8    Aberrations: 9    Bokeh: 8    Handling: 10    Value: 10    Camera Used: K-r   

Hard to know how my experience of this lens is so much better than everyone else! Needless to say that on APSC the issue of edge softness goes away and your left with the sweet spot. Also don't think it needs stopping down too far to reach good levels of detail. I would say f5.6.
   
New Member

Registered: February, 2015
Posts: 2

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: February 13, 2015 Not Recommended | Price: $10.55 | Rating: 4 

 
Pros: Construction, all metal and glass! Decent image and color once stepped down to f/8-11
Cons: Heavy, poor landscape results, f/2.5 isn't sharp or contrasty, soft edges.
Sharpness: 7    Aberrations: 6    Bokeh: 5    Handling: 7    Value: 6    Camera Used: Sony a6000   

I concur with Ghostrider's review, and reiterate some same opinions of my sample of this lens.
Mine had clean optics and mechanics, smooth operating, and OM mounting.

First thing I noticed, mine has some left to right play in the front barrel. Therefore, focus ring will not immediately have affect on the front elements' distance. A slight clunkiness is felt. Focused on landscapes with infinity yielded inconsistently out of focus photos.
Short distance photos show lesser problems from the added looseness.

So, the main issue of focus could be isolated to my worn sample.
But it's shorter distance performance is only average to slightly above. A Komine-Vivitar 28mm f/2.8 Close-Focus I used to compare, produced better images all around. A Series-1 28-90 f/2.8-3.5 also did so. As well as a Kiron 28-105 f/3.5-4.5 zoom.
All were tested at f/5.6 and f/8 with a tripod.
Granted, the improvements were slight, but detectable. The 2.5 is center sharp, edge soft.
And the 2.5 stop is not useful. This lens is best for close distance photography.
There are better 28mm offerings to use on a cropped sensor. I'd pass on this one, given that Vivitar's 28mm f/2.8 are better and can be had for similar pricing.
   
Veteran Member

Registered: July, 2009
Location: 14er Country
Posts: 323
Review Date: November 30, 2010 Not Recommended | Price: $15.00 | Rating: 4 

 
Pros: Cheap, Plentiful, f2.5
Cons: You can do a lot better optically

I've had two of these now -- a preset version and a standard aperture. Neither impressed me all that much. There's a myth floating around Cyberspace that anything Kiron made is optically as good as it gets. I've seen stuff from some Kiron optics that would seem to support that theorey, but this lens sure doesn't fall into that category. It probably doesn't help that I tested it against the M 28mm f3.5, but the lens never really impressed me at any aperture, especially f2.5 (which is why I would use this over the M 28mm). Interestingly, the lens seems to do better with closer objects than farther ones. The bokeh is fair to meddling, but the color is really lacking out of the lens. There are Kiron gems out there, but this isn't one of them.
   
Forum Member

Registered: August, 2010
Location: Belgium
Posts: 60
Review Date: September 26, 2010 Recommended | Price: $30.00 | Rating: 6 

 
Pros: Cheap, good IQ with a film SLR
Cons: Too big compared to f2.8 counterparts, vulnerable front glass

When reading this review, please don't forget it's only my opinion on one sample of a lens.

The sample I bought some years ago looks like the one pictured on the top of this page. Markings are slightly different : Vivitar 28MM 1:2.5 AUTO WIDE-ANGLE N° 22xxxxxx Ø 62MM
It's probably a hard job listing all the variants of this lens.

My usual way to "test" a lens like this one is having a walk with it and taking pictures of places I know. I firstly tried it with film cameras (a cheap Praktica and a K1000 with an adapter), and found it to be a good moderate WA lens.
I'm not happy with the results on my K100D, mainly because it's not easy focusing accurately with this lens in a small finder without the help of microprisms and stigmometer.

IMO, the 2.5 maximum aperture isn't a big advantage over the more commonly found 2.8 ; especially considering the lens isn't compact and that the large and vulnerable front glass requires the use of a sturdy lens hood. This makes more sense as the coatings are not as impressive as those on my KA 2.8/28mm or even on the cheap Pentacon M42 MC 2.8/29mm.

A good "landscape" WA prime on a film camera, but a relatively poor performer as a "standard" on an APS-C DSLR.
   
Junior Member

Registered: August, 2009
Location: Lexington, KY
Posts: 30
Review Date: October 18, 2009 Not Recommended | Price: $50.00 | Rating: 7 

 
Pros: Well made, good IQ stopped down
Cons: Not tiny, nervous bokeh, FF corners are dark
Sharpness: 8    Aberrations: 7    Bokeh: 6    Handling: 9    Value: 6    Camera Used: Sony A350, NEX-7, A7   

This review is for a like new copy on a 1.5X crop DSLR. The one I have is a 22xxxxxx serial number with a 67mm filter thread. The $50 cost for me includes shipping and was at the high end of the price spectrum for this on eBay. However, given the condition of my copy, I still think $50 is a fair price.

I bought this when I had been looking for decent old wide-angle lenses without much success. This lens is competitive with a modern wide-angle lens on APS-C. It is sharper, smaller, and MUCH better built than most modern wide-angle (especially zoom) lenses. Overall, however, APS-C IQ is just competitive due to problems like low contrast.

The lens is somewhat difficult to focus (easy to be slightly off; depth of focus is large, but f/2.5 means it isn't all crisply in focus). This lens also is quite a bit larger than the tiny Takumar 28mm f/3.5, and takes much larger filters -- but this is an f/2.5. It is capable of very good IQ, yields comparable (if slightly inferior) sharpness as compared to my Takumar 28mm f/3.5 -- with as good build quality. It beats my Canon FDn 28mm f/2.8 in just about every way.

Initially, I rated this lens a 9 because there really isn't anything wrong with it on APS-C, but it only beats a modern kit zoom by being a relatively fast f/2.5. Now, I think that's just not enough (and f/2.5 isn't really fast for a "normal" angle-of-view APS-C lens). I also have other cheap 28mm lenses that do better, and this certainly isn't in the same class as my old Rokkor 28mm f/2.5. It is vaguely competitive with the Takumar 28mm f/3.5. Anyway, I dropped the rating to 8 when I saw other 28mm lenses doing better, and now, thanks to seeing really bad dark corners wide open on my full-frame Sony A7, I call it a 7.

Here's a wide-open out-of-camera-JPEG example from my A7 FF that doesn't look too bad:

   
Site Supporter

Registered: January, 2007
Location: Toronto
Posts: 17,868

1 user found this helpful
Review Date: January 19, 2009 Recommended | Price: $10.00 | Rating: 8 

 
Pros: fast wide angle lens
Cons:

this lens offers a good quality for the price paid.

Version reviewed was M42 mount, Manufactured by Kino (Kiron) with serial number beginning 22.

Edit note: It would appear that later versions (at least those in the market place) with bayonett mount have 67mm filter diameter. Still manufactured by Kino. but the focusing collar seems to be slightly different, with rubberized collar as opposed to machined aluminium.

the lens performs well, and exposure is fairly consistent over the entire range of apature.

focusing is difficult without a split image due to the depth of field even wide open.

Focusing ring operation is smooth and has 270 degree rotation from minimum focusing distance of just under one foot to infinity

Apature detents are a reasonably stiff, with one detent at every 1/2 stop.

It is not clear what the detent between F2.5 and F4 is, and this will be checked with testing later. Edit note it appears to be F2.8 based on exposure test, with the 1/2 stop detent missing between F2.8 and F4


Metering and exposure accuracy:

On the *istD the lens begins -1/4 stop from F2.5 to F4 and rises t +1/4 stop by F8, falling back slightly at F22 to just slightly over nominal.

On the K10D the lens begins at -3/4 stop at F2.5 to correct exposure at F4.5 rising to plus 1 stop at F9 through F16, and falling back to +1/4 stop at F22

edit note.

for those interested, one of our forum members has posted a summary of all 28mm vivitar MF lenses. it can be found here

http://photografica.robinparmar.com/vivitar.html
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