Paal,
That was me who said I had actually handled one. Also when I
mentioned it to a rep awhile back he indicated that it existed
but that there were very few of them. Darren Sutherland also
said he was told by a rep that they exist.
Unless it was the same rep that we both talked to that makes
three claims that the lens was produced and sold. I also
vaguely remember it being listed by B&H in the mid-late 80s (I
wouldn't swear to this and even if they did, I have seen them
list things that never hit the market).
I tend to think that the 35/1.4M prototype was shown just prior
to the introduction of the A series lenses and as Bob Walkden
suggested a short run was produced in the A mount (that would
have been a simple change, just a matter of putting the glass
that may have already been ground for the M series which was
obsolete before they were even assembled in the new mounts.
Heck, they probably could have used parts of the M mechanical
assembly in them. And then the A mount very quickly became
obsolete with the introduction of the autofocus, as you
mentioned. Another thing many may not be remembering is there
was a world wide recession in the early eighties that may also
have led to the production of this very
expensive lens being abruptly cut short.
The one I saw about eight years ago was used, also it was in a
camera store here in the US. That in itself makes me disbelieve
it was a prototype. I certainly didn't realize at the time that
they were so rare as to be virtually nonexistent as seems to be
the case going by the comments of the very knowledgeable folk
here in the PDML.
--Tom
Pål Jensen wrote:
>
> Yoshihiko wrote:
>
> > If you mentioned about M35/1.4, it exactly exists.
> > I heard that few prototypes of M35/1.4 were produced and
> > I once saw one.
>
> No, I was thinking about the "A" 35/1.4 not the "M" 35/1.4 lens. The M lens was
>shown at Photokina in 1979 or 1980. It even entered some of the Pentax catalogues of
>the times.
> I've never seen anything official on the A 35/1.4 but a couple of people say it
>exist and one claims to have seen it. Its certainly not impossible; the A lens series
>was probably aborted prematurely because of the advent of auto focus and the
>unexpected sucess of the Minolta 7000. So there might have been some A-series lenses
>about to be released that was withheld in the last minute when sales of manual focus
>lenses collapsed.
>
>
> > I do not know why M35/1.4 was not released.
> > Do you know something about that ?
>
> I have no idea why the M 35/1.4 was withdrawn. Probably some beancounter that
>figured out that Pentax would loose money on it. Another possibility is that it was
>only three years until the A series would reach the market so maybe Pentax figured ot
>that a three year effective lifespan of such a low-volume item was not very feasible.
>Hence, they may have postponed it to the A series. However, when the A series lost
>its impetus due to the advent of AF, Pentax may have dropped the lens completely.
>Just a guess
>
> Pål
>
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