On 2/10/2003 Greg wrote; It's "SMC PENTAX-M 1:2 50mm", according to the printing on the front. Is this one of the good ones, or one of the cheap ones? It's SMC, but it's not a Takumar 50/1.4.
SMC Takumars 50/1.4 were screw mount lenses. The SMCP-M 50/2.0 is a good lens, you should not be having sharpness problems with it.A couple of things to try. If you have other K mount lenses shoot a roll with different lenses and compare the resolution. If you are shooting color negative film it may be that the lab's printer may not be in great focus, try another lab or better still shoot a roll of slide film and examine with a good loupe. Printers out of focus are more common then you would think. When I got my Pentax 645 my first test, processed at a pro wedding lab, looked ok but I didn't see the difference I was expecting with MF. I printed a 5x7 at the lab I was working at and was amazed at the sharpness difference. I then shot some B&W and processed and printed at home and it confirmed that my lenses were very contrasty and sharp. Very few labs run routine focus tests on their machines. If you do find out it was their machine, and you have a decent relationship with the lab, do them a favor and show them that their machine is not in focus. The good labs will try to correct that problem. Actually it was the sharpness of my M 50/2.0 over a Vivitar zoom lens that convinced me to go back to primes. I recently got a M 50/1.4. Maybe I'll do a sharpness comparison test of the 2 lenses. BUTCH Each man had only one genuine vocation - to find the way to himself. Hermann Hess (Damien)
