At yesterday's town festival, I was shooting beside a woman with a compact
digicam. She took an interest in my gear. "This digicam" (a Kodak) has 6.1
megapixels. But I still like to use my SLR."
"What is it?"
"Oh, not much; a Sears."
I explained that I own and love two Sears KS Auto bodies, which are rebranded
Rikenon XR-2s bodies. I told her how the Sears nameplate helps me reassure
guards that I'm not a pro so that I can shoot freely where they might restrict
me if my camera bore a respected nameplate.
"I wish I had a fisheye, like yours," she said. "But they're kind of
expensive."
I suggested she pick up a Zenitar 16/2.8K for about 100 bucks. She had no idea
a fisheye cost so little.
Later, I saw a 45-ish man wearing a zipped-up never-ready SLR case. "What kind
of camera is in there?" I asked.
"Oh, I don't remember; something old," he apologized. He unzipped the case, and
there was a K1000 fitted with a Rikenon 50/2P.
"My son is taking a photography course," he explained, "so I decided to learn
with him."
I assured him that he had a great combination, not just for learning but for
shooting great pictures.
I, too, use the Rikenon 50/2P on Pentax bodies when I need a normal lens that
will deliver corner sharpness at wide apertures. In my controlled test shots of
a newspaper page, the Rikenon 50/2P was the only lens that rivaled or surpassed
the Pentax SMC 35/2K in corner sharpness at every aperture. In this sense, it's
more versatile than my SMC 55/1.8K, which doesn't really shine till f/5.6 or
f/8.
Paul Stregevsky
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