Moss Park Play Ground

Moss Park is quite pretty in spring -- T2i & Vivitar 28mm f2.0 AI Mount. Larger Picture.

Vivitar 28mm f2.0 Part 4 -- Sharpness Test

For many days, I was looking for my tripod. Finally found it couple days ago. Perfect timing for the Vivitar 28mm f2.0 sharpness test. This is the first "serious" sharpness test I have done for a lens, and I learned that I didn't have to do the previous vignetting test at all, as the sharpness and vignetting test can be done at the same time. Oh well, live and learn. Better planning next time.

First thing first. This is not a scientific test. Please take it with a grain of salt. Also, copy variance exists, so this lens may perform better or worse than yours. I take no responsibility and no guarantee of the results will resemble your lens.

Also, the test images were shot as RAW + Jpeg (L). I used the camera generated jpeg files instead of converting the images from RAW. I think this equalizes the results across all of the images. The RAW file, when converted, is slightly sharper with better quality. If you need the RAW file, leave a comment and I will send you a copy.

Finally, doing test like this is tedious and boring. It takes up a lot of time, but I hope the results are usable for you if you are thinking of buying one of these lenses used.

Test setup:
Lens -- Vivitar 28mm f2.0 Ai-S mount, serial #28409972.
Lens Condition -- Excellent physically and cosmetically. No sign of abuse.
Adapter -- Cheap Focus Assist Ai to EOS adapter. Focus Assist feature not used
Camera -- Canon 5D with EE-S screen to aid manual focusing. Mirror lockup and timer used
Tripod -- Volbon Carmagne 630 carbon fiber tripod
Tripod Head -- Acratech Ultimate Ball Head
Test Target -- Wall

Summary of test --It's a nice little lens. Quite sharp even wide open at the center. Moderately heavy vignetting until f4. As expected, far corners performance isn't very good but improves a lot by f8. You can see the barrel distortion in the full picture. Sorry I don't have software or instrument to test the amount of distortion, but it's visible.


Full Image. A little under exposed -- Larger Picture.


Wide Open at f2. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Half a stop down at f2.5. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


One stop down at f2.8. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


f3.5. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Two stops down at f4.0. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


f4.5. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Three stops down at f5.6. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


f6.3. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Four stops down at f8.0. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


f9.0. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Five stops down at f11.0. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.


Minimum Aperture at f16. 100% Crops. Larger Picture.

Homeless in Toronto

Homeless -- 5D & Vivitar 28mm f2 @ f2. Larger Picture.

This picture is unfortunately too common in Toronto. I see this everyday in the downtown core each day I ride my bike to work, even in the frigid cold winter weather. In the shadow of many happy people, there are some who are less fortunate. I am sure it's not unique to Toronto, but it's a social problem that all of us, and the government, must face.

Vivitar 28mm f2.0 Part 3 -- Vignetting & FlareTest

Like most fast lenses, this Vivitar 28mm f2 (Komine version), vignettes pretty severely wide open. However, it's basically gone by f4. One of the nice touches of this lens is the half-stop settings. You can set half stops from f2.5 to f11, and between f11 and minimum aperture of f16, there is no half stop.


Vignetting Test from f2.0 to f3.5. Please excuse the dirty sensor. Larger Picture.


Vignetting Test from f4-f8. Please excuse the dirty sensor. Larger Picture.

In terms of flare, it didn't fair too well wide open, but improves quite a bit as aperture closes down to about f4. I did not use a lens hood. It might have been better if a hood was used. To be honest, this was expected as most older lenses were not very good at flare control, even with multi-coating, as in this one. But, this kind of condition is tough on even the best of lenses.


Flare test wide open at f2.0. Larger Picture.


Flare test at f4. Two stops down, must better. Larger Picture.

Next up, sharpness test.

Vivitar 28mm f2 for Nikon Ai-S Mount - Part 2

As it turns out, I have two copies of the Vivitar 28mm f2, made by different manufacturers. The Nikon Mount was made by Komine (one of my favourite manufacturers) and the other was made by Kiron. Unfortunately, the Kiron version has a Konica mount, which I can not use on the 5D, so I really can't compare the two. I could, however, try them on the G1, but then we will be using only a small portion of the optics, and you will never know how the edges will look like.

Starting with the Vivitar 28mm f2, I am going to provide more details when reviewing a lens, and this will span over multiple posts. For starters, I will include test shots for all apertures with 100% crop. For sure this will take up a lot of my time and shooting walls as test pictures is as exciting as watching paint dry. But, I think the used lens market is huge and lots of people are looking for information on old lenses. I am hoping by providing more details on old lenses, this will help protential buyers decide if the lens is for them or not.

Vivitar 28mm f2 for Nikon Ai-S Mount

Vivitar is (was) an interesting company. Now adays, it's known for cheap and crappy lenses and accessories. But, in its hay days of the 70s, they designed some of the best lenses of its time, and eventually become cult classics. They were never a manufacturing company, but they hired some very bright optical designers to create interesting lenses. These lenses were manufactured by many different companies, including Tokina, Schneider of Germany, Perkin Elmer of US, and Kino, Olympus, among others. Their most famous line was the Series 1. Lenses bearing this mark usually have excellent optical quality, like the Canon's L lenses.

Vivitar made Many versions of the 28mm focal length. I have owned the 28mm f2.8, 28mm f2.5, 28mm f1.9 (Series 1), 28mm f2.0. By the the best known of the 28mm is the Series 1 28mm f1.9, which I have in a Minolta MD mount.

Yesterday I acquired the 28mm f2 in Nikon Ai-S mount. Lens was made by Komine, as the serial # suggests (28xxxxx). This very compact lens has a 49mm filter thread, small for a lens this fast. A unique feature is the close focusing capabilities, which makes for some interesting effects. For one thing, you can actually get very defocused background if you shoot at minimum focus distance. In fact, the bokeh is not bad at all. At slightly longer distance, you can get a lot of background but still have a subject fill most of the frame.

For the couple dozen of shots I did last night, I am amazed at how sharp this lens is wide open! Definitely better than most 28mm lenses from its time. Will shoot some more to assess the image quality later on.


Untitled -- 5D & Vivitar 28mm f2 @ f2. Larger Picture.


Canadian Opera Company -- 5D & Vivitar 28mm f2 @ f2.5. Larger Picture.