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Pentax FA31 Limited Lens
  • punditpundit

    Moved from the Driftwood settings topic...

    @strancali @driftwood @feha Thanks and following on from the Cluster V6 discussion regarding the Pentax FA31 Ltd.

    image

    It is a bit of a gem though it's not exactly cheap. I have a Pentax DSLR system and already had this lens for some two years before I bought the GH2. It's not as sharp as say a Samyang 35 F1.4 is wide open, but it's very good from around F2.5.

    However it has great color, bokeh and 'depth' for want of a better term. Yes there are faster lenses, and lenses that are sharper wide open, but the FA31 does have a certain look that I think makes it quite unique and seems to be the reason many like it.

    It's around 58mm (35 still frame equivalent) on the GH2 and almost could be considered a 'standard' focal length lens on an Super35 or APS-C video camera.

    All three Pentax FA Limited's which include the FA31, FA43 and FA77 come from the film era and while they are screw drive auto-focus they do have proper external focusing rings with hard end points and are probably amongst the best manual focusing auto-focus lenses around. They also have proper aperture rings which can be set to either the 'A' setting for aperture control via a Pentax DSLR or you can manually set the aperture when the lenses are fitted to any other camera such as the GH2. The FA Limiteds take lens gears and operate fine with my follow focus.

    If I didn't have any Pentax camera gear and was just looking for lenses for the GH2 would I buy a Pentax FA31 Ltd now? I guess at around $1000 USD you need to ask yourself the question is there another lens(es) that would be more desirable for shooting video on your GH2?

    I'm personally quite interested in the Voigtlander 17.5mm F0.95 but only wish I could use it on my Pentax K5 as well.

    The other thing is the lighting. I use a Photek Softlighter II with flash for still photography but replace the strobe head with 4 x 85w Spiral Fluro's when shooting video.

    Sorry for the long rant but you did ask! ;>)

    Here's a still shot taken of the same fellow (but in orange garb) with the FA31 Ltd on my previous Pentax K7 and also using the Photek Softlighter II but with flash rather than fluros. The APS-C sensor of the Pentax means a crop factor of 1.5 versus 1.86 with the GH2. So this is around 46mm equivalent focal length on a Super35 which is more relevant with video being the subject here.

    (This was shot about two years ago when his house was much less cluttered!)

    image

  • 3 Replies sorted by
  • strancalistrancali

    @pundit thanks for this. I see what you are saying regarding buying the lens "today" if you have to do it from scratch. At this price range, I wonder if it's better to buy the zeiss distagons instead but the images from your pentax is impressive none the less. Looking forward to the rest of the video. Hope you re feeling better :)

  • punditpundit

    @strancali Apologies, I left the 'r' out of your name.

    If you already had a Pentax DSLR or were planning on putting a Pentax system together then the three FA Limiteds would be something that I would definitely recommend especially as Zeiss no longer manufacture lenses in Pentax 'K' mount. And the Pentax Limiteds are auto focus on a Pentax body.

    However if you were just buying for shooting video on a GH2 then yes, for $1000 Zeiss and possibly even Samyang's cheaper 35mm F1.4 would be contenders.

    From what I've seen the Samyang is blisteringly sharp though sharpness is not the only aspect of a lenses desirability especially for video/film.

    I'm somewhat partial to older Pentax glass especially for video. I find the more modern lenses designed for digital sensors almost too vibrant/contrasty which gives more of a baked in look which the GH2 is already somewhat renowned for. The FA Limiteds have this to some degree but not as much as the newer DA series lenses.

  • strancalistrancali

    @pundit I will mainly be using it for the GH2. I will take a look at the Samyang first since they are only $450. We'll see how that goes :). I really love the quality of your video. This can stand up to scarlet footage (comparing 1080p wise). Looking forward to some more videos from you!

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