The Pentacon 30mm f/3.5, said to be a quirky, low-cost M42 lens, is well-suited for vintage enthusiasts looking for legacies that are easily adaptable to modern mirrorless or digital SLR cameras.
The lens, known for its decent center sharpness, a unique bokeh, and potential flare issues, is a 5-element in 5 groups retrofocus design with 10 blades and a click-less pre-set diaphragm.
The Pentacon 30mm f/3.5 has a minimum focusing distance of 0.33 meters, measures approximately 45mm in length, accepts 49mm filters, and weighs around 145 grams.
The manual-focus wide-angle prime lens, originally produced by Meyer-Optik Gorlitz from 1964 to 1970, and later marketed as Pentacon 30 mm f/3.5 after the East German optical industry was consolidated. The lens features a 5-element in 5-group Tessar-type optical design, with a 10-blade preset diaphragm, and a clickless aperture ring with an aperture range from f/3.5 to f/22.
The Pentacon series is also known to have been through a couple of production iterations, with the imperial distance scale of the final version(?) colored green. On PentaxForums, the combined Pentacon / Meyer Optik Lydith 30mm F3.5 review enjoys ratings for Sharpness at 8.3, Aberrations at 8.6, Bokeh at 8.3, Handling at 8.4, and Value at 9.3.
On the Sony DSLR-A350, with its 1.5x crop APS-C sensor, the Pentacon 30mm f/3.5 is equivalent to a 45mm prime lens on a full-frame camera, a 'standard normal' equivalent with a field of view that closely mimics what the eye sees - images with natural perspective that are natural and undistorted.
The focal length, ideal for street and documentary photography, environmental and candid portraits, as well as for product, food, and still life, sits right in between the 40 and 50mm standards, the sweet spot between wide-angle context and telephoto compression, with enough scene context (architecture, surroundings, ambient light) while keeping subjects prominent.
Though not described as 'tack-sharp,' stopping down the Pentacon 30mm f/3.5 to between f/5.6 and f/11 will produce a clearer picture of the lens's capabilities. With its single-layer coating, images tend to have low natural contrast, giving a nostalgic vintage look that is proverbial to some enthusiasts.
The Sony Alpha DSLR-A350, the top-tier entry-level digital SLR camera from 2008, features a high-resolution 14.2MP APS-C Super HAD CCD sensor, with in-body image stabilization (Super SteadyShot), a secondary Live View system, and a vertically tilting 230,000 dots 2.7-inch LCD. This camera is also fitted with a 9-point AF system with Single, Continuous, and Manual focus modes.
