Today it’s snowstorm here. The last few days I have had the idea to do a 50mm battle (my armada of 50mm lenses is growing), but I never seem to get out and do it. Well, I have some images on storage since last shoot so… heres fluffy catched in backlight with Asahi Opt.Co. Super-Multi-Coated 55mm f1.8 M42-lens on the camera Canon EOS 350D:

Fluffy sunset with this Pentax-lens

Old Yashinon-lenses are not often mentioned in discussions about which M42 SLR-lenses to get. Well, not as often as Takumars and Carl Zeiss anyway. I think this might be bacause they are underrated, or maybe just not as common. Many might associate them with the Contax/Yashica-mount of later Yashica lenses. But there are some great stuff for your M42 camera or adapter if you’ll take a look…

The purchase
I bought a Yashica J-7 here in Sweden with this lens on it. It is the camera I reviewed on YashicaForum and entered in EpicEdits $50-dollar camera challenge. Both the camera and lens are in great shape, no marks and great lenses. It has yellowed a bit but I haven’t noticed any impact on my images.

Yashinon-DX 50mm f1.7 m42

The lens
It’s quit an odd construction, with inner tube alu-metal and focusrings in black plastic. The aperturering is very thin, but has big notches so you can easily turn it any way. It has a manual/auto-switch, that works on old Yashica M42-cameras. The switch is under the lens and hard to use while looking through the lens - so it’s not usable as a shortcut to stopping down the aperture as you can do on some other lenses with such a switch.

Side of Yashinon-lens

This normal lens it’s avarage sized, maybe large, for a 50mm. It takes 52mm filters, which is good because it’s the same filtersize as my Yashica MLs, Helios and Canon EF.

Mount of Yashinon-DX 50mm/1.7

The lens has thorium in it, the radioactive substance that makes many old lenses turn yellow. If you get a yellowed one you can put it in the sun for a few weeks and the tint will go away. The radioactivity is not much to worry about, remember this are lenses constructed to be close to negative film in analogue cameras.

Glass of this Yashinon normal lens

Results
I should use this lens more then I do, because every time I get some great shots! Good soft bokeh, sharp where I want it to be, saturated colours. I feel it suitable for nordic blue dark november for some reason.

Images
Mounted on Canon EOS 350D:

Bumblebee with m42-lens Yashinon-DX 50/1.7

Yashinon Spider

Bumblebee

Leaf with bokeh

Swedish blue november woods

Mounted on Yashica J-7 with Tri-X 400:

Stockholm old town on Tri-X

Old town chair on Tri-X

Pros
+ Lovely bokeh and colours
+ Sharp
+ Big notches on aperturering, so you get a grip eventhough it’s thin and close to camera
+ Fast
+ Good buildquality
(+ On some Yashica SLRs the auto-function works)

Cons
- The yellowing by thorium
- Single coating (although I don’t really think that’s a big con)
- No easy “aperture-open-button”
- Actually, I can’t think of that many cons - it’s a great lens.

Reading
A Photo.net thread on Yashinon-lenses
My review of the Yashica J-7 with this lens
Full roll of Tri-X film with J-7 and this lens

Went for a walk and took russian M42-lenses with me, including the Mir-1v. This is the result, photographs in the dark swedish november, in the sundown. Lens mounted on camera Canon EOS 350D.

Mir 1V into sundown

Field portraied by this old russian lens

I’ve been taking pictures of another lens Richard sent me, the Mir-1V 37mm/2.8. It is an M42 so I put it on the Zenit ET and then the Canon EOS 300V (SLR) with an adapter.

Mir-1V on Zenit ET

Mir-1V on Canon EOS 300V

Mir-1V M42-lens Canon EOS 300V

Got a couple of russian lenses from Richard and now I have spent some time taking photographic portraits of them. More to come ;)

Industar 50-2

Just a nice little portrait of one favorite lens, the Asahi Opt.Co. Auto-Takumar 85mm/1.8. As usual the Spotmatic acts cameramodel for the Asahi-lenses (since I need the DSLR to create the image ;) ).

Asahi Auto-Takumar 85mm f1.8 on Pentax Spotmatic

This is the Asahi Pentax Spotmatic with Super-Takumar 135mm/3.5 (M42 mount offcourse). Nice old camera and lens. It’s very pretty, I’m thinking of making this into a wallpaper. What do you think?
Oh, by the way, the image is shot with Yashica ML 50mm/2 on Canon EOS 350D.

Pentax Super Takumar 135mm/3.5 on camera Spotmatic