Peter, 37 is Tokina, not Cosina, so it's no surprise that those lenses tend to be good.1.95 200/3 75-Z05/3.8 Close-locus Zm. Im referring to the 70-210 apo series 1 af 62mm (there is an older 67mm. Call it vintage or a classic, whatever. Judging by the serial number, its likely from the mid 80s. Mine is the first version, made by Kiron optics, which spanned from the 70s to 80s in production. Vivitar Series 1 70-210mm AF 35mm Zoom.According to Vivitar employees of the time, Komine-made products were first seen internally at Ponder & Best in the year 1971.Series 1 70-210mm f/3.5 (version 2, Tokina, Olympus OM mount): Very impressive, very well made, very easy to use. Most researchers believe that Vivitar lenses with serial numbers starting 28x were Komine-made. A company named 'Komine' is known to have manufactured lenses for Ponder & Best (later Vivitar).I still have an occasionally use the Komine-made 70-210/2.8-4 in Nikon F mount.With Kodachrome and Provia 100F, the 28-90/2.8-3.5 ranged from acceptable at the wide end (with very pronounced falloff/vignetting that didn't clear up until f/5.6) to very good at 50mm to good at 90mm but soft until stopped down quite a bit. All were very good for the film era, tho' by contemporary standards they'd be considered only fair to very good with dSLRs.I had two copies of the 28-90/2.8-3.5 (or was it f/2.8-3.6?) varifocal, one in Olympus OM mount, the other Canon FD. I have T4 adapters for Minolta MC and Canon FD.I've owned a few Series 1 zooms. The one big advantage of this lens is that its minimum focus distance is about half the Nikkor's - about 6"! This makes certain dramatic close-up compositions possible that the Nikkor can't do.Auto 135mm f/2.8 (Tokina, T4 mount): I was given this one fairly recently and haven't tried it yet. Very large, also, with 82mm filter threads. Deciphering Vivitar Serial Numbers This coding system is for all Vivitar Series 1 lenses.Auto Wide-angle 20mm f/3.8 (Kiron, Nikon F mount): Good, but not as sharp or contrasty as my Nikkor 20mm f/4, and highly vulnerable to flare.
Vivitar Series 1 70-210 S Series 1 AfIt's prone to lower contrast from veiling flare and very much needs a hood. It also imparts a cyan/blue cast that must be corrected for every photo, altho' WB through the lens helps a bit. For one thing I find 70-210mm an awkward focal range for a DX sensor (a fast 50-150 would suit me better). The varifocal design was a bit fiddly but reportedly a necessary compromise to produce the lens within Vivitar's price specification.The 70-210/2.8-4 was very satisfactory when I used it only with film, but the lens gets only limited use with my dSLR. Some zooms that offer macro or close focusing only do so at the short end where it's less useful. It offers true continuous close focusing from 100mm-210mm, where it does the most good. When I have to use it handheld I usually stop down to compensate for slight focus variations.The best feature of the 70-210/2.8-4 is the sorta-macro focusing capability. The ring slides around when the camera is tilted even slightly, and keeping a finger on the ring to steady it also introduces very slight problems with consistent focus (my hands aren't very steady now, but this may not be a problem for other users). It's reasonably sharp wide open toward the short (70mm) end, but soft wide open toward the long end.I also find the one-touch zoom/focus operation fiddly and difficult to use both quickly and precisely. A rubber band around the lens barrel helps, especially if you want to avoid touching the lens to steady it, which for me would only induce more vibration.Regarding manufacturing, a couple of anecdotes:According to a Herbert Keppler article several years ago in which he interviewed a Vivitar executive, Vivitar designed the Series 1 lenses and farmed out everything else to various manufacturers. With the camera aimed downward, even from a tripod, the ring will creep. But it wouldn't satisfy today's bokeholics.The main problem with using the 70-210/2.8-4 for macrophotography is the slippy-slidey one-touch zoom/focus ring. Eh, personally I think far too much is made of the whole bokeh issue, especially with closeups. The only one I use now is the Tokina made f3.5 version. I've owned all the 70-210mm Series 1 lenses except the very last. And you might still be able to find a cache of the old "Cult Classics" site Robert Monaghan used to maintain via the Wayback Machine on the Internet Archives.Most of the Vivitar Series 1 lenses are as good or better than some of the lenses made by the big camera makers and some are not. That's about the only issue I don't recall the Vivitar rep mentioning during discussions back in the 1990s.Another fellow who was knowledgeable about the Vivitar Series 1 arcana was Russ Butner. This was confirmed by a former Vivitar rep who was a regular on a couple of forums I visited back during the 1990s.If the parts and diagrams all appear to have only Vivitar labels, it's possible that Vivitar did this because they assumed full responsibility for warranty service. Apparently Vivitar did the design work and marketing, but was not otherwise involved in manufacturing of Series 1 lenses. It was built as good as any Leica lens and was razor sharp with great contrast. But the very best Vivitar Series 1 lens I have ever owned, maybe the best lens I ever owned period, was the Series 1 90-180mm medical-macro lens. Beautiful, dreamy portraits at 85mm f2.8 and razor sharp from 35mm to 85mm at between f5.6-8. I also have an old beat-up 35-85mm Series 1 vari-focal that is just a honey. It doesn't have the macro or faster aperture of the others, but it's smaller, sharper(I think), lighter and easier to use than the others. It was a Komine-made 28-90mm f/2.8-3.5 in Canon FD mount. JohnWI bought my first Vivitar Series 1 lens back in 1983, I guess it was. Wish I would have never sold it and I'm still watching for another. I certainly wasn't, so I just thought of the 28-105 as being a nice update. Back then I don't think anybody was as tuned in to who made which lens for Vivitar as they are now. I kept it until I switched systems about seven years later (Canon to Nikon), and bought the Cosina-made update, the 28-105mm f/2.8-3.8. It was, by far, my favorite walking around lens. He offered me too much money to say no. I also owned a 90-180 flat field macro briefly until I let a friend talk me out of it. They were both very nice lenses. Optically I couldn't really tell much of a difference between the two. I like the 2nd edition better, mostly because it was smaller and lighter weight. Microsoft office 2011 for mac walmartI've seen pics taken by both and they seem to be pretty spectacular lenses. I would like to give the 135 and 200 a try someday. Very sharp lens.The only Vivitar S1 prime I've ever used is my 105 macro. A couple years ago, I started re-acquiring much of the Canon FD gear I sold off when I bought into Nikon, and one of the items I bought was a S1 24-48 f/3.8.
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