It’s not secret that I like older MF Rokkor lenses. I think Minolta makes excellent glass but every now and again I find a lens that is every bit as good (or better) than the Rokkor alternative. This is the case with the Komine made Vivitar 28/2 Close Focus (in MD mount of course). I recently picked up the Minolta MC 24/2.8- SI. It’s alleged to have been a lens design that was so well regarded that it was also sold by Leitz as a Leica R lens. Despite the pedigree I find myself reaching for the Vivitar almost every time.
This lens is a case of the product being greater than the sum of its parts. Vivitar was a California based company that contracted out with various lens manufactures to make the lenses the sold. You can tell which company manufactured the lens based on the serial number of the front of the lens. This one has a serial number 28xxxxxxxx meaning it was manufactured by Komine. The lens is a multi-coated design with 6 blades and very nice construction. It feels much nicer in the hand than you would imagine for a lens that cost be all of $100 including the MD to NEX adapter. The lens has a 49mm thread for filters and weighs approx. 285 grams. The DOF is quite narrow wide open and produces lovely smooth OOF backgrounds.
Mounted on my NEX 5n (APS-C ) the Vivitar gives me a very versatile 42mm EFL with a relatively fast maximum aperture of f2. It’s reasonably sharp wide open and better at f2.8 and the sweet spot seems to be f5.6. It’s very well made and shared Minolta’s buttery smooth focus action. I’ve always been a fan of the M-Rokkor 40/2 and Summicron-C 40/2 used on Leica M bodies but have resisted buying either for two reasons. First off they’re a bit spendy and I have things like car payments and rent to consider. Second I like to be able to get close to my subjects and close focusing is not something that most rangefinder lenses do particularly well. The minimum focus distance for the Vivitar is around 6 inches and allows for a great deal of flexibility when shooting. I would place this lens a very close second after my beloved MD 35-70/3.5 when it comes to favorite lenses to shoot with. The Vivitar has the definite advantage when I want to minimize the size of my kit. I’ve noticed the lens a slight susceptibility to flaring in some situations so it can benefit from a hood. That said, I live in the Pacific Northwest so I don’t find this to a major issue for me. The color it produces tends toward the cool but is easily corrected. I find that the images this lens produces translate well when I convert to BW.
Although the color aint bad either.
The Vivitar is a great companion to my NEX 5n (and I assume the same would be true with any number of APS-C cameras). You get a very flexible lens with close up abilities (1:5 ratio), good low light performance, terrific sharpness and bokeh. The NEX and Vivitar 28/2 make a nice small combo that are capable of terrific results. As someone that grew up shooting old compact RF cameras like the Konica S3 and Olympus 35C the 42/2 EFL feels very comfortable and while it might not be a Leica CL (or Minolta CLE) with an M-Rokkor 40/2 somehow it doesn’t matter.
The Adapted Rokkor 