Pentax Lens Marking Secrets

The best times for Pentax fell on the second half of the twentieth century. She was the first among other mastodons in the photography market to acquire a medium format (in 1979), showed the public an autofocus SLR (in 1981) and a SLR camera with built-in flash (in 1987). Today, the Japanese brand is not doing so well, but its products should not be discounted — there are plenty of brand adherents and they will definitely be interested to know what is hidden behind the intricacies of symbols in the abbreviations of Pentax lenses.

The current designations that are assigned to optics from a Japanese manufacturer begin with a combination of the following characters:

DA — the sequence of these letters in the name of the lens indicates its compatibility with APS-C format cameras ( Pentax DSLRs with a crop factor of 1.5). Using such optics on full frame cameras will result in severe vignetting in the image.

DA L — the designation of simplified versions of DA lenses using a plastic bayonet mount instead of a metal one with identical optical properties.

DA* is the so-called "star" series of optics with improved optical and mechanical properties. Its representatives have high image quality and weather protection. The line also uses special elements in the optical design to suppress chromatic aberrations and other parasitic effects, along with antireflection coatings applied to the front lens.

The manufacturer speaks of the "star" series without any modesty: "The use of aspherical elements, optical glasses of a special composition and special SMC coatings makes it possible to obtain an image of equal brightness over the entire area of the frame, and the quality of contrast and sharpness gives the right to call these lenses one of the best ever. or created"

DA Limited — no less cool lenses than the "star" ones. Often made in a compact form factor (including in the form of "pancakes"), with the exception of the zoom lens Pentax 20-40mm f/2.8-4.0 HD DC DA ED WR Limited Price from 37 851 up to 49 282 ₴. The "fighters" of the LTD squad draw a high-quality picture with a spectacular artistic background blur. Their bayonet mount is made of metal, and the optical aperture ranges from f / 2.4 at 70mm prime to f / 4 at ultra-wide with a focal length of 15mm.

D FA — optics with sufficient resolution to cover the full frame. It should be noted that in the company's line of cameras there is only one actual full frame — this is a DSLR Pentax K-1 body Price from 75 390 up to 89 555 ₴. However, nothing prevents the use of such lenses in conjunction with the brand's old film SLR cameras.

645 are medium format lenses that can work with huge resolutions. They are designed to be mounted on a medium format camera Pentax 645D body and her successor Pentax 645Z body — 51 MP "monster" with a 43.8x32.6 mm sensor, which is 1.7 times larger than any full-frame DSLR on the market.

Q — a bayonet mount for a mirrorless system, which did not become widespread and further developed after the “pen test” in the field of the production of system cameras — the announcement of mirrorless Pentax Q body , which happened way back in 2011.

For some reason, the production of Pentax mirrorless systems did not start ...

Following the indication of the type of bayonet mount, perhaps the main symbols are written in the name of the lens — the focal length and the maximum aperture values:

35mm, 18-135mm — designation of the focal length of a particular lens. A pair of values, written with a hyphen, indicates the minimum and maximum zoom position for optics with a variable set of focal lengths.

f / 2.4, f / 3.5-5.6 — the maximum possible aperture value of the lens. All zoom lenses specify two values: for the minimum and maximum focal lengths.

Directly on the lens body, aperture values \u200b\u200bcan be written in the form "1: 3.5-5.6"

A separate group in the marking of Pentax lenses made designations that relate to the autofocus system.

DC(Direct Current motor) — ring drive of the autofocus system, providing fast and accurate aiming at the target. A similar motor is installed on board lenses Pentax 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 IF DC SMC DA ED AL WR , Pentax 16-85mm f/3.5-5.6 HD DC DA ED WR Price from 23 844 up to 38 704 ₴ and others.

SDM(Super Direct-drive Motor) is an ultrasonic drive for the autofocus system. Distinctive features of the motor are high focus speed, low power consumption, and low noise level.

IF(Internal Focus) — focus in lenses with this marking occurs due to the movement of only internal lens groups. This makes it possible to use gradient filters (the front lens of the lens does not rotate) and prevents dust from being sucked into the structure.

The optical properties of the lens are described in one of the following symbolic combinations:

ED(Extra-low Dispersion) — the use of elements with extra-low dispersion in the optical design to combat chromatic aberrations.

AL(Aspherical Lense) — the inclusion of aspherical lenses in the scheme in order to maintain high optical qualities while reducing the weight and size of the lens.

SMC(Super Multi Coating) is a multilayer front lens coating that reduces light loss at the interface between the air gap and the glass. It is applied to all Pentax optics, so it may not appear in the name of a particular lens.

SP(Super Protect Coating) is a protective coating of the front lens of the lens based on a fluorine compound with water-repellent properties. It also protects the lens glass from scratches.

With a protective coating, you do not have to worry much about possible damage to the front lens of the lens

GC(Ghostless Coating) is a coating that eliminates ghosting and ghosting.

ABC(Aero Bright Coating) is a multi-layer coating to combat flare and ghosting, which in addition significantly improves light transmittance.

HD is an upgraded version of the front lens coating that combines the best features of SMC (for even longer durability) and ABC.

The HD coating has a number of advantages over conventional multilayer coating, which is visualized in the form of a graph.

PZ(Power Zoom) — the use of a mechanical zoom drive in the design of the lens for a smoother change in focal length (acquires particular relevance when shooting video).

AW(All Weather lenses) — the aforementioned all-weather protection of the lenses of the "star" DA * series.

WR(Water Resistance) is an abbreviation related to the previous designation, indicating the waterproofness of the lens.

Thanks to its weather resistance, rugged optics are useful for those who prefer to shoot outdoors.

Finally, a few special notations need to be highlighted:

A — this symbol appears in the name of non-autofocus lenses with auto iris.

M — this is how representatives of the genus of manual optics are marked.

Fisheye is a family of fisheye lenses with a characteristic pattern and a wide field of view (about 180°). Five interesting models of such optics are described in the article "See all: TOP 5 fisheye lenses".

Macro — this name speaks for itself and needs no explanation. You can meet him on board macro lenses.

Good luck with your shooting!