Are you a tree or people portraitist?
Best of Pentax Forums Newsletter March 26, 2026
Are your portraits people? Trees? Something else?
I’ve long been a fan of the great portraitists: Richard Avendon’s In the American West; Edward Weston’s nudes; Annie Leibovitz’s magazine covers; and most especially Diane Arbus’ work.
But I like Weston’s peppers even better than his nudes. And when I’m out seriously shooting I almost never point my camera at people. I think that’s because I spent so many years as a photojournalist, photographing people during tragedies and disasters. So no people photos.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t shoot portraits. Weston had his peppers; I have my trees. How about you? Do you shoot portraits? People? Trees? Animals? Something else? Vote in this week’s poll, and tell us in the comments how you do that voodoo you do so well!
Elsewhere in this week’s newsletter, Senior Member Jeff Bennett gets his hands on a Royer Teleroy with Berthiot lens; Site Supporter marcusBMG reviews the Petri C.C. Auto (Carenar, Exactar) 55mm f1.8; and Site Supporter Fontophagus bends the world with his Rokinon 8mm F3.5 FISH-EYE CS.
If you’ve been forwarded this newsletter, please take a moment to join the almost 1,600 Pentaxians who have subscribed to our free curated compendium of the hundreds of great images and post shared each week in our Pentax community. Please let us know your thoughts here in the comments and on our Pentax Forums, and have a perfect Pentaxian week!
Threads of the Week:
March 22, 2026 • Vintage Cameras and Equipment • 1 replies • 238 views
Jeff Bennett said — Just got something pretty uncommon yesterday. It’s my first French Camera. A Royer Teleroy with Berthiot lens. Everything seems to work but slow speeds stick a little bit and the rangefinder is pretty dim. It just uses prisms in the rangefinder. Read more »
Memories of Shallow DoF vs Everything in Focus from 67
March 18, 2026 • General Photography • 32 replies • 666 views
normhead said — OK Time Machine observation. I 67 in Photo Arts the discussions which outline the difference philosophies, everything in focus championed by the Group Æ’64 An Ansel Adms Æ’64 club photo. Foreground and back ground in focus. Read more »
Pentaxian User Reviews
Third-Party Pentax Lenses
Petri C.C. Auto (Carenar, Exactar) 55mm f1.8
Reviewed by Site Supporter marcusBMG
Review Date: March 21, 2026Recommended | Price: $20.00 | Rating: 8
Pros: Classic nifty fifty(five), iq across the frame
Cons: Soft wide open, weak contrast, prefer taks
Sharpness: 9 Aberrations: 7 Bokeh: 9 Handling: 8 Value: 10 Camera Used: KS2, K3ii
So the obvious comparison is with the takumars. My example of the petri is the one in pic 1. No silver band, orange DoF numerals, green f stop numerals.
The petri and tak are similar in mechanics, both have an A-M switch. The one on the petri is smaller and harder to operate tucked up against the camera mount. The tak has a longer focus throw and focuses to 0.45m as opposed to 0.6m with the Petri. The other significant difference is the petri has single stop clicks while the tak has half stop clicks on the aperture ring. My first impressions of the petri were not very good, this was because of its persistent weak contrast. However once I got the pics on the PC and tweaked things, the underlying quality came out. In the test linked to in the description, the petri showed very well on full frame. I don’t have a full frame camera to corroborate that, these test pics are on a K3-ii. At F1.8 the petri was soft - the tak was much better. But it sharpened right up at f2.8 (no click at f2) yielding nothing to the tak centre frame, distinctly softer still at the right edge - the persistence of that suggestive of a bit of decentering. From f5.6 up there was really little difference, both were sharp in the centre and good across the frame. But the tak had peristently better contrast. It should be noted mine is the later "smc" takumar - obviously better coatings. The petri is a good lens and buffing the images up with contrast tweaks highlights its quality. But I didn't find any reason to prefer it over the takumar.
Rokinon 8mm F3.5 FISH-EYE CS
Reviewed by Site Supporter Fontophagus
Review Date: March 18, 2026 Recommended | Price: $70.00 | Rating: 10
Pros: Cheap, decent built quality, reasonably sharp stopped down
Cons: Non removable hood - visible in FF
Sharpness: 9 Aberrations: 9 Bokeh: 5 Handling: 10 Value: 10 Camera Used: Pentax K5, Pentax K1ii
Pros/cons largely sum it up. It’s MF only, which doesn’t matter that much on an 8mm lens, and you have to stop it down a bit to get good performance. I bought it for very little on ebay, so you mileage may vary in this regard. It’s also not weather sealed, so be careful. For me its one of the best value lenses I own, that said, my expectations are far from clinical for such a cheap lens and I mostly use it for infrared (you wont get these flares in normal light), where the sharpness isn’t the best, tho I have yet to find lens where it is.
Comment of the Week:
Site Supporter ChrisPlatt on What’s your lucky go-to lens? The Best of Pentax Forums January 22 Poll: There’s all kinds of luck...I had a lens that gave me pleasing images, an older 105/2.5 Nikkor-P I used for portraits. After a time I realized that most of the people whose photos I took with it became ill or died, got divorced, lost their jobs, etc. I am not usually a superstitious person but I sent this lens as a gift to a friend on the West Coast...
Are your portraits people? Trees? Something else?
The Best of Pentax Forums March 26 Poll
I’ve long been a fan of the great portraitists: Richard Avendon’s In the American West; Edward Weston’s nudes; Annie Leibovitz’s magazine covers; and most especially Diane Arbus’ work.
But I like Weston’s peppers even better than his nudes. And when I’m out seriously shooting I almost never point my camera at people. I think that’s because I spent so many years as a photojournalist, photographing people during tragedies and disasters. So no people photos.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t shoot portraits. Weston had his peppers; I have my trees. I’m fascinated by their growth, and resilience, the scarring left by creature and storm.
How about you? Do you shoot portraits? People? Trees? Animals?
Something else? Vote in this week’s poll, and tell us in the comments how you do that voodoo you do so well!
This poll closes April 1
And here are the results of last week’s poll:
Weekly Photo Challenges
Project 52-14-12: wide-angle, until 3-29 (Sunday)
The wide-angle photo challenge is an excellent way to hone your photographic eye and explore dramatic perspectives.
Wide-angle lenses (typically anything under 35mm on a full-frame camera, 24mm on aps-c or the equivalent on smaller sensors) distort perspectives, emphasize the foreground, and capture expansive scenes.
Whatever scene you choose ...., it's entirely up to you.
Post your best photo, but most importantly: Have fun!
I'm looking forward to seeing many familiar and new participants of Project 52 and am excited to see your wide-angle images.
And here is the entry from Site Supporter MiguelATF: A local 'family farm' near my home in southern Oregon. Taken with my KP, using the DA10-17 fisheye zoom, on the 17mm end which minimizes the fisheye effects. Converted to monochrome in Lightroom.
A Walk Down Memory Lane
Kerrick James
Pentaxian Profile
By PF Staff in Pentaxian Profiles on Jul 28, 2011
I grew up with cameras in the house, of all types, but my first SLR was a Pentax ES, the first ‘automatic’ camera, as it was then touted. My early love in photography was for landscape and nothing else, and I carried that screw-mount body with a 55/1.8 Takumar, a nice 21mm Soligor wide optic and a so-so quality Vivitar 135mm for several years, all through high school in California and college in the American Southwest.
PentaxForum Front page stories March 19-25:
February 2026 “Telephoto Landscape” Photo Contest Winners
Announcing the winners of our monthly contest
By PF Staff in Photo Contests on Mar 23, 2026
It is our pleasure to announce the winners of our February, 2026 “Telephoto Landscape” photo contest! In first place was forum member mattb123 from USA who captured “Moonrise at Hartman Rocks” (pictured above). This photo was shot with a Pentax 645D and an SMC Pentax-A* 645 300mm F4 lens.
Our runners-up were forum member johanpte from Slovakia in second place with “A view from Velkej Race 1236m.n.m” and david94903 from USA in third place with “Morning Fog”.