Vintage Vivitar 75-205mm F3.8 Test Photographs

I was very impressed with the first street photographs taken with the (vintage) Vivitar 75-205mm F3.8 MC Macro-Focusing zoom lens (SN:22000588). In my opinion, the photographs taken with this lens are  bold and lively.  Sharpness of the lens, like beauty, is in the eyes of the beholder. Sharpness tended to vary, but strangely, the image sharpness and softness seemed to work with the images produced here.  

The first two digits of the serial number '22' designate that the lens was made by Kino Precision Optics in Japan. The mount on the lens was 'Olympus' and was easily adapted to the Samsung NX1's NX mount with a OM-to-NX mount adapter.

This Vivitar 75-205mm on a crop sensor camera like the NX1 is equivalent to approximately a 112-303mm lens on a full-frame 35mm camera. The lens is an all-metal build that provides a sturdy, premium feel.

At f3.8 wide-open, it is not a fast lens, but the ISO can be bumped-up in today's modern digital cameras to compensate for less light transmission through the lens, without any or minimal added noise to the image, depending on how dark the scene.  

It's large outer focusing barrel ring was smooth.  I found the push-pull of the outer zoom focusing barrel that adjusts the focal length to be a little sticky, but not unexpected for the lens's 45-50 year age. Focus breathing was evident when watching the 'focus-assist' vary on the LCD screen once the focus was set.

The images shown below were taken a various focal lengths, handheld, but mostly 205mm and in the aperture range of 5.6 to 8.  

The image here are presented 'as-photographed with no filters and the camera's picture profile options disabled..  I have not yet tested to MACRO feature of the lens.