A classic lens with a monumental 175 year old Petzval optic. Today, it is re-interpreted and this lens is now available for photographers to own them for their creative and artistic photography. This is the new Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Art Lens by Lomography.
This lens, the Petzval 58 bokeh control lens was initially launched via Kickstarter in June 2015 and it was extremely successful. Today, it is now available for your regular purchase. This is a very beautiful lens, the built quality and aesthetics are really of high quality and standards in beautiful brass or black finish and premium Russian Glass Optics. The overall packaging of the Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh control lens is nice and classy, packed nicely inside the box.
The key characteristics of the Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Lens would be the Bokeh Control, the freedom to adjust swirly bokeh like never before, from bokeh levels 1 to 7, to be fitted with a maximum aperture of f/1.9, you can produce something artistic from these characteristics.
Here are some key technical specifications on the Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Lens
Focal Length: 58mm
Aperture: Waterhouse aperture stops: f/1.9, f/2.8, f/4, f/5.6, f/8, f/11, f/16
Lens Mounting Profile: Canon EF or Nikon F
Electronic Contacts: No
Closet Focusing Distance: 0.6m
Bokeh Control Levels: 1 (minimum swirl) to 7 (maximum swirl)
There are two sets of special aperture plates that allows the photographer to expand their creativity with Lomography’s range of Special Aperture Plates. The Special Aperture Plates can are available for purchase separately.
If you are using other camera brands such as Sony, you can purchase adaptors separately to use the Petzval 58 lens with your camera.
I was given the opportunity by Lomography South East Asia to review the Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Lens and I used it with my Canon EOS-1DX during the review period.
Beyond just an artistic portrait lens
This lens is well known and recognised as a portrait lens, with swirly bokeh control feature that gives it an artistic edge. During my review period, I wanted to test the lens beyond just being a portrait lens and see how versatile it can be when in use.
Besides shooting portraits, I took the Petzval 58 lens out, taking photos of flowers, food and urban landscapes. The option to utilise the swirly bokeh control feature on other subjects (other than human portraits) makes our photography shots more interesting and unique if we decide to apply it in our photography composition.
Delicious charcoal grilled cuisine by Kush SG
What are my thoughts and views of the Lomography Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Lens?
Pros
Beautiful and sharp lens for portraits
This is a beautiful lens, it is sharp. Once you hit the sweet spot, you would love it, the beauty, sharpness and details.
Swirly bokeh at your own artistic preference
You have a choice of how much swirly bokeh you want in your photograph. With the choices of bokeh levels from 1 to 7, it’s up to you on how you want to express your artistic preference on your portraits or photography subjects.
Creative and artistic! It’s more than just a portrait lens
No doubt, this is first and foremost, primarily used as a portrait lens. This lens is creative and artistic! Pair it with an artistic and creative photographer, it would be a pretty awesome combination of artistic and creative photography! The Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh art control lens also shows that it can be versatile and used in other fields of photography beside portrait photography.
Delicious and awesome charcoal grilled skewers by Kush SG at Timbre+
Cons
Not an easy lens to use
This is a full manual lens, you would need time to get used to a full manual lens with selection of your aperture size/plate and manual focusing.
Aperture plates
The aperture stop can drop out easily when shooting in portrait mode, making it challenging to hold and keep in place when you want to shoot in portrait mode.
Where can I buy the Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh art lens?
This Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh control art lens can be purchased from the Lomography Online Shop and Gallery Stores worldwide.
Here are the links for the Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh control art lens
Lomography Online Shop – http://shop.lomography.com/lenses/art-lenses
Lomography Petzval 58 microsite – http://microsites.lomography.com/petzval-58-bokeh-control-lens/
Special Aperture Blades Season 1 – http://shop.lomography.com/en/petzval58-special-aperture-blades-season1
Special Aperture Blades Season 2 – http://shop.lomography.com/en/petzval58-special-aperture-blades-season2
When I first started using this lens, it took me quite a while to get customised to using this manual lens since I am pretty used to the modern auto-focus lenses. As I slowly got myself used to how the Lomography Petzval 58 bokeh art lens operates, and learning more about the lens characteristics, using this lens got a bit easier down the road during the review period.
In my personal opinion, this lens is able to perform beyond its fame and reputation as a portrait lens, an artistic and creative lens too with its swirly bokeh feature. How a lens can perform is up to the photographer and the photography subject/field matter, and how the lens can be utilised to its other potential.
* I would like to thank Lomography for the opportunity to review the New Petzval 58 Bokeh Control Art Lens *
* I would also like to sincerely thank my friends HP of Hpility SG and Deming of The Quarters and Kush SG for volunteering to be my models for the Lomography Petzval 58 Bokeh Art Lens review *