Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8 (SQ)
Zenza Bronica · Bronica SQ · 1996
Also known as: Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8 · Zenzanon PS 80mm F2.8 · Bronica SQ 80mm f/2.8 PS · Zenza Bronica Zenzanon-PS 80mm 2.8 · Bronica Zenzanon PS 80/2.8 · Zenzanon-PS/B 80mm f/2.8 · ZENZANON-PS 1:2.8 f=80mm · ゼンザノン PS 80mm F2.8 · ゼンザブロニカ ゼンザノン PS 80mm F2.8 · ブロニカ SQ 80mm F2.8 · ZENZANON-PS 80mm F2.8 SQ用
Variants & identification
| Variant | Mount | Years | Serial ranges | Production |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8 | Bronica SQ | 1996–2003 | — | — |
| Zenzanon-PS/B 80mm f/2.8 (SQ-B kit lens) | Bronica SQ | 1996–2003 | — | — |
- Six elements in five groups is what Japanese Wikipedia (5群6枚) and Tamron's US lens overview of 2004 ('6 elements in 5 groups') give for the PS 80. camera-wiki's table prints 6/4 for both the S and the PS 80; the PS figure there appears to repeat the S lens's 4 groups, and the two maker-derived sources are taken as stronger.
- Minimum focus 0.8 m, 67 mm filter, f/2.8–22, 52 mm long by 82 mm across and 490 g are from Tamron Japan's SQ-Ai specification table; camera-wiki agrees on 52 mm and 490 g. The S lens, on its own page, is 470 g on the same length.
- Dates. The first year given here, 1996, is the earliest document in which the PS 80 is listed with a price (Tamron's US list of April 1996); the PS line was on sale before that, and the year the PS 80 replaced the S 80 has not been established from a dated source. The end date is the end of SQ-Ai, lens and accessory production at the end of September 2003 (Tamron notice, via camera-wiki), after which stock was sold until exhausted.
- Prices are US list prices from Tamron, the US distributor and from 1998 Bronica's owner: $1,465 in April 1996, $1,660 in 2004. No Japanese list price has been found.
How to tell them apart
- Bronica SQ four-claw bayonet with the Seiko #0 leaf shutter inside the lens and no shutter-speed ring: the body times the shutter electronically, so the lens carries only aperture and focus rings and, except on the PS/B, a T setting
- ZENZANON-PS on the front ring tells it from the earlier ZENZANON-S 80mm f/2.8, which is the 4-group lens and 20 g lighter at the same 52 mm length
- Not the Zenzanon-PE 75mm f/2.8 for the ETR (6×4.5), the Zenzanon-PG 80mm f/3.5 for the GS-1 (6×7) or the Zenzanon MC 80mm f/2.8 for the focal-plane S2/EC bodies: none of those mounts on an SQ, and each is marked with its own suffix
Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8:
- Engraved ZENZANON-PS, not ZENZANON-S, on the front ring; the T setting is present (camera-wiki: the T mode works on lenses equipped with it)
Zenzanon-PS/B 80mm f/2.8 (SQ-B kit lens):
- Marked PS/B; no T setting (camera-wiki: 'The often bundled lens 80mm PS/B lens does not have a T mode')
- Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8: The standard lens of the later SQ kits, sold with the SQ-Ai and listed at $1,465 in Tamron's April 1996 US price list and $1,660 in 2004. It was still in the 2004 list after production of the SQ-Ai and its lenses had ended in September 2003 and stock was being sold down.
- Zenzanon-PS/B 80mm f/2.8 (SQ-B kit lens): The simplified version bundled with the SQ-B of 1996, a manual body without TTL metering, AE or a T/B setting. The PS/B lens dispenses with the T setting the SQ-B could not use. No optical difference from the PS is recorded. It mounts on every SQ body.
Specifications
- Construction
- 6 elements / 5 groups
- Aperture range
- f/2.8–f/22
- Shutter
- Seiko #0 electronic leaf shutter, timed by the body: 8 s–1/500 + T on the SQ, SQ-A and SQ-Am, 16 s–1/500 + T/B on the SQ-Ai, 8 s–1/500 on the SQ-B; mechanical 1/500 without a battery
- Min. focus
- 0.8 m
- Dimensions
- 82 × 52 mm
- Weight
- 490 g
- Filter
- 67 mm
- Years manufactured
- 1996–2003
- Country
- Japan
- Original price
- $1,465 (April 1996 US list); $1,660 (2004 US list) (today $2,930)
What reviewers say
- Adrian Vila (Emulsive), SQ-Ai with the PS 50, 80, 150 and 250 (blog) — A camera review rather than a lens test, with the PS 80 as the everyday lens: the Zenzanon-PS lenses are "very, very sharp" though "not the fastest", the PS said to have slightly better optics and coating than the S, and both generations fit the SQ-Ai. His complaint is the weight of the whole system on a hike, not the lens.
History
The Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8 is the standard lens of the later Bronica SQ, the 6×6 leaf-shutter SLR line that Zenza Bronica introduced in 1980 and that Tamron, its owner from 1998, built until September 2003. Like every SQ lens it carries a Seiko #0 leaf shutter that the body times electronically, from 8 s to 1/500 on the SQ, SQ-A and SQ-Am and from 16 s to 1/500 with T and B on the SQ-Ai, with a mechanical 1/500 when the battery is flat; the lens has no shutter-speed ring of its own. The PS replaced the Zenzanon-S 80mm f/2.8 of 1980 and is a different optical design: six elements in five groups, by Japanese Wikipedia and Tamron’s own lens overview, against the S lens’s six in four. The barrel dimensions did not change — 52 mm long, 67 mm filter, 0.8 m closest focus — and the weight rose by 20 g to 490 g. When the PS 80 took over from the S has not been fixed from a dated document; it is in Tamron’s US price list of April 1996 at $1,465, and in the 2004 list at $1,660, by which time the factory had stopped and remaining stock was being sold.
Two versions of the PS 80 exist. The ordinary lens has the T setting that the SQ bodies use for long exposures. The PS/B, bundled with the SQ-B of 1996 — a stripped manual body without metering, AE or a T/B setting — omits it, and camera-wiki warns that the PS/B will not give a T exposure on any body. Nothing suggests the glass differs. Either lens mounts on every SQ body from the 1980 original to the SQ-Ai, as do the older S lenses.
The one hands-on account found is Adrian Vila’s review of the SQ-Ai on Emulsive, where the PS 80 is the lens he carries with the 50, 150 and 250. He calls the Zenzanon-PS lenses very, very sharp and not very fast, repeats the common view that the PS has slightly better optics and coating than the S, and finds the weight of the outfit, rather than anything about the 80, the thing to complain about. No dedicated test of the lens, in English or Japanese, has been found, and the aperture blade count and any serial-to-year table remain unrecorded.
This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.
Example photos
Sample photo wanted — shot with a Zenzanon-PS 80mm f/2.8 (SQ)? We'd love to feature it (with credit).
Live listings
- Bronica SQ-Am w/ 80mm f2.8 PS
- Bronica SQ-Ai w/ Prism 120 Back & 80mm f/2.8 Lens B#1511239 L# 8323172
- ブロニカ Zenza Bronica ZENZANON PS 80mm f2.8 SQ SQ-B SQ-A SQ 6745#J
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