Pentax ME Super 35mm SLR Camera Package

Product Information

KF article top The Pentax ME Super, one of Pentax’s classic manual-focus bodies (All pics: Aaron Gold) This outwardly simple camera’s semi-automatic nature, its diminutive size, and its surprisingly good performance left us with some questions. Specifically, why is this camera so often overlooked by shooters? How’d they make this thing so small? And why doesn’t Pentax get any respect? I genuinely really like the Pentax ME Super, I think I like it so much because I learned to shoot on a camera very similar, the Nikon EM. The fact that the ME Super is an aperture priority camera that can house great lenses is why I think it’s so great.

An ME Super was my last SLR before going mostly digital and I do like it mostly, but aperture-priority has never really worked for me. A great way to understand how good the Pentax ME Super is is to compare it to another Pentax Titan, the K1000. The K1000 being a cult classic SLR, it’s hard to overstate how brilliant the K1000 still is.I’d definitely love to see this being produced again since Pentax has announced they could be producing film cameras again. I think the key thing that lets the ME Super down is that it’s hard to come by one that works properly, due to its electronic shutter. If Pentax produced this again, I think it’d be an amazing go-to camera for street photography.

Both of the Vivitar macros were manufactured by Komine and were sold under several different brand names. If you search for one also look under the Panagor, Elicar, Quantaray, Spiratone, and Rokunar brand names. I think the SMC Pentax-A 50mm f/2 looked better both wide open and stopped down. While it still exhibited a hexagonal quality, it was tame in comparison to the 50mm f/1.7. Couple that with its lower price, lighter weight and the way it balances on a small Pentax body like the ME Super or MX, it’s one to keep around.

Aesthetically, the ME is a quintessential mid-70s, entry-level SLR. It’s basic, angular, stoic, and ready for action. But where the ME most differs from its competition is in its size. This camera is simply tiny. Its closest dimensional rival would have to be Olympus’ OM system, and it gives that legendarily tiny camera a real run for its Yen. Walking about with the ME we’re pretty amazed at how small, light, and convenient it is. Compared to the iPhone 5S (the right size iPhone), the ME isn’t much larger in two dimensions. A clever feature of this quite electronically controlled camera is that in the case of battery failure, the camera can still be operated manually using a 1/125 shutter speed, so in a pinch (and with a light meter or a lot of experience), you can keep on shooting until you find new batteries.

I ended up with a copy of the SMC Pentax-M 50mm f/1.4 quite by accident and it made me think. I had used the 50mm f/1.7 forever and never really had a desire to seek out the 50/1.4 Why? I mostly shoot street and landscape. I could not give a damn about how the bokeh looks or how sharp the lens is wide open. The bottom of the Pentax Super Program is equipped to accept a power winder, which enables the camera to shoot at a whopping 3.5 FPS. there’s also a button to release the film for rewinding, a standard tripod mount, and the cover for two A76 (or similar) batteries. At its intended purpose, the ME is pretty fabulous. It’s one of those rare values in the world of vintage cameras that offers a near perfect balance of assets; excellent form factor, robust construction, technical prowess, and low cost. There are similar cameras in its category that may be just as good (Nikon’s EM springs to mind), but no camera in its segment is decidedly superior to the ME.Thus the Super A / Super Program is a great little camera. Not perfect but one of the best bundles. My favourite - along with the K2 DMD and ME Super. It's fun to watch the balance change and how the engineers tried to anticipate how the camera would be used under different lights.

When I received the test roll from the lab, I was both surprised and disappointed. The 50mm F1.7 lens turned out to be an excellent performer, and due to the fantastic viewfinder, I nailed focus on every frame. This camera & lens combo can focus as well or better than my autofocus cameras. If you own a ME Super then you’ll feel right at home with the Super A. As the Super A has a similar top dial layout as the older M Series camera. There is no traditional shutter speed dial like with the ME Super and the dial serves more as a mode dial. Moving the dial to “AUTO” lets you use “Program” or “Aperture Priority” modes. Move the shutter dial to “M” lets you use “Shutter Priority” or “Manual” modes. There is also a “B” setting for long exposures and a “125X” for non-dedicated flashes. The actual shutter speed is adjusted with two buttons and there is a top LCD widow indicating the selected shutter speed. Looking through the viewfinder you will see two boxes on the bottom, the left indicates the shutter speed and the right the aperture. Refer to the camera manual for various symbols/characters appearing in these windows for certain program modes. The Super A needs working batteries to function. This small size is something I really appreciate now too. It is slightly smaller than the Pentax MX, or at least it’s slightly narrower whilst also being ever so slightly taller. Neither dimensional difference amounts to much, and in the hand you wouldn’t really notice, but proportionally speaking it looks more right than the MX somehow, which I think looks a little wide/squat.The Pentax Me Super is best for all kinds of photography, with its compact body, it’s suited to travel, street photography, documentary photography, portrait, editorial and much more. Since it has a hot shoe you can use a flash, so this camera is suited to all sorts. Obviously, from a client perception point of view, this camera doesn’t really have a ‘wow factor’, so that’s something to bear in mind if you were to use it for anything client-facing like portrait or editorial work. Lastly, the SMC Pentax-M 50/1.4. In practice, it’s a little too wild wide open but once you stop it down to f/2 things look really good, especially if you dig the bubbly type of bokeh. In fact, the nice circular bokeh balls are visible all the way up to f/4. I think this lens at f/2.8 might be my favorite image of the whole test and would be a clear choice if bokeh was your thing. While not a perfectly composed image by any stretch of the imagination, it succeeded in its intended goal of highlighting the differences between each lens. And the differences between the lenses were more significant than I had imagined. I should say I was also really surprised by some of the results. For a trip I would bring the MX (fully mechanical joy to use) and the ME along with me. Together with some fixed lenses.