Petzval 58 gets full backing on Kickstarter

The Petzval lens previously released by Lomo was a huge hit, but it was fixed 85mm. This is a nice focal length for portraits but the blurring, well, I think it could have been better.

The upcoming 58mm is also similar, that it allows for those swirly bokeh effects and will also be available soon thanks to its support from Kickstarter.

These are all manual lenses, for both Nikon and Canon mounts and you can be assured that it will work on digital as well as film cameras. The only problem is that aperture settings are totally manual so you won't be seeing any metadata exposure in camera.

My own feelings is this. If you can get a second hand Nikon lens (manual) at 50mm full frame lens, with a 1.5x crop factor for APS sensor cameras, you already got yourself a good portrait lens. What's more the corner sharpness of these old 50mm lenses are nothing short of legendary compared to the Petzval. This means you can place off center subjects and make them sharp.

I am not a fan of center sharp bokeh lenses. The corner sharpness of Petzvals is poor so therefore all your subject shots have to be placed in the center of the focus screen. The lens cost 500 bucks, and God knows how much it will be when it becomes available for retail in Christmas.