It is the lens you may not have heard of

It is the lens you may not have heard of

Pearl River 35mm f/2.3 from China

It was the lens from the late 70s. At that time, China started to open to the outside world, I still remembered the China which I visited at 1980s.  Some trains were still powered by steam engines. The people slept outside during summer without fearing about the robbery.  Basically, the  society was well organized but relatively poor in western standard. (on the other side of the world, we were too materialistic )  Without any help from another country, China started their camera manufacturing by learning from other manufacturers.  The appearance and the workmanship are very close to Nikon but indeed it is the lens for Pearl River ST series camera in modified MD mount. The optical design of this lens is very tradition but not exact copy from other.  And according to historic information, the glasses of this lens were made in China.  It is a multi coated lens. Due to the material shortage at that time, the brass was coated with zinc and not nickel.

It was the lens I owned for many years.  The lens has a little drawback and it has very strong yellow cast.  May be due to the fact that most of the film used at that time was Black and White.  Yellow tone indeed can make the black and white image sharper. Today, it is not a problem since we can correct the tone digitally by few clicks. 

It is a very good performer.  Won several awards in China at that time and it was manufactured by military factories. (During the country transformation, the military factories started to produce civilian products.)   It is both rare and unheard by western.  The lens was sold in Hong Kong for sometime during 1980. 

I included the instruction sheets.