Vintage or modern lenses with interesting and alive pictures.

Some time ago my friend give me to try vintage soviet lense - Helios 44 58mm f2. I mount to my sony apsc and use it some days.
I am not pro, so using manual lense was a big competition for me, but... casual pictures, especially portraits, closeup objects is absolutely amasing, magic. Life is alive.
Todays in most review and discussions dominate mistaken (IMO) point of view: pixel sharpness at corners. Than more pixels at corners is sharp - than lense is better. Really, it's like comparing drink water by it's technical pureness. By pureness metric distilled water always wins, but nobody like distilled water, it has no life, no taste.
I am begin to look, read information about old lenses and dive so deep and lost a little myself.
Now, I am asking community help to clarify some information:
-does it worth to dive in vintage lenses world or exist modern lenses that also give alive not synthetic pictures? (as I know all modern lenses is distilled and technically castrated), but may be I am wrong.
-what vintage lenses really give interesting picture, and be good candidates to try it (may be super takumars, zeiss planars\pancolor, yashica etc..)
-does exist good and interesting m39 mount lenses? (for apsc m42-emount adapter is really big, so I want to be as compact as it possible).

Thanks!

quick shot office cat with helios

Although not exactly mine, I have good experience with helios lenses too. For me it is the age and experience thing. Before, I wanted the best of the best, but now it seems I really enjoy lenses with some character.

Good middleground is Samyang/rokinon, TTArtisan, 7Artisans and such. When stopped down, these produce fairly great quality and razor sharpness after PP, but wide open, these can provide some blurry vignetted magic. I am certainly going to have lot of fun with these.

Well done. I have two M42-thread Helios 58mm - a 44-2 and 44M. These are a copy of previous Zeiss lens design and are well-known for their "swirl": a la Petzval.

To get swirl around your cat: shoot wide open f/.2 close up {just the head} with distant background having points of light {like backlit tree) to give distinct bokeh.

I have also just received an M42-thread 20mm Carl Zeiss Jena f/4 Flektogon ... not tried yet ... It is marked DDR, so Soviet-era.

I can recommend Takumars by Asahi Optical Co - I have 24mm, 200mm and 400mm all very good.

Because I am guilty of posting nearly no images, I will push myself this time.
There is one with 7Artisans 35mm f/1,4 Z. My 16yo partner Sindy before going to sleep.:

For starters, to have this possibility to throw background out of focus at 35mm this wildly for $300, priceless. I mean $300 after tax. :-)
This one is cropped, but add natural vignette to it, and little more character compared to modern sterile lenses, and some great shots are almost guaranteed.

"Which brush is best for painting," said the student to the master. "The one in your hand," he replied.

IDK about vintage besides some of the names you've already mentioned (Takumar4Life), but if you haven't checked out Lensbaby's products, you're missing out.

My favorite is the Jupiter-8, a sovjet 50/2 Sonnar-copy. Very classic, small and light, and cheap because of the high production numbers. It is my most used manual focus lens on my Sony A7.
Another option could be the Jupiter-12 35/2.8, if it fits your camera. On many APS-C cameras it can not mounted because it have a big rear protruding element.

If you exclude M42 a lot of interesting options fall flat of course, but I'm personally a big fan of adapting enlarging lenses and a majority of those comes with M39 threads or can be adapted easily. Here's just a couple of shots with enlarging lenses I like in terms of rendering:

Ready for take off... by simple.joy, on Flickr

In the twine-light by simple.joy, on Flickr

Contextural by simple.joy, on Flickr

Time to rain in his ambition… by simple.joy, on Flickr

Some chocolate and you're golden by simple.joy, on Flickr

Sunshine in a basket case by simple.joy, on Flickr

Mandatory morning breathing by simple.joy, on Flickr

School supplies... more to the point. by simple.joy, on Flickr

It‘s spring… time to get out of here! by simple.joy, on Flickr

Do bean counters need glasses? by simple.joy, on Flickr

… but I dye-grass. by simple.joy, on Flickr

Then there's also some with interesting unique bokeh shapes:

I‘m completely crazy… but a square shooter! by simple.joy, on Flickr

Rust suspect busted! by simple.joy, on Flickr

And if you're willing to do some adapting you might also be able to get some projection lenses onto M39, some of which feature really smooth and beautiful, others quite busy but interesting rendering styles:

Cookies - and all worries are melting away... by simple.joy, on Flickr

Ultralit grass by simple.joy, on Flickr

Grace and gradient by simple.joy, on Flickr

Cut-the-pillars by simple.joy, on Flickr

Rose from the ranks by simple.joy, on Flickr

Leaning towards chaos by simple.joy, on Flickr

We‘ll leave and try a second time… by simple.joy, on Flickr

I would say, it really depends on what you're looking for. And in case of both enlarger as well as projection lenses it's also important to note that many are optimized for close-up work, so that's what they're best at. There are some great options for the macro to portrait range, and some even work very well at infinity. You can take a look at our growing archive of (way over 3000) alt lenses here:

deltalenses.com/archive/

There are also lots of tests already:
deltalenses.com/hall/

And if you find something that interests you, please also drop by at this forums "Adapted Lens Talk" section and post your results, experiences or further questions. Have fun!

The 35mm Takumar is also very good.
When buying Takumars, look out for the "SMC" (Super Multicoated) version.

Don Cox

I have never tried one but heard great things about a number of SMC lenses. However I think none of those is available in M39, as the OP mentioned. Or ist here one?

Another LTM/M39 lens I thought of that features a focusing mechanism:

The Voigtländer Apo-Lanthar 90 mm f/3.5

Try to be on the bright side of history by simple.joy, on Flickr

I yell-oh how I yellow! by simple.joy, on Flickr

Light shapes everything by simple.joy, on Flickr

Not sure there's anything special to it in terms of rendering though...