Carl Zeiss lens appreciation thread

[Raymond Lin]

I am just trying to get my head round where does the money go...

There is always the clarity slider in LR

 

[D.P.]

I am just trying to get my head round where does the money go...

There is always the clarity slider in LR

Indeed, I would rather have a lens that is incredibly sharp which I can soften at will in processing, and a lens that has incredible contrast and definition which I can washout in post than try and go the other way.
And its easy and cheap to buy lenses that do the same as the zeiss for a lot lens money - many of the old Canon and Nikon did the same, soft wide open with low contrast, and even softer corners. Those aren't characteristics I would pay more for

 

[D.P.]

Very similar to a soft focus lens. Retains a lot of detail but not to the point of the clinical sharpness that people seem to get a boner over nowadays. Some of the best photos ever taken in the last 100 years where taken using lenses that weren't super sharp of had sharpness throughout the entire frame etc. People who crave such pointless things as that need to get a life tbh and take more pictures.

As for my new 50mm, it's extremely sharp in the centre (more than the summilux in fact) and has softer edges. This is on a sensor without an aa filter so the sharpness is easily noticed. Can't tell the difference in this in terms of sharpness compared to my fantastic leica 35 f2, which also produced stunning results wide open.

I know fully well that there are many more attributes to a lens than a few objective metrics like sharpness and in general Zeiss lenses are very good in these respects. However, many of them a re not and offer up harsh Bokeh or colour fringing in the out of focus areas, or don't correct chromatic aberrations at all well.
I stand by my point that a lens that is not sharp wide open, soft in the corners and lacks contrast, doesn't autofocus, is heavy, very expensive and often 1-2 stops lower than the competition is not a great lens for SOME people for SOME applications.

 

[danoliver1]

I thought this was a Carl Zeiss lens appreciation thread.

 

[Andy90]

I thought this was a Carl Zeiss lens appreciation thread.

It is, but when has that ever stopped people from criticising lenses they don't own?

 

[D.P.]

It is, but when has that ever stopped people from criticising lenses they don't own?

I had a zeiss 50 1.4 ZF for a few from a friend and plain disliked. I can form form opinions on products I have used thank-you very much!


But yes, I apologies for taking this thread off topic and I won't say anything more.

 

[Raymond Lin]

I thought this was a Carl Zeiss lens appreciation thread.

I actually thought about getting 35mm Distagon T to see for myself what the fuss is about. As the sample images from users on POTN seems decent. I want a first hand experience for myself what they mean by the images look 3D.

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1024340&page=50&highlight=zeiss+35mm

Looking through that you slowly notice a theme, it's all very static...then you remember, it is manual focus.

Then I look at the thread on the 35L.

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1121099&page=444

Like the photo of the guy jumping into the sea (bottom), and I am like...try that with a manual focus! sharp as the Zeiss might, it'll never get that, it'll just be a sharp but out of focus photo of some dust particles.

And then there is also the Sigma which is also stunning.

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1249570&page=383

There is also a underlying theme to all 3 sets of photos.

The 35L samples has LOADS of professional shots, either what looks like commercial shoots, paid work. The Zeiss thread is filled with snap shots of everyday objects, shots of no real focus or idea what it is about, like someone just bought the lens and took it out for a test drive. What I mean is, when it comes down to it, the professionals sticks to the L.

 

[Andy90]

Ray,

of course a Zeiss lens would get the shot of the lad jumping into the sea - that's a predictable shot, you set up, prefocus and tell the lad to jump in - click - shot taken. They're wide angle lenses and they do have quite large depths of field even at small apertures. Btw the shot right at the bottom looks horribly out of focus and has only been 'rescued' by a horrible instagramesque filter to make it look trendy, makes a mockery of the superior L lens.

Going by your 'theory' it makes me wonder how all those pin sharp, split second photographs were taken for years by Photographers without Autofocus lenses....

 

[James J]

So, somewhere, we said that Zeiss = professional? I don't know whats worse, justifying why you like a particular brand/item or justifying why you don't lol.

The fact is, those L lenses you love so much are enormous compares to ZM mount primes especially. They are also fitted onto a body that isn't exactly pocketable and requires a decent sized bag to stick it in on a trip out somewhere. Where as you gain autofocus, I gain the convience of size. Walk around with a DSLR around your neck and take some photos and you get noticed in no time, do the same with my camera and people don't even bat an eyelid.

As for the lenses (and a bit more ontopic), the build quality of my 50mm F1.5 C Sonnar ZM feels near enough the same as my leica lenses. The entire thing is metal with no plastic apart from the little blue dot (compared to the red one on leica lenses). No tacky plastic that creeks when you hold it

I'd recommend getting hold of something like a fuji x system and have a play with one in full manual mode. You'll get a vague idea of what its like to shoot a leica M series if you do that. Theres something far more interesting and fun about having to do everything yourself, especially when its so tactile. Makes the results even more fun to achieve. Compare that to most DSLR users now relying on auto iso and keeping the aperture at its widest for everything, resulting in turning their expensive setup into a glorified point and shoot. Where is the fun in that?!

 

[Raymond Lin]

Andy, that jumping shot is just an example. Look at both threads and you will see that almost all the Zeiss shots are full of things that don't move, and the thread is seriously lacking in any commercial work samples. As that that jumping shot, sure enough if you set it up and ask the guy to jump you will do it, but its another matter to do it looking through the viewfinder, turn the barrel to get it in focus after you see him taking a run and about to jump. That is a totally different ball game.

I am not saying you NEED an AF lens for professional work, or people never used MF stuff in the past or that they don't do it now. MF has a place still. All I am saying is from what I am seeing on those threads, evidence in front of you, as opposed to taking a stab as the whole wide world out there. It's not a theory, it's just what I see right there. I see a serious lack of images what I consider to be commercial work in those samples. All things being equal, there should be the same amount of percentages in each lens sample threads with a balance of everyday snapshots to professional work. The Zeiss threads breaks that trend and noticeably so.

I ask myself why?

James

As above.

And I have an MF lens, in fact, because of the tilting, the whole exposure system goes out of wack so I end up manual expose anyway on the fly. I've done it, i know how to do it. But, (there is always a but).

Traditional camera (or your Leica) has a split focus screen, even the Fuji has focus peek. Modern DSLR don't and most removed the options for you to change it (My 5Dii can, but only a 3rd party one. The 5Diii can't). So it has now become more difficult than it was 30 years ago to focus with a manual lens on a modern DSLR. The bodies and controls are not designed for it anymore so the user experience has gone out the window along with it. It isn't interesting or fun to squint your eyes into the viewfinder and having to guess whether it is in focus. The most you will get is the red square blink if you have it in focus....then again, that's just the computer saying so, rather than a visual confirmation from a split focus screen. Trust me, it is rather unnerving, not fun.

p.s. no tacky plastic on my 85L either or my 45mm TS or the 24L...apart from the red ring, I think the ring is plastic.

 

[James J]

Andy, that jumping shot is just an example. Look at both threads and you will see that almost all the Zeiss shots are full of things that don't move, and the thread is seriously lacking in any commercial work samples. As that that jumping shot, sure enough if you set it up and ask the guy to jump you will do it, but its another matter to do it looking through the viewfinder, turn the barrel to get it in focus after you see him taking a run and about to jump. That is a totally different ball game.

I am not saying you NEED an AF lens for professional work, or people never used MF stuff in the past or that they don't do it now. MF has a place still. All I am saying is from what I am seeing on those threads, evidence in front of you, as opposed to taking a stab as the whole wild world out there. It's not a theory, it's just what I see right there.

James

As above.

And I have an MF lens, in fact, because of the tilting, the whole exposure system goes out of wack so I end up manual expose anyway on the fly. I've done it, i know how to do it. But, (there is always a but).

Traditional camera (or your Leica) has a split focus screen, even the Fuji has focus peek. Modern DSLR actually don't and most removed the options for you to change it (My 5Dii can, but only a 3rd party one. The 5Diii can't). So it has now become more difficult than it was 30 years ago to focus with a manual lens on a modern DSLR. The bodies and controls are not designed for it anymore so the user experience has gone out the window along wit hit. It isn't interesting or fun to squint your eyes into the viewfinder and having to guess whether it is in focus. The most you will get is the red square blink if you have it in focus....then again, that's just the computer saying so, rather than a visual confirmation from a split focus screen. Trust me, it is rather unnerving, not fun.

p.s. no tacky plastic on my 85L either or my 45mm TS or the 24L...apart from the red ring, I think the ring is plastic.

Yeah I remember the focus screens could be changed on my old 5d mk ii. A lot of studio work doesn't involve moving targets, so MF lenses would be fine in that setting. Not all professional work is of a moving target.

 

[Andy90]

Ray,,

I've looked through those threads - the shots taken seem to be similar no matter what lens they used, the Canon or the Zeiss.

This isn't surprising since the 35mm is a classic focal length - good for what I would call recording shots, landscape, street and portraits.

You can see that each lens has a distinct signature (a tint in colour perhaps), but to me judging by both of those threads, shot for shot they could be taken on either lens.

 

[Raymond Lin]

Yeah I remember the focus screens could be changed on my old 5d mk ii. A lot of studio work doesn't involve moving targets, so MF lenses would be fine in that setting. Not all professional work is of a moving target.

I agree, lots of portrait photographer shoots manual, Lara Jade for one does it too, but she doesn't use Zeiss though.

The people that I can think of who like Zeiss are people who use DSLR for videos, one of the main reason being the focus ring and the way it turn is nicer on the Zeiss as it is designed to be a MF lens from the start.

 

[Ksanti]

It is, but when has that ever stopped people from criticising lenses they don't own?

That's not a valid argument against someone's credibility any more than saying "oh you bought it you must be fanboy". The decision to buy something or not is symptomatic of their views on the product not causal 99% of the time.

I take the build argument, sure, but the IQ just isn't there in a lot of the Zeiss lenses so it becomes spending up to 5 times the cost of that IQ just for the build and lack of autofocus. If I wanted something soft wide open I'd have bought a Nikon 50 1.4D, or gone even older. The MF experience is definitely better when I've used manual only lenses, but I think it's hardly surprising that people find it difficult to understand spending top-end DSLR money for the sake of middling image quality, MF and good build quality

 

[James J]

That's not a valid argument against someone's credibility any more than saying "oh you bought it you must be fanboy". The decision to buy something or not is symptomatic of their views on the product not causal 99% of the time.

I take the build argument, sure, but the IQ just isn't there in a lot of the Zeiss lenses so it becomes spending up to 5 times the cost of that IQ just for the build and lack of autofocus. If I wanted something soft wide open I'd have bought a Nikon 50 1.4D, or gone even older. The MF experience is definitely better when I've used manual only lenses, but I think it's hardly surprising that people find it difficult to understand spending top-end DSLR money for the sake of middling image quality, MF and good build quality

Which zeiss lenses are crap then? You seem to talk like an authority on their lens line up. The new 50 I've got is sharper in the centre at f1.5 than the Nikon 50 f1.4g is at f2 and has better bokeh. How do I know that? Owned both.

 

[Ksanti]

Which zeiss lenses are crap then? You seem to talk like an authority on their lens line up. The new 50 I've got is sharper in the centre at f1.5 than the Nikon 50 f1.4g is at f2 and has better bokeh. How do I know that? Owned both.

I'm talking primarily of the DSLR lineup not the M mount stuff which is completely irrelevant to my uses. As DP mentioned the Planar 50 and 85 1.4's are very average performers and very expensive with it. The Otus might be great but it goes completely away from your ideal of a simple optical construction and it's ridiculously expensive with it. There are a lot of gems in the lineup, sure, but they're almost all very expensive and compared to some of the first party and even third party options they look like very questionable value propositions. I'm not saying Zeiss has no merits I'm saying it's hardly surprising that lenses that cost as much as the best lenses in the Canikon lineups are then criticised for not matching up optically, so obviously questions such as Raymond's are going to come up and a simple of retort of "god why do people care about IQ get a life and spend £1k on a lens never mind the performance" type responses isn't really going to do much to convince anyone.

 

[danoliver1]

Can the people who actually own zeiss lenses post some samples iam sick of reading the my lens is better than your lens arguments. Lets get back on topic here. I would love to own a sony a7 and zeiss 35 2.8 and 55 1.8.

 

[Ksanti]

Can the people who actually own zeiss lenses post some samples iam sick of reading the my lens is better than your lens arguments. Lets get back on topic here. I would love to own a sony a7 and zeiss 35 2.8 and 55 1.8.

You can find plenty of samples online. If you didn't want to read gear discussions it was probably a bad idea going into a gear thread on a tech forum

 

[danoliver1]

If the thread was called carl zeiss lenses vs nikon and canon lenses then i would agree but its not, if you want to post about how good your nikon lenses are then do it in a nikon thread not a carl zeiss one. Iam only interested in zeiss and the thoughts of zeiss users.

 

[Ksanti]

If the thread was called carl zeiss lenses vs nikon and canon lenses then i would agree but its not, if you want to post about how good your nikon lenses are then do it in a nikon thread not a carl zeiss one. Iam only interested in zeiss and the thoughts of zeiss users.

I was responding to James's retort to Raymond of "get a life" when he suggested that shock horror optical quality is quite an important trait to consider when spending this sort of money on lenses. I'm not saying Nikon's better I'm saying Raymond's questions about "rendering characteristics" and "zeiss soft" were perfectly valid.