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Archive 2014 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?

  
 
DaMadSetta
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


Reviews are all over the place for this lens. Some say it is the sharpest they have seen, other's say it's soft wide open. I have one that requires barely any focus adjust, but mine certainly looks soft at f/2. For those who have it, is your copy soft at f/2 and 2.8? At f/4 mine gets considerably better as seen below.





f2









Jul 21, 2014 at 08:29 PM
James R
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


I was never impressed with it. I bought it used and it may have been issue with the DC aspect that effected the overall performance. At least that is what someone around here said years ago.


Jul 21, 2014 at 08:33 PM
giopaolo
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


i borrowed a friend's 135mm and it required a +14 on my D700 to get sharp images wide open.


Jul 21, 2014 at 09:49 PM
NathanHamler
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


No offense intended here, but stop pixel peeping on books, and go shoot an actual subject in an actual setting, and THEN see if it impresses or not....All lenses are sharper stopped down than wide open....if it needs some AF adjust, that's one thing.....but we can't really tell if it needs AF adjust by the photos you provided....


Jul 22, 2014 at 07:48 AM
aspirebooth
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


Bad advice. Doesn't matter whether you are shooting a book, an orange, the sun or people. If it's soft, it's soft. Taking photos of people in a different setting is only going to mask the problem that is...........

The lens is still soft.

Yes your copy is soft. The good copies are sharp at F2. The ones that are not honestly belong in a dumpster as they cost more to fix then they are worth. For years people always thought it was just the camera missing focus and the majority of the times its a combination of issues with the DC motor and the in camera motor not jiving together in harmony.

It may in theory not be the lens but rather the combination of the lens and camera. I have found with DC lenses in particular that they can be wicked sharp using some cameras and then others not so much. There is a damn good reason why Nikon needs to update the 105/135 offerings.




Jul 22, 2014 at 07:59 AM
hijazist
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


Did you have to remind me about my school loans!!!


Jul 22, 2014 at 08:08 AM
josiahkim
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


NathanHamler wrote:
No offense intended here, but stop pixel peeping on books, and go shoot an actual subject in an actual setting, and THEN see if it impresses or not....All lenses are sharper stopped down than wide open....if it needs some AF adjust, that's one thing.....but we can't really tell if it needs AF adjust by the photos you provided....


I disagree with this, as well. Lens are mechanical objects and are designed to work in specific ways. I personally don't know how sharp the 135mm for Nikon is supposed to be, but I would imagine it's designed to be sharp wide open no matter the distance of the object in focus.

OP, if you purchased this brand new, I would ask for an exchange.



Jul 22, 2014 at 08:53 AM
williamkazak
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


Not to change the subject but to give you the benefit of my experience with two 105 F2DC lenses that I owned; one was "softer" at F2 and the other was "sharper" at F2 but they were both "getting into the zone" by F2.8 and both were just fine at F4. I shot a lot at F2.8 and F4.


Jul 22, 2014 at 10:02 AM
jhinkey
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


My experience with the 135DC was pretty dismal. At portrait-type distances wide open it was just not sharp. Lots of CA. In fact it was no better than my 135/2 AIS.
However my 135/2 AIS is sharp at far distances (though lacks contrast) wide open while the DC it makes no difference what the distance is.
Also the term "sharp" is relative to people and how they use the lens. So when someone says that their lens is "sharp" all that means is that it's sharp enough for them, but perhaps not for you.

I also found the 135/2DC to be pretty poor in AF accuracy (this was on my D700), though it did require a lot of AF fine tune, it just was totally unreliable in locking in focus most of the time.

I found the 105/2DC to be much better than the 135/2DC in all aspects - sharpness wide open, CA, and focusing accuracy.

As far as testing vs. picture taking - I do both. Testing to know in a more controlled fashion how the lens is behaving and what its characteristics are. Image taking to see how it actually delivers for the types of images I like to take and when it doesn't deliver I usually know why from my testing.

My 2 cents.



Jul 22, 2014 at 10:51 AM
Kerry Pierce
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


FWIW, I'd tend to agree with aspirebooth. I have owned both the 105 and 135 for years and they are among my most favorite portrait lenses.

But, they can be a real problem if they don't play well with your specific camera, plus camera shake can be more of an issue than many seem to realize. You need to AF fine tune the lens to the camera, at the distances that you want to shoot. I think that's more important with these lenses than with most of my other Nikons. If the AF motor and the linkage in the lens aren't in harmony, that's not good for critical focus.

I don't often mess with them too much these days. I tend to like the way the lenses draw the scene and especially the subject isolation and bokeh. Only my 200 f/2 is better, but the price tag differences should ensure that the 200 is better, much better.

Whether or not your particular copy is a problem, is hard to say, without knowing what you've done for AF fine tune at the distances you want to use it and whether or not these shots were handheld, etc.

Kerry



Jul 22, 2014 at 03:23 PM
aspirebooth
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


Kerry, 100% bang on. You'll honestly find its going to be different AF amounts for different bodies too. On my D700 it was +12 on the D800 -8. I really can't stand the DC lenses anymore as they just aren't reliable.


Jul 22, 2014 at 04:08 PM
jhinkey
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


aspirebooth wrote:
Bad advice. Doesn't matter whether you are shooting a book, an orange, the sun or people. If it's soft, it's soft. Taking photos of people in a different setting is only going to mask the problem that is...........

The lens is still soft.

Yes your copy is soft. The good copies are sharp at F2. The ones that are not honestly belong in a dumpster as they cost more to fix then they are worth. For years people always thought it was just the camera missing focus and the majority of the times its a combination of issues with the DC motor
...Show more

What "DC motor" are you talking about? There is no motor inside the 135/2DC.
When I look at the MTF published by Nikon it shows that it's just not that sharp by design . . .



Jul 22, 2014 at 04:09 PM
Kerry Pierce
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · Am I expecting too much out of my 135mm f/2 DC?


aspirebooth wrote:
Kerry, 100% bang on. You'll honestly find its going to be different AF amounts for different bodies too. On my D700 it was +12 on the D800 -8. I really can't stand the DC lenses anymore as they just aren't reliable.


I can't recall what my AFFT settings are for these lenses, but many of my other Nikkor primes also change AFFT from body to body, some rather severely. It's really a hassle at times, trying to set a lens to a new body or new lens to older bodies, especially in the winter.

Even so, I still use my DC lenses rather frequently, but like you, not as much as I used to use them. If you can control the background, the subject isolation and bokeh aren't quite as important, especially on FX.

Kerry



Jul 23, 2014 at 02:27 PM





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