DaveEP
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 p.1 #7 · Fast Primes - Why The CA's? | |
OK - don't take this personally - I am not picking on you directly 
Dawei Ye wrote:
..... but my 85L II and 35L are tack sharp wide open
......though both lenses do improve in sharpness stopped down
Don't these contradict each other ? How sharp is 'tack sharp' and how much sharper than 'tack sharp' can you get?
All things are relative, or course, but I wondered about this apparent contradiction.... because now we don't quite know what you (or many other people) mean by 'tack sharp'. It's a term used quite a lot on forums and if it's 'less sharp' than when the lens is stopped down, then it wasn't actually the sharpest it could be, so is it really tack sharp wide open or not 
I had both the 35L and 85L and sold them. Apart from shallow DOF (which I almost never used), I found they were not significantly better (when stopped down) than a stopped down (high quality) zoom on a final print (pixel peeping didn't count). For instance, my 24-70L beat the crap out of my 35L in the corners at f2.8 and upwards. The 35L was 'marginally' sharper in the center when pixel peeping, but not enough to make it noticeable on an A2 print. I know this because I tested them side by side and made prints. I sold my 35L the next week.
The 85L was also awesome at f1.2, but pretty much unusable for anything other than planned shots. The DOF was so shallow it needed very careful focusing to get it just right. Focusing on the 85L was too slow to be usable for anything that moved much. Again, stopped down my 70-200 f2.8L IS was just as good for the end results on large prints, and much better at focusing on things . Again, after testing them side by side, and making large (A2) prints, I sold the 85L.
I am not criticizing prime lenses in any way. They do have their place, and they absolutely have their supporters. I do sometimes wonder though about the gear lust generated on these forums, and how many people find that after spending their $1500 (or whatever) that the lens really didn't make 'that much' difference in terms of picture quality (ignoring shallow DOF here for a moment) and had distinct downsides in terms of flexibility. I hear (read) so much BS about learning to zoom with your feet it makes me mad. If I have a specific shot framed in my mind, and I can't zoom to that framing with the prime lens using my feet (due to other environmental factors like people, roads, rivers, walls etc), now what? Answer, carry more primes, which defeats the object of traveling light, and even then, I usually ended up with a compromise, because, search as I may, I couldn't find (say) a 64mm prime to use on this shot and a 46mm prime on the next. So, the framing was almost never what I had in mind before lifting the camera to my eye. At least with a zoom I can so this.
Now, having said all this, if shallow DOF is your goal, and you are looking to use it day-in and day-out, then primes are the only way to go, you will just have to accept that sometimes they are less than perfect in other areas. Photography is a compromise.
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