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Following a discussion in another thread I became interested in finding out how good people are at differentiating between the lenses of two different lens manufacturers.
We've had many threads where people had to match images to specific lenses and the results have been varying. This is a far more simple test - is there objectively a "Zeiss" or a "Canon" or a "Leica" rendering style - i.e can you associate a certain look with a lens manufacturer? So this is not about which lens is better or which you like more. It's just to see if people can consistently tell the two brands apart.
I'm going to post six pairs of images. For each pair one is an image shot with a Canon lens and one with a Zeiss lens. The challange is to for each pair guess which one is the Canon and which one is the Zeiss. The two shots that form a pair have been shot at the same aperture and with the same nominal focal length (there is some variation in actual FL per lens). A total of 9 different lenses - four Canons and five Zeiss lenses were used. The images have been processed identically. The order of the images has been generated by a random generator.
I'll be posting an identical thread in a Canon-only forum to see if the average (i.e not lens fanatics like us here in the alt forum) photographer can pick out the brands. I'll give the answers in two days or after 20-30 people have guessed.
To compare the images, open the pairs in separate browser tabs and flip between them.
Nice test, thanks in advance for the effort.
I'm no Zeiss expert, so what I did was just picking my favourite photo from each pair.
The winners:
a2 (significantly better)
b1 (slightly better)
c2 (better exposed, so this one does not count)
d1 (better)
e1 (slightly better)
Furthermore, I'd rate all the winners as having "better resolving power". Or should I say "better detail", as we're looking at resized pictures.
rsolti13 wrote:
Extra credit All small web based jpgs are Zeiss EXCEPT 'A'
What's that saying... pride goes before fall
Ok, for extra credit. This is not part of the test. They are shots taken with the Zeiss 100 MP and the Canon 100/2.8 Macro. The lenses are trivial to tell apart at infinity, but for closeups, at f/2.8.. well.. you be the judge:
Not that easy, eh? I originally intended to use a closeup in the test but I could not find a single shot where there was a significant difference. Both 100mm lenses are really exceptional for closeups. The 100 MP is of course an f/2 lens but the Canon is a true 1:1 Macro.
Well, since the second set isn't part of the overall test, I can tell you that the F:ZC, G:CZ, H:ZC combo that three people have guessed now is not correct.
All small web based jpgs are Zeiss EXCEPT 'A'