The Tamron 90mm macro is spectacular in the center (see MTF), so I used it to check out the Mamiya 120mm M645 macro - said to be right there with the Hassi and Contax 120 macros, which shouldn't be as sharp as the Tamron in the center but then they don't need to be given the MUCH larger negative. Used a 40D and focused with LiveView, f/11.

Here's what I got:

Mamiya

Interesting...

They look really, really close to me...

I just asked my wife if she knew the American penny had naked male buttocks on them. She said "no way..." We then pulled out a few pennies with no visible proof. I then showed her the macro pics you shot... Maybe its George Washington in really, really tight pants?

Who knew?

That's the Lincoln Memorial with Lincoln in the middle sitting down.;-)

He must have had unfeasably huge knees then!

That's when happens when you've sat for that long. And great comparison shots! The Mamiya shots look as though they have more contrast.

I think what appears to be more contrast is actually a bit less exposure than the Tamron, I forgot to change the metering mode with the Tammy to match the no-lens default mode you get with a bellows.

The highlights are blown on both, so they look the same while everything else is more saturated with the Mamiya. Look at the blown-out rim of the penny to the left of "United", you can see detail further up the edge with the Mamiya exposure.

I can't find any MTF or lines per mm info on the 120mm, but I've read that in it's day some said it was the sharpest MF lens ever made. (I expect the newer Hassi HC line and others made for digital backs are better.) Not the best for portraits though, still sharp at distance but hard to focus due to huge focus shift with barely any focus ring movement. For the coins on the monorail rig I set the lens at infinity and focused with the geared movements. Couldn't focus the lens at anything but infinity, since I didn't set the rail to the match the 645 body registration (around 65mm). I'm also concerned that the aperture blades on my used 120mm are out of whack, they don't make a very round pupil when stopped down. It may go back to the seller for replacement, I need to look at some other lenses first to compare.

I'm trying out a few Mamiya RZ lenes for wide angle next. The 140mm RZ macro is nothing special so I went for the 645 instead.

Drew, thanks for the comparison. I have a Mamiya M645 A 120/4 Macro on the way. I'll compare it with my Canon EF 100/2.8 Macro USM, and with a variety of enlarger lenses and other stuff on M645 tilt-shift bellows. I'm especially interested to compare the OOF areas of these lenses, and to use the M645 120/4 on my Mirex adapter.

You get mirror box shadowing with a healthy tilt, a digital back is really the way to go.

I'll probably only use the Mirex for modest tilt at less than 1:2 magnification. I'll use the Mamiya M645 Auto Bellows N for more extreme motions, as it has tilt/swing about the lens centre axis, as well as rise/fall on the front standard. That's one reason I want to compare the M645 macros (80/4 and 120/4) with enlarging/bellows lenses like the EL-Nikkor 50/2.8 and SMC Bellows-Takumar 100/4.

Both were very sharp lenses. I was just up there and showed the pic to my wife and she said "that's Lincoln's knees" guy musta had humongus knees. But once again the less expensive lens imho is as good as the expensive one.

The Mamiya 645 lenses remain under-rated. The general principle about larger lenses resolving less is still being misapplied to medium format! In reality, the majority of MF lenses are just as sharp as their 35mm equivalents, even in the centre of their image circle. In Zone C, where the 35mm optic is often looking flaky, the best MF lenses suffer little performance deterioration.

It's not widely known that the - even cheaper - M645 80mm Macro is right up there with the 120mm!

Hey, the longer people follow the myth that MF lenses don't perform as well as (or better than in some cases) their 35mm cousins, the longer prices stay realistic for the rest of us...



hubsand wrote:
The Mamiya 645 lenses remain under-rated. The general principle about larger lenses resolving less is still being misapplied to medium format! In reality, the majority of MF lenses are just as sharp as their 35mm equivalents, even in the centre of their image circle. In Zone C, where the 35mm optic is often looking flaky, the best MF lenses suffer little performance deterioration.

Conner999 wrote:
Hey, the longer people follow the myth that MF lenses don't perform as well as (or better than in some cases) their 35mm cousins, the longer prices stay realistic for the rest of us...


I don't know that I'd call it a "myth". Yes, the best MF lenses are better than many 35mm lenses, but the best 35mm lenses are still sharper in the center than the best MF, and the average 35mm lenses are still better than average MF lenses. (But the larger MF film more than makes up for the resolution loss.)

Instead of myth, I would say the better MF lenses don't get the credit they deserve, and that some 35mm glass gets too much credit.

I'd say this test demonstrates the fallacy of the '35mm lenses resolve best' position: the Tamron 90mm is among the top 20% of all SLR lenses for sharpness, yet is here comfortably matched by the Mamiya. To give a really fair summary of a lens' resolving power you have to take into account the whole area covered by the sensor: the smaller image circle of 35mm lenses frequently counts against them.

The idea that 35mm lens designers 'work that much harder because the image has to be enlarged more' is absurdly conjectural and doubtless inaccurate. I'm sure the designers and makers of truly professional systems over at Pentax, Mamiya, Hasselblad and Fuji would take issue with it.

Sure, the best Zeiss lenses record massive resolution figures in Zone A, but even our most demanding cameras are way too blunt instruments to tell. And the same lens will record very different figures in Zones B and C, and at non-optimal apertures. In just about any real world shooting environment you can contrive, a good medium format lens will match or outperform its 35mm equivalent every time. QED.

Conner999 wrote:
Hey, the longer people follow the myth that MF lenses don't perform as well as (or better than in some cases) their 35mm cousins, the longer prices stay realistic for the rest of us...

hubsand wrote:
The Mamiya 645 lenses remain under-rated . . . .


Long may it last!

hubsand wrote:
It's not widely known that the - even cheaper - M645 80mm Macro is right up there with the 120mm!

Note the big difference between the two is the 120 is an APO design, the 80/4 is not. Both are very sharp.

Before anybody goes nuts and digs up a used Ultima 35 and a Cambo lens mount for Mamiya 645, know that I had to grind/cut a LOT of the aperture adjustment ring out of the lens panel to get the 120mm to fit the mount. Not sure why it's designed the way it is, Cambo stuff is gorgeous but often needs modification to work.

It's not easy to take a cut-off wheel or die grinder to silly expensive camera equipment...but it gets easier the more you do it.

Making a homebrew RZ to Ultima 35 mount now.

mawz wrote:
hubsand wrote:
It's not widely known that the - even cheaper - M645 80mm Macro is right up there with the 120mm!

Note the big difference between the two is the 120 is an APO design, the 80/4 is not. Both are very sharp.

Onanother thread someone said the 120/4 macro 645 is not apo.. so it is or it isnt?

Paoletto wrote:
mawz wrote:
hubsand wrote:
It's not widely known that the - even cheaper - M645 80mm Macro is right up there with the 120mm!

Note the big difference between the two is the 120 is an APO design, the 80/4 is not. Both are very sharp.

Onanother thread someone said the 120/4 macro 645 is not apo.. so it is or it isnt?

As per Mamiya's website "Anomalous dispersion optical glass is employed to reduce chromatic aberrations, which results in APO-quality lens performance when focused from infinity to 1:2 magnification, and significantly reduces chromatic aberration from 1:2 to 1:1 magnification."

Paoletto wrote:
mawz wrote:
hubsand wrote:
It's not widely known that the - even cheaper - M645 80mm Macro is right up there with the 120mm!

Note the big difference between the two is the 120 is an APO design, the 80/4 is not. Both are very sharp.

Onanother thread someone said the 120/4 macro 645 is not apo.. so it is or it isnt?

As per Mamiya's website "Anomalous dispersion optical glass is employed to reduce chromatic aberrations, which results in APO-quality lens performance when focused from infinity to 1:2 magnification, and significantly reduces chromatic aberration from 1:2 to 1:1 magnification."

I see.. would be interesting a comparison of the 120/4 vs an CV apo lanthar 125 macro..