Well, maybe not heaven, but its still a good pairing.

Today my Voigtlander Leica M to m43 adapter arrived, as well as my long-awaited Voigtlander Nokton 50mm f/1.1 lens. I didn't get much time with it as I had a busy day at work, but I did slap it on and took a few pictures of the box sitting at my desk. I also took a few pictures of my wife and daughter after dinner tonight. My wife would kill me if she knew I posted these because she wouldn't like the wrinkles on her face, but I think it shows character--hers and the lenses.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jhapeman/sets/72157621613423252/

You can click on the "All Sizes" link above each image and then the "Original Size" link. The box pictures are native jpegs out of the camera, with default settings. The pictures of my wife and daughter are converted from raw files, and have all noise reduction, sharpening, etc turned off. The images were output as tiff files to PS CS4, and a very mild Smart Sharpen filter was applied.

The lens is scary sharp at f/1.4, and just keeps getting sharper as you stop down. There is some halation at f/1.1, but, hey, its f/1.1! Longitudinal chromatic aberration is present in the OOF areas until about f/2.8-4, when it disappears. It has excellent contrast and renders the color very nice. The bokeh is very smooth. I am really going to enjoy this lens, but then I am a fast glass junky.

Olympus definitely could make some improvements to the manual focus interface for lenses that don't have the full electronics. With the standard kit lens, if you touch the manual focus ring, it zooms in to an enlarged view for critical focusing. I need a one-button way to do the same thing when using a non-electronic lens. If there is a way to do it, I haven't found it yet. More on that in another post, I guess.

Jeff

If possible, I'd love to see 100% crops in 1.1 and 1.4.

TIA.

Happy shooting,
Yakim.

One-button MF assist is something we G1 shooters have been asking for from the get go.

I'm VERY interested in trying the Nokton on my G1. It looks like a gem, although I'd have to say I'm a little more interested in the 35/1.2.

This combination is what grabbed my interest as soon as I saw the announcement of the adapter from Cosina. Very nice photo quality. Were these at base ISO? The full scale versions show some noise in the shadow areas, so I am just curious.

Even with a bit of noise, I am liking what I see. Thanks for posting!

Craig

Csquare4 wrote:
This combination is what grabbed my interest as soon as I saw the announcement of the adapter from Cosina. Very nice photo quality. Were these at base ISO? The full scale versions show some noise in the shadow areas, so I am just curious.

Even with a bit of noise, I am liking what I see. Thanks for posting!

Craig

The ones with my wife and daughter are base ISO. There is shadow noise, but I believe its because of how the Olympus software was trying to do some shadow fill. I can't stand that software.

Jeff

mawz wrote:
One-button MF assist is something we G1 shooters have been asking for from the get go.

I'm VERY interested in trying the Nokton on my G1. It looks like a gem, although I'd have to say I'm a little more interested in the 35/1.2.

Yes, I am tempted by the 35/1.2 as well, but also torn about having too many large primes. I might end up getting the 35/1.4 just to have a compact relatively fast lens. There is a huge difference in size. Decisions, decisions--which one to get?

Yakim Peled wrote:
If possible, I'd love to see 100% crops in 1.1 and 1.4.

TIA.

Happy shooting,
Yakim.

Here you go.

100% crop, f/1.1

Much obliged.

Happy shooting,
Yakim.

jhapeman wrote:
Olympus definitely could make some improvements to the manual focus interface for lenses that don't have the full electronics. With the standard kit lens, if you touch the manual focus ring, it zooms in to an enlarged view for critical focusing. I need a one-button way to do the same thing when using a non-electronic lens. If there is a way to do it, I haven't found it yet. More on that in another post, I guess.

Jeff

This morning is the first time I have gotten to use my MF lenses and now I see what you are talking about

I am going to have to get better at handling the body and using the MF lenses - I am waaayy too shaky.

To be fair, the high magnification of the Live View MF screen also magnifies your shaking. You would see that kind of shaking in an optical viewfinder if you could see the viewfinder at 10x. I have figured out how to do it, and I don't view MF as something I will be doing all the time anyway.

jhapeman wrote:
To be fair, the high magnification of the Live View MF screen also magnifies your shaking. You would see that kind of shaking in an optical viewfinder if you could see the viewfinder at 10x. I have figured out how to do it, and I don't view MF as something I will be doing all the time anyway.

Yeah, that can be a real issue when using MF Assist with poor support (heck, it can be a real issue with using MF Assist on a tripod if the lens is long enough, I've tried that with a Bigma @500mm and shake was a serious issue).

I know what you mean. I shoot air rifles/pistol and use a 9 power scope - I couldn't stand any stronger because it shows just how bad I shake