Tariq Gibran wrote:
They certainly better get their act together but right now, they don't seem to have much to be concerned about (for compact/ wide FF ILC).
Wait until a few more high performance native AF wide angle primes are available for the FE class Sony cams, and then some nice Zeiss alternatives to ZM in the form of electronically coupled manual focus FE class all metal lenses.
Sure, the RF experience means something and for some will it simply won't ever be replaced.
But the siren call of high IQ, big sensors, sexy AF and MF lenses - for some it'll be too hard to resist as the Sony (and probably other) systems fill out in depth.
It feels like a sea change of sorts is under way and while the current isn't yet moving fast, it'll pick up speed as the tide goes out.
I am struggling to recall even minor technical faults with my Sonys. There are always things you would prefer to work differently, but none have needed a trip back to the dealer...that level of reliability matters if you shoot in far away places. So I expect the a7r to be the same, so much so that it goes away with me next Feb. We all really hope Leica does find their way.
With the Leica M wides, everyone hoped it would all come up smelling of roses, we would all potentially benefit from it. I doubt any conspiracy theory regarding Sony/Zeiss however, as neither company flinches from competition. The E mount has no royalties, Zeiss compete everywhere you look.
They probably took the decision to make the sensor as good as it could be for M wides (the quintessential 1% of the market) without jeopardising the rest of what they want to do - FEs, ZAs, other DLSR lenses...and no doubt Zeiss would have indicated their needs for their forthcoming MF lenses and wide FEs. Always bears remembering these go for $1700 and $2300. Mass market. Any wonder they are selling well, look at what you get. It's a game changer, despite the M lens problems.
philip_pj wrote:
Always bears remembering these go for $1700 and $2300. Mass market.
I suspect that has a lot to do with things. These A7 sensors have and will find their way into many Sony FF offerings so specific - and expensive- changes designed for just one tiny fringe market was likely not even a consideration.
I also agree about Sony reliability - both hardware and software. I have yet to have any issue with a Sony camera. Folks complain about the lack or slowness of firmware updates but the fact is Sony does not release half-cooked firmware (unlike say even Fuji have been known to do). Sure, there are always feature desires or things that could be improved but seldom real bugs/ major issues.
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Except for maybe that cheap WATE right? There were certainly also a lot of pundits writing about the effect of these Sony's on Leica so it was out there in the press (not just on forums). For users, the fact that the A7's are less than stellar with wide angle rangefinder lenses still means that if you want the most compact FF ILC body for use with wide angle compact lenses, it's still a Leica and not a Sony (and Leica has to be grinning about that after all the A7 press lately). I'm certainly not saying it's a good thing, just that it's a current fact. ...Show more →
yeah but all that hype was for a cheap competitor for leica. it's not like there are a bunch of people who are gonna say "oh, the m 21 SE doesn't work well on the A7r, guess i'll get an m240 instead" (double digits world wide maybe? ). this will ultimately probably hurt leica's bottom line not help it, even if it does give them short term bragging rights. leica camera prices, camera design, and production capabilities essentially put them out of direct competition with sony for camera bodies. it's only the lenses where they are likely to have measureable impact on each other's sales (imho of course).
sebboh wrote:
yeah but all that hype was for a cheap competitor for leica. it's not like there are a bunch of people who are gonna say "oh, the m 21 SE doesn't work well on the A7r, guess i'll get an m240 instead" (double digits world wide maybe? ). this will ultimately probably hurt leica's bottom line not help it, even if it does give them short term bragging rights. leica camera prices, camera design, and production capabilities essentially put them out of direct competition with sony for camera bodies. it's only the lenses where they are likely to have measureable impact on each other's sales (imho of course).
In my opinion, Leica at this point is in jeopardy of losing even more market share with Sony's introduction of the A7 and A7r. Leica had their chance but lost much of their opportunity with their short shortsightedness with the introduction of the M240. They must do something quickly or fall even further behind in this rapidly changing market. Leica may make some of the finest and best mechanically operated and small lenses, but that is no longer enough.
sebboh wrote:
yeah but all that hype was for a cheap competitor for leica. it's not like there are a bunch of people who are gonna say "oh, the m 21 SE doesn't work well on the A7r, guess i'll get an m240 instead" (double digits world wide maybe? ). this will ultimately probably hurt leica's bottom line not help it, even if it does give them short term bragging rights. leica camera prices, camera design, and production capabilities essentially put them out of direct competition with sony for camera bodies. it's only the lenses where they are likely to have measureable impact on each other's sales (imho of course).
I doubt it will have any effect on Leica's bottom line given their customer base. Of course, some folks around here might say something more like "my ZM, CV or Leica wide will not perform so hot on the A7r so I'll buy a used M9 instead or just not buy that A7r as a second body for my Leica" or "since I have to use SLR wides for best performance anyway, I'll just stick with my Nikon or Canon ". I do think both of these groups will be less hot for the A7's.
Sony's obvious problem for the larger market is their lack of native lens options, which is made even worse by the situation above (and Sony and their reps have made a big deal about adapting other lenses). I think Sony has a fairly small window (before Photokina next year) where they (or their partners and third parties) must come out with compelling native lens offerings or the system will loose steam as competition gears up. Sony is not going to be able to rely on their A7 customers adapting lenses en masse.
I always said that Sony would not design their cameras to sell Leica lenses. Obviously selling Sony lenses -or Sony/Zeiss- is their priority. Simply, when they launch with just 2 lenses (the kit zoom for A7 and the FE 35 f:2.8), they "encourage" talk about how it works with other lenses (RF, Canon) because it suits them.
To wit: do you remember how long people talked about what a nice system NEX was, except no lenses? And now, no word of missing lenses, on the contrary, massive buzz and pre-orders. Well done Sony.
Second argument in support of my theory: the Touit 12mm. It works flawlessly on my NEX7, a camera that "hates" very wide angles. That Zeiss could design a high performance UWA that is neither very large nor very heavy means the NEX keeps its low size/weight advantage, and everyone is happy, especially Sony and Zeiss.
Thus I fully expect that there will be one or maybe even two primes wider than 35mm from Zeiss in the not-too-distant future that will work as well for FF as my Touit 12 for APS-C, not be very heavy or large, and cost around 1000+ $ or €.
That will directly cost Leica in one major segment of their business, the shooters interested primarily in small size/low weight FF.
It will also cost them more indirectly, which is to show pictures taken with other bodies than theirs with Leica glass. That will show that the 7000$/€ body is no longer state-of-the-art as an imagemaker. That the Sony wll not be the prefect host for Leica wides will not prevent that disaffection from hitting some present or would-be Leica owners.
On another subject, a couple of members write that it is "normal" for the 'Lux 50 to underperform on A7, since it also underperforms on NEX. I disagree wholeheartedly. Either my standards are just much lower than theirs, or I got a better copy, but my 'Lux fills me me with joy whenever I get a shot right.
@philber I cringe when I read these comments on "under performing 50 lux", also. I believe that assessment will go down in flames as yet another pre-mature conclusion based on a few flawed samples. Huff, who by now actually has quite a bit of Leica experience, noted the 50 lux "was back" with the A7r, after a muting with the M240, to the M9 standard.
That would be good news. These are too small to make judgement about corner detail, sharpness, etc but unless they've been fixed in Cornerfix or Lightroom there is no evidence of colour shift or banding. I wonder how it looks on the A7R.
I would add that this lens does perform acceptably well on the NEX7 wrt colour shift and darkened edges. In my experience it is just about detectable at corners in extreme circumstances, such as snow scenes or white walls, but nothing to worry about. The CV 25/4 however is another matter and I sold mine but my MD 24/2.8 is first rate, albeit with a little corner softness, but then that is an SLR lens. Now did I read here that the CV 21/1.8 is OK on the A7? That would be a result. uhoh7 wrote:
another RF wide back from the dead?
rscheffler wrote:
The tests I did with the ZM21/2.8 on the a7 look bad, IMO, if you're into infinity landscape images. You pretty much have to stop down to f/11, though f/8 might suffice. It will need stopping down a fair amount.
Please see my 4-way 21mm shootout on the M9, including a subset shot on the NEX-7 and GXR. There are full-fez downloads with samples through the full aperture range up to f/11. On the M9, the ZM21 had color shift problems until the more recent firmware versions, but still probably isn't perfect. It also has field curvature, which means flat, frame filling subjects result in soft edges/corners until around f/5.6. Overall it's a really good lens, especially stopped down a bit. I'm less enthusiastic about it on the a7... ...Show more → alwang wrote:
Ron, your ZM21 shots on the a7 do indeed look terrible: I feel like there must have been something off with the camera or adapter. But when I look at this shot at 1:1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/inikon/10867266285/sizes/l/in/set-72157637688730425/
It's not far off to me from the ZM21 f8 shot in your M9 21mm shootout (the one of the cityscape at infinity). Neither one has perfect corners at f8, but both seem pretty decent, and I suspect if I downrezzed the a7 shot to 18MP, the results would be awfully close (setting aside the color cast and vignetting, which doesn't bother me).
Seeing as how I have a sampling size of one lens, it's certainly possible my copy is not entirely representative of the ZM21/2.8 population. And I have suspected the lens for a while, to the point where in the above linked 21mm review, I borrowed another copy from the local Zeiss dealer, and wrote in the review:
While conducting the tests for this review, I noticed that my copy’s images along the left side are not quite as sharp as the right side until past f/5.6. I borrowed a demo copy from Rob Skeoch, a Canadian Zeiss dealer at the Rangefinder Store, and it appeared to have better wide open edge performance, but at the consequence of poorer central sharpness. This could also be a recent rangefinder optimization consideration by Zeiss to moderate the effects of field curvature, but is only a guess. It would be necessary to try a few more copies to get a better feel for this.
What I did not do with the a7 test was optimize focus for a non-central area to compensate for possible field curvature and let the slightly softened central area recover through stopping down more...
As for the CV28/2 being a 'classic reborn' our friend here http://www.flickr.com/photos/inikon/sets/ shot it on both cameras. It's better than I remember it being at f/8, but the wider apertures certainly remind me of when I tested it on the M9...
_julian_ wrote:
I agree that the 50s (ZM50p, ZM50c, 'Lux 50) all under-perform on both cameras. Queue the insults..
Jonas B wrote:
Well, the 50Lux-M under-performed with my Nex-5 so I'm not that surprised it doesn't works better with a FF version. One has to wonder if the glass stack on top of the Sony sensors are designed by random. Sony went from Nex-5 to the 5N. Now give me a A7n...
If you mean it had poor edges there's also the coincidence of the lens's mid zone dip aligning with the edge of the APS-C image area. Though if you got better results on the 5N, I wouldn't be surprised because I do believe the Lux ASPH is more sensitive to sensor topping variables than other 50s.
sebboh wrote:
50 lux asph seems to underperform a bit, i'd still happily use it though. the zm 50's both seem to perform very well except for that one test where the zm 50/2 is misfocused and tilted (i've seen a couple others where it looks just like it does on the m240). the zm 50/1.5 sonnar actually seems to lose less than the lux. i'd say downsampled shots from the a7r should look as good or better than they do on the m9.
also the 40 cron, 50 cron pre-AA, and g45 all look as shapr as they do on the m9/film.
What is impressing me with many early samples is how good this focal length is looking in 'real world' images not at infinity or with a flat subject filling the frame... Quite a few nice people photos against blurred out backgrounds, etc..
uhoh7 wrote:
Just dust off the 21/1.4: http://flic.kr/s/aHsjMyGC9U
edges seem to be there @f/2
hey buddy, just put that lens down. I don't care how it works. My mentors at FM told me: no usable RF WAs.
michaelwatkins wrote:
I sure hope that lenses worth seven kilo-bucks are not necessary to get decent edges at 21mm. I'm willing to suffer some pain to get what I want - pain of waiting, of adapting larger lenses than I'd like, etc., but that kind of wallet pain I'm not ready for.
I remain in the hopeful yet pragmatic middle, but I don't think this game is going to get any more fun going forward with new camera releases. Quite the opposite.
Well, I happen to have one and it would be great to see it perform reasonably well on the a7R. Unfortunately those samples are all 1024px and you can't really judge anything from them.
One lens I have yet to see any images from is the CV21/1.8. Has anyone come across any? My hunch is, of the 21mm RF lenses out there, it should play relatively well, though vignetting will probably be pretty high (as it was on the M9).
Tariq Gibran wrote:
Though we already know they will be larger (or slower or both) than the current ZM versions when they hopefully start showing up a year from now.
How do we know that? Compare the ZM 35/2.8 (with adapter) and the FE 35/2.8. They are roughly the same size when considering that the FE barrel is mostly just filled with air.
philip_pj wrote:
I am struggling to recall even minor technical faults with my Sonys.
I don't have to struggle to recall that both my RX1:s were faulty.
Can't say I agree I'm afraid. Both have magenta banding although not extreme I accept. The CV Nokton 35/1.2 shows bad vignetting too which is a surprise.
Olaf G wrote:
The shots provided here give me hope that well-centered samples of CV 15 LTM and CV 21 LTM (stopped down) do actually work reasonably well on a A7:
waterden wrote:
Can't say I agree I'm afraid. Both have magenta banding although not extreme I accept. The CV Nokton 35/1.2 shows bad vignetting too which is a surprise.
I am absolutely not concerned about magenta shifts and/or vignetting. They can easily be corrected via flat field correction in Lightroom. MF digital back users (and these digital backs cost a fortune) have to live with this problem as well.
What really bothers me is smearing. I disassembled and reassembled my heavily decentered CV 15 and CV 21 maybe 20-30 times until I liked the results. They now perform very well (especially the CV15 even wide open) on my Nex-5n and also on a friend's M9. When I look at the samples (e.g. the corners/edges of the CV21 shots taken inside of the school bus) I am quite confident that the CV21 stopped down (which is more of a Biogon-type than the CV15) can deliver usable results.
... as it pertains to vignetting and smearing?
). this will ultimately probably hurt leica's bottom line not help it, even if it does give them short term bragging rights. leica camera prices, camera design, and production capabilities essentially put them out of direct competition with sony for camera bodies. it's only the lenses where they are likely to have measureable impact on each other's sales (imho of course).
