Archive 2017 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

aks2000
Offline
•
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

Hello,

I was testing my new FE 55 wide open ( 1.8) with A7R II to take a picture of a tree against bright sky and noticed horrible purple fringes along all the tree branches. Stepping down the aperture to f2.8 helps reduce it but it is still there. f4 seems clean.

Is it something normal for this lens with all copies showing this ? Or can my lens be a bad copy showing more than usual ? I don't know if chromatic aberration can vary from one copy to another of the lenses.

I have uploaded this image taken at f1.8, its 100% crop, f4 and its 100% crop.

https://youtu.be/BGTO8IyJ-XI

I saw the exact same issue with FE 28mm at f2.0

Will appreciate your advise .

Thanks

Feb 22, 2017 at 03:32 PM

tylerdurden801
Offline
• •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

Nope, that's one of the biggest weaknesses of the lens. Very poorly controlled LoCA, and, IMO, very difficult to satisfactorily correct without cocking up the rest of the image. If someone has a secret trick to correct it well, I'd like to hear it, because in harsher light the lens isn't usable below 2.8. I mostly use it as a landscape lens, at those apertures it's extremely competent, or if using for more portrait type work I am well aware of the lighting conditions and will often switch to the B85.

Feb 22, 2017 at 05:08 PM

lightskyland
Offline
• • •
Upload & Sell: On

p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

It's really easy to fix loca (bokeh CA) using the Color Fringe Reduction Action in Photoshop by Shay Stephens. It also fixes general purple fringing that the lightroom CA removal tool can't manage.

Feb 22, 2017 at 10:24 PM

rico
Offline
• • • • •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

Fixing LCA is easy: just desaturate every purple pixel in the image.

Feb 23, 2017 at 12:40 AM

TheEmrys
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

The 55/1.8 is a great lens. LoCa can be an issue. For me, I just never worried about it. For the sort of shooting I do, it just never came up. I shot around it. If I needed to shoot overwhelmingly high contrast subjects like tree branches next to a bright sky, I stopped it down. 9/10ths of all of my landscape shooting when I used the 55 was stopped down to at least f/4. Even Fred's technique of Aperture Stacking (which I am painfully slow at doing) never saw the issue come up as I would stack from f/2.8 to f/10-12.

The truth of the matter (for me) is that every lens has a flaw. Whether it is color signature, LoCa, bokeh, uneven sharpness wide open (a flaw? Not really), distortion, decentering, size, weight, no stabilization, or whatever. Then there are the "flaws" of sensors and cameras . Shooting around flaws isn't too tough. For the 55/1.8, it means stopping down 1 1/3rd of a stop when shooting extremely high contrast scenes.

For my portraiture, it never came up. I never printed too large to where the minor corrections needed mattered one iota. I never had a client come back with a magnifying glass and ask "is this LoCa?"

Feb 23, 2017 at 08:10 AM

JohnJ
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

OP, the 55 has significant LoCA, as mentioned by others. I've found I can live with it and TBH it rarely causes me significant problems even though I prefer to shoot wide open (because I like the lenses bokeh so much).

I think the attached pic shows reasonably well how important it is to accurately focus the lens because if focus is slight out then green or purple fringing will result. Of course this doesn't help in many circumstances because subject are typically three dimensional but it does help to understand how important accurate focus is with this particular lens.

http://www.photocornucopia.com/images/Lenses/Sony/FE55/focus55.jpg

Feb 23, 2017 at 02:29 PM

TheEmrys
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

One thing i neglected to mention is that for high contrast scenes outdoors, I always use a cpl. Bringing out the blue in the sky really helps with hiding (not really eliminating) the purple fringing of LoCa. It drops the contrast of a white sky by turning it to a better shade of blue.

The other thing I did was play around with the Creative Styles. I would often shoot in vivid with saturation and contrast at -1 or Neutral or Clear with them at +1 or +2.

Feb 23, 2017 at 05:08 PM

Fred Miranda
Offline
Admin
Upload & Sell: On

p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

I agree with all of the above, except that contrast is not that high and LoCA is not that minor, ...especially when comparing to the FE 50/1.4.

Bespoked wrote:
What I like about the 1.8/55;

- Small size and light weight
- Fast speed of T1.8.
- Awesome AF on A7RII and A6K, A6300 (haven't tested with 6500 but assume it would be equally brilliant)
- Resolution and contrast, especially wide open
- Bokeh, but only the transition from in focus to out of focus which I describe as 'smooth' and backgrounds which usually aren't busy/nervous.

What I don't;

- $1K price point, it's $300-$400 too high imho. I'll buy two more for our business, but only when they come down to at least $700.
- Specular highlights, bokeh isn't usually nice in my experience for night...Show more →

Feb 23, 2017 at 07:24 PM

virtualrain
Offline
• • •
Upload & Sell: Off

p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · Sony FE 55 f1.8 chromatic aberration

I think you guys suffering with LoCA need to consider switching to Capture One Pro. It does a mighty fine job of eliminating most of it, without compromise.

Feb 23, 2017 at 10:11 PM


FM Forums \| Sony Forum \| Join Upload & Sell

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.