You can make a sharp lens soft, but you can't make a soft lens sharp. Go buy a 58 1.4 and then go insane trying to calibrate it like I did. atnpro wrote:
This lens seems very very sharp. Perhaps it will be able to handle even 64K video nicely. But, at the same time, too sharp for my taste.
JadedWriter wrote:
You can make a sharp lens soft, but you can't make a soft lens sharp. Go buy a 58 1.4 and then go insane trying to calibrate it like I did.
In general, I find Nikon's Z glasses are too sharp or too computerized 64K virtual reality video-look for my taste. It's as if they aren't necessarily designed for photography, but more so for video work down the road.
atnpro wrote:
In general, I find Nikon's Z glasses are too sharp or too computerized 64K virtual reality video-look for my taste. It's as if they aren't necessarily designed for photography, but more so for video work down the road.
Yes, they are optically great lenses, and can be used for photography or videography as needed.
And yes, not to everyone's liking.
saaketham wrote:
Yes, they are optically great lenses, and can be used for photography or videography as needed.
And yes, not to everyone's liking.
These lenses are not optimized for maximum sharpness, but try to put equal weight on bokeh and other qualities. This is especially true for some lenses like the 105mm f/1.4 E or the 50mm f/1.2 S, which - at that price - could actually be sharper if they were optimized for maximum sharpness. They generally do not have a particular "character", however (with at least one exception, the 58mm f/1.4 G).
For the the f/1.8 S lenses, one could argue that the compromise solution of very good sharpnees plus smooth and neutral bokeh results in some dullness of the reproduction (compared to a Zeiss Otus or Milvus, for example) - so I see why one would wish for a Leica Noctilux 50mm f/1.2 character lens with Nikon pricing. But then, you are stuck with that particular character, and it will not always give the best results in all situations.
JadedWriter wrote:
You can make a sharp lens soft, but you can't make a soft lens sharp. Go buy a 58 1.4 and then go insane trying to calibrate it like I did.
I'm not sure if it's always possible or easy to make a sharp lens soft and obtain a pleasing picture, as the softness of soft lenses is often non-standard and not easily reproducible in post-processing.
You can probably just lower the clarity and I'm pretty sure you can do this in Photoshop with some type of mask. Whatever you do it's a lot easier to to do that than it is to make something soft realistically sharp. Some people are too obsessed with green fringing character lenses, I on the other hand am not. AcuteShadows wrote:
I'm not sure if it's always possible or easy to make a sharp lens soft and obtain a pleasing picture, as the softness of soft lenses is often non-standard and not easily reproducible in post-processing.
"Whatever you now find weird, ugly, uncomfortable and nasty about a new medium will surely become its signature. CD distortion, the jitteriness of digital video, the crap sound of 8-bit - all of these will be cherished and emulated as soon as they can be avoided. It’s the sound of failure: so much modern art is the sound of things going out of control, of a medium pushing to its limits and breaking apart. The distorted guitar sound is the sound of something too loud for the medium supposed to carry it. The blues singer with the cracked voice is the sound of an emotional cry too powerful for the throat that releases it. The excitement of grainy film, of bleached-out black and white, is the excitement of witnessing events too momentous for the medium assigned to record them."
Some folks love sharpness, some love "character", some don't care as long as it takes good images, some are in between.
There's room for all of us in the world of photography.
Taking our kitten out to the Missouri River to let her explore the world outside.
NIKON Z 9NIKKOR Z 50mm f/1.2 S lens50mmf/1.41/6000s64 ISO0.0 EV
NIKON Z 9NIKKOR Z 50mm f/1.2 S lens50mmf/2.81/750s400 ISO0.0 EV
I get it. I will always defend my literal work horse lenses. saaketham wrote:
Some folks love sharpness, some love "character", some don't care as long as it takes good images, some are in between.
There's room for all of us in the world of photography.
Taking our kitten out to the Missouri River to let her explore the world outside.
I think I was agreeing with your explanation while stating why I said what I said that started that discussion. saaketham wrote:
I was replying to the poster who said z lenses are too sharp 🙂 I agree with you that any image can be softened with a few well-placed clicks.
