I did some simple AF tests last night on the Z9 running 3.10, asking my daughter to run towards me in our poorly lit living room at night.
100% of the images were tack sharp on the eyes at f1.2 up to about 1m from me. Clearly better than what I am typically getting from the 50mm f1.2 S in similar conditions.
PeteStewardson wrote:
OK so no idea what was going on with the lens yesterday, focus was all over the place. Today I have had zero issues with focus, and the only thing that changed was I took out the memory card to get photos off yesterday, and took the lens off the body and put it back on this morning. Not having any inconsistency issues at all today. In fact, I think this is about to replace the cream machine as my favourite lens ever.
Maybe yesterday was nerves on first night of the honeymoon. Looks pretty good today, keep 'em coming!
rene descartes wrote:
There's nothing sharp in any of these photos at f/1.2.
If you compare it to the Canon RF 85mm f/1.2, this lens is just ... well piss poor. Even 3 .years later.
The sharpness isn't there at the focal point (which could be from the poor autofocus on the Z series rather than the lens). The rendering of the out of focus areas isn't smooth at all compared to the Canon. The images don't pop at all. They're lifeless.
Another clinical Chinese lens from Nikon.
What a shame.
I am glad you enjoy your Canon lens. It is a good solid 3.5 star lens:
A quick walk in a park this morning before going to work. Nothing much but I just wanted to test AF and check bokeh a bit more. All shot wide opened with Z9.
https://morboi.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/NZ9_2604.jpg
I was shooting this at 3fps and got off 9 shots. I was in wide area-S with auto subject detection (not animal detection) and 6/9 were in focus. The other 3 was in the middle of the sequence I think when the bird was off focus area and the camera picked up the bird again when I got the bird back in focus area. I was not expecting to see a bird on my path. I think with wide area-L and animal detection, keeper rate should be even better.
Had a quick few goes with my black Labrador running towards me. She’s a Labrador and I’m not a rabbit so it was more a mid paced cantor than a sprint towards me but at 1.2 out of a 10fps 3 second burst of her coming towards me I’d say 24 were in focus, 3 maybe slightly back focused but eyes still in focus, and 3 missed. At 1.2 that’s shockingly good tbh.
Sharpness wide open looks good to me. I do really like the rendering. Optically it looks like a wonderful addition to the Z ecosystem. I expect that it will build a good following among Z system portrait photographers.
It does look huge to me. But I don't think photographers buying into the Z system are looking for small and lite.
Congratulations on your new lens guys. Enjoy it. I am looking forward to seeing many more images posted.
P.S. like Scott I prefer EXIF data to be exposed. But if that is not your style post it your way. I am in California we are a bit more liberal than Texas out here.
Mar 26, 2023 at 06:35 AM
Steve Spencer Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: On
1bwana1 wrote:
Sharpness wide open looks good to me. I do really like the rendering. Optically it looks like a wonderful addition to the Z ecosystem. I expect that it will build a good following among Z system portrait photographers.
It does look huge to me. But I don't think photographers buying into the Z system are looking for small and lite.
Congratulations on your new lens guys. Enjoy it. I am looking forward to seeing many more images posted.
P.S. like Scott I prefer EXIF data to be exposed. But if that is not your style post it your way. I am in California we are a bit more liberal than Texas out here....Show more →
I think that some photographers buying into the Z system do and will want small and light. If they want small and light, however, they aren't going to be able to get f/1.2 lenses for the Z system. Not from Nikon, anyway. The 50 f/1.2 and 85 f/1.2 are big lenses, but both have really nice performance. If you want small and light on the Z system you will pick the f/1.8S lenses or if you want very small and light you will pick Nikon's compact primes which are tiny.
Vento wrote:
You can always go the manual focus route, if you want it both, small and fast.
CV 40mm f/1.2 Nokton Aspherical Z, CV 50mm f/1 Nokton Aspherical Z.
I have the CV and no. Special lens below 2 and very nice above 2.8, but it cannot compare with the 50Z 1.2 (or the 1.8)
I never said that either.
It's the option for those who still want compactness with super fast glass.
There is no question that there are compromises, if you want to stay compact with very fast glass.
Apart from that, the two CV 40/1.2 and CV 50 f/1 are not really comparable, correspondingly far apart in price the latter is.
Steve Spencer wrote:
I think that some photographers buying into the Z system do and will want small and light. If they want small and light, however, they aren't going to be able to get f/1.2 lenses for the Z system. Not from Nikon, anyway. The 50 f/1.2 and 85 f/1.2 are big lenses, but both have really nice performance. If you want small and light on the Z system you will pick the f/1.8S lenses or if you want very small and light you will pick Nikon's compact primes which are tiny.
The simple and obvious solution is to adapt whatever more compact f1.2 lens Sony would release. Adapters work amazingly well nowadays with excellent AF performance.
Way better than what many Canon shooters who added Sony bodies to their line up for pro use used to experience with their EF lenses.
This is a key value of the Z mount.
As a Sony user if you need a top quality 85mm f1.2 with good AF you are out of luck, there simply isn’t any solution but to buy a Z9.
bernardl wrote:
The simple and obvious solution is to adapt whatever more compact f1.2 lens Sony would release. Adapters work amazingly well nowadays with excellent AF performance.
Way better than what many Canon shooters who added Sony bodies to their line up for pro use used to experience with their EF lenses.
This is a key value of the Z mount.
As a Sony user if you need a top quality 85mm f1.2 with good AF you are out of luck, there simply isn’t any solution but to buy a Z9.
I totally agree with this. I have adapted several Sony lenses to Nikon Z and they do adapt quite well.
bernardl wrote:
The simple and obvious solution is to adapt whatever more compact f1.2 lens Sony would release. Adapters work amazingly well nowadays with excellent AF performance.
Way better than what many Canon shooters who added Sony bodies to their line up for pro use used to experience with their EF lenses.
This is a key value of the Z mount.
As a Sony user if you need a top quality 85mm f1.2 with good AF you are out of luck, there simply isn’t any solution but to buy a Z9.
Yes, I used Sony 14/1.8 a bit with Z7 ii. I was using Sony 85/1.4GM as well. But now with 85/1.2S, I won't need to use the Sony anymore. May be fun to compare the two one of these days.
1bwana1 wrote:
The Sony 85mm f/1.2 GM is scheduled for release shortly. If it matches the superb Sony 50mm f/1.2 GM then everyone will be happy.
While complaining that Sony body is not big enough for my hands, at least Sony is trying to address that by coming out with
smaller, lighter high performance lens in the last several years. Unlike initially when Sony was releasing monstrous 50/1.4, 35/1.4, 85/14 that was trying to outdo Sigma Art line with less ergonomic bodies. That really put me off Sony lenses a lot and I ended using my Sony with Leica and other manual AF lenses more and more. When I can't deal with bigger heavier bodies and lenses anymore, it will be nice to have Sony as an option
Not concern about what C or S are doing. I'm having a conflict on which N top portrait lens to use!! They are so good.
I will need to do more shooting with this 85mm. Been waiting for a 85mm f1.2 from Nikon it for 20 years. So far, the 85mm is much more friendly indoor as expected.
This is the real cats eye bokeh. Driveitputtit wrote:
FedEx dropped mine off today. Too much work to do to get outside, but here's the obligatory wide open cat pic.
