Just for the hey of it, I find the typoch 28mm very nice on the Fuji GFX 100ii. Though never look for absolute perfection so you may differ. I like it's colors and rendering at 35mm mode.
Overall image assessment is more a matter of the balance of character traits than perfection, you might agree. DZO wanted to engineer the cine look into Simera lenses because they knew could not approach perfection, or even the quality of high end cine lenses like their Arles range, in such small light ranges of lenses.
They had therefore to manufacture the specific look they decided on, directly into the lenses' images, whereas the super cine lenses (for example) Zeiss/Arri make are extremely neutral and ready for filters to produce the final look the artistic director wants.
We all react differently to these things, but the Simera rich warm yet realistic color palette is a big part of the look, for this purely color photographer, at least I have the impression it's not just a matter of a move along the warm/cool spectrum in post either.
The high aperture blade count will encourage a back to the future look of using mid-apertures more than with other fast lenses with tetchy blade effects. The bokeh remains very settled not just at wide open and adjacent settings like f2-f2.8, but also at f5.6-f11. It's a lot of versatility for creative imagery, other than just using T1.5.
I went out shooting this evening in San Diego Gaslamp District with some friends. I shot almost exclusively with the Simera 50mm f/1.4 ASPL. I will say that in low light, and in night light this lens is aa joy to shoot experience wise, and produces excellent results. I will have a good number of shots to share tomorrow.
This was the first shot of the evening when there still was some daylight. I shot this unposed street portrait of one of our group. Hand held at f/1.7 I think it did a wonderful job on the portrait with just the right amount of detail. Also producing nice separation and beautiful rendering of the background. This just may be my new favorite 50mm for the M.
1bwana1 wrote:
I went out shooting this evening in San Diego Gaslamp District with some friends. I shot almost exclusively with the Simera 50mm f/1.4 ASPL. I will say that in low light, and in night light this lens is aa joy to shoot experience wise, and produces excellent results. I will have a good number of shots to share tomorrow.
This was the first shot of the evening when there still was some daylight. I shot this unposed street portrait of one of our group. Hand held at f/1.7 I think it did a wonderful job on the portrait with just the right amount of detail. Also producing nice separation and beautiful rendering of the background. This just may be my new favorite 50mm for the M....Show more →
Even when stopped down to f/2.8 the Simera's 14 aperture blades keep the bokeh balls round and smooth. Not angular hexagon outlines like the Leica 50mm Summilux does. I much prefer this. The subject get a nice boost in detail and contrast stopped down just a little like this.
I'm surprised not to have read much about the beautiful packaging of these lenses. I've bought many lenses but this is quite remarkably high end: a lovely sleeved artistically decorated hinged box with slot-packed lens and hood, a stylish rubber ceiling to prevent movement, a ribbon hinge and inside a lens of fine build quality and perfect hood fit.
Almost imperceptible aperture detents, it simply exudes quality. What a fine gift it would make. It throws shade on so many others (and kudos to B&H for a four business day delivery to Australia, door to door).
philip_pj wrote:
Almost imperceptible aperture detents, it simply exudes quality.
I definitely prefer more noticeable clicks and the non-equidistant spacing exudes to me the opposite of quality.
Sadly the focus ring on my sample also doesn't feel overly tightly assembled.
The nice box sadly cannot make me overlook these things.
There is a lot to like about the Thypoch lenses, but the mechanical design needs 1-2 more iterations.
I am still happy they got rid of the useless infinity locks, maybe next generation we get a decent aperture ring
and the one after we can get rid of that unnecessary visifocus scale in favour of a better sized focus ring instead.
BastianK wrote:
I definitely prefer more noticeable clicks and the non-equidistant spacing exudes to me the opposite of quality.
Sadly the focus ring on my sample also doesn't feel overly tightly assembled.
The nice box sadly cannot make me overlook these things.
There is a lot to like about the Thypoch lenses, but the mechanical design needs 1-2 more iterations.
I am still happy they got rid of the useless infinity locks, maybe next generation we get a decent aperture ring
and the one after we can get rid of that unnecessary visifocus scale in favour of a better sized focus ring instead.
I like the scale on the Thypoch lenses; it sets them apart from other third-party options. They’ve got this unique mechanical way of doing zone focusing that I hope sticks around. With the 50mm f/1.4, I don’t use it much since the depth of field is narrow anyway, but I’m curious to try it with the Simera 28mm. I still use the depth of field scale for zone focusing and find it works well by just adding a stop to it, given that it's calibrated for the film era. Because of this, I prefer using it when shooting film.
I didn’t like the dots, but whatever Thypoch does, I hope they figure out a way to make the focus ring larger, and the focus throw longer. I also prefer regular interval half stops for aperture.
At least they got rid of the infinity lock. Still not solid economics my opinion. I am curious to try the cine version I ordered, which has a longer focus throw and no dots.
philip_pj wrote:
I'm surprised not to have read much about the beautiful packaging of these lenses. I've bought many lenses but this is quite remarkably high end: a lovely sleeved artistically decorated hinged box with slot-packed lens and hood, a stylish rubber ceiling to prevent movement, a ribbon hinge and inside a lens of fine build quality and perfect hood fit.
Almost imperceptible aperture detents, it simply exudes quality. What a fine gift it would make. It throws shade on so many others (and kudos to B&H for a four business day delivery to Australia, door to door).
The boxes that my TTArtisan 28 5.6 and Brightin Star 28 2.8 came in are simply gorgeous.
The BS lens even had a linen pouch for the lens within the box! Both are $300 lenses.
It makes me think that a nice box is not exactly hard or expensive to make.
Desmolicious wrote:
The boxes that my TTArtisan 28 5.6 and Brightin Star 28 2.8 came in are simply gorgeous.
The BS lens even had a linen pouch for the lens within the box! Both are $300 lenses.
It makes me think that a nice box is not exactly hard or expensive to make.
I actually don't want any of the crap- The old Leica lenses that came in these massive boxes, or the MP's in these things with drawers etc.
No need for all that excess. Just securely wrap the lens and ship it to me
RustyRus wrote:
I actually don't want any of the crap- The old Leica lenses that came in these massive boxes, or the MP's in these things with drawers etc.
No need for all that excess. Just securely wrap the lens and ship it to me
Agreed. The way Leica packages many of its cameras is bizarre. It’s almost as if they designed it for one of those youtube unpackaging videos!
The one good thing about the new M6 is it shows up in a small hard shell plastic case. That’s it. No extra junk. The other film Ms still come in that excessive multi layered hidden compartments extravaganza.
Desmolicious wrote:
Agreed. The way Leica packages many of its cameras is bizarre. It’s almost as if they designed it for one of those youtube unpackaging videos!
The one good thing about the new M6 is it shows up in a small hard shell plastic case. That’s it. No extra junk. The other film Ms still come in that excessive multi layered hidden compartments extravaganza.
Most of my Cameras and lenses never see their boxes again until the day I sell them. Too busy shooting them. Nice solid packaging is good enough for me.
It's a non sequitur, isn't it, Steve? We take what we get in this low end corporate world. ALL my lens boxes are stored away, even the ones that look they contain a game boy device. I see it as a service to the next owner since we are just caretakers of long life equipment.
Zeiss never did anything like this, and now Cosina jams some folding paper in the store standard box to buffer the lens, lol. And the cheapest plastic wrap and cradle available to them.
And it's important also in psychology some may not understand. It shows you they care about their product and they care about the protection in transit of the expensive item, and beginning of their relationship.
Would you rather buy a ring for your wife that came in an industrial foam-filled, thin cardboard Zeiss box, or this lovely and durable Thypoch presentation standard box? Rhetorical question, I already know the answer. As with clothes, paintwork, wood and upholstery, presentation is a strong indicator of the quality of the contents. Aesthetics matter, unless you are cutting corners of course.
BastianK wrote:
I definitely prefer more noticeable clicks and the non-equidistant spacing exudes to me the opposite of quality.
Sadly the focus ring on my sample also doesn't feel overly tightly assembled.
The nice box sadly cannot make me overlook these things.
There is a lot to like about the Thypoch lenses, but the mechanical design needs 1-2 more iterations.
I am still happy they got rid of the useless infinity locks, maybe next generation we get a decent aperture ring
and the one after we can get rid of that unnecessary visifocus scale in favour of a better sized focus ring instead.
It's interesting how subjective the perception of quality is to each of us. The almost silky smooth, ball-bearing like quality of the aperture detents on my copy of the Thypoch Simera 50 1.4 exude a sense of precision and quality for me. The detents are just noticeable enough in use for me that they are pretty much perfect, giving just the right amount of tactile feedback. I would prefer half stops over the entire range though.
The focus ring on my copy feels right with just enough resistance (your experience does make me wonder about quality control). I would however prefer a longer focus throw. The vintage Alpa depth of field indicator method matters little to me, particularly with the 50. Perhaps more useful with wider lenses, though I would suspect one would need to be very conservative in it's use with high MP digital.
The packaging presentation is a nice first impression imo, though as others have mentioned, I have been similarly impressed by other offerings from TTArtisan with less expensive lenses.
