I ordered the lens and received it just before leaving on a long trip to Europe. A very interesting lens indeed, as expected some difficulties when using at 1.2 aperture, notably lack of depth of field, but otherwise a fun experience. A first batch of pictures from a brief stop in Paris: https://www.lamanchatx.com/Travel-Photography/2025-Paris
I just picked up a perfect used copy of this lens for my new (to me) R6 II. Yes, it's an imperfect lens by many measures, and yes, there are some scenarios where things can get a bit wild, but overall, I'm actually rather impressed. In the majority of the testing scenarios I've done, it produces quite a lovely rendering, and it's actually quite sharp over most of the frame from wide open. Sure, the edges and corners get smeary from coma at f/1.2, but in the vast majority of situations where I'd be shooting at f/1.2, that is a non-issue.
Here's just a quick shot of my cat at f/1.2 (and of course the Eye AF nailed it):
Pixelpuffin wrote:
Those saying the edges are soft?
That wouldn't be the case using crop bodies… would it?
A 72mm 1.2 prime does sound interesting.
I often used the 40stm on my SL1
I found using that combination was easier than either the 24stm or 35mm.
With the crop sensor you avoid the outer parts of the field of view. But as your pixels are smaller, a 24Mp crop corresponds to a 61Mp FF sensor, your sensor is more demanding, i.e. it shows more of any imperfections within its view. It´s mostly a win in my experience, which does not include this particular lens.
Someone who remembers how the f-value changes with the crop sensor shall enlighten us about that issue.
The f-value itself doesn’t change at all. It’s still a 45mm f/1.2 lens. It will have the field of view and depth of field a 72mm f/1.9 lens on full frame but the aperture doesn’t actually change.
Jman13 wrote:
The f-value itself doesn’t change at all. It’s still a 45mm f/1.2 lens. It will have the field of view and depth of field a 72mm f/1.9 lens on full frame but the aperture doesn’t actually change.
Exactly. In terms of light gathering, it's an f/1.2. The math to calculate the f/stop does not change.
But the depth of field and field of view are as you stated.
Z250SA wrote:
With the crop sensor you avoid the outer parts of the field of view. But as your pixels are smaller, a 24Mp crop corresponds to a 61Mp FF sensor, your sensor is more demanding, i.e. it shows more of any imperfections within its view. It´s mostly a win in my experience, which does not include this particular lens.
Someone who remembers how the f-value changes with the crop sensor shall enlighten us about that issue.
Can you explain how you got the 61mp FF equivalent please?
61/1.6 =38
I guess I’m wrong? Can someone enlighten me please?
Tom_W wrote:
Exactly. In terms of light gathering, it's an f/1.2. The math to calculate the f/stop does not change.
But the depth of field and field of view are as you stated.
Also keep in mind that FF sensor have less noise at higher ISO, so a 45 f/1.2 lens shot on an APS-C sensor camera will have the field of view and depth of field of a 72 f/1.9 lens and the noise of a FF camera with the ISO turned up a stop and a third.
Tom_W wrote:
Exactly. In terms of light gathering, it's an f/1.2. The math to calculate the f/stop does not change.
But the depth of field and field of view are as you stated.
Depends on what you mean by "light gathering". For the same scene and shutter speed, f/1.2 on FF will put 2.5x more light on the sensor than it will on crop whereas at f/1.9 on FF the same amount of light would be projected on the sensor as f/1.2 on crop. However, as the FF sensor has 2.5x the area, the amount of light per area (exposure) will be less at f/1.9 than f/1.2. With regards to the ISO setting, then, it's the amount of light per area that matters, not the total amount of light on the sensor. But with regards to noise, what matters is the total amount of light on the sensor, not the amount of light per area (regardless of the ISO setting). Thus, for a given scene and shutter speed, we'd use a different ISO setting at f/1.9 on FF than we would at f/1.2 on crop (since the light per area on the sensor would be different), but the noise would be the same (because the total amount of light on the sensor would be the same, assuming the sensors are comparable with how they process the light on them).
takowasa wrote:
Depends on what you mean by "light gathering". For the same scene and shutter speed, f/1.2 on FF will put 2.5x more light on the sensor than it will on crop. However, the FF sensor has 2.5x the area, so the amount of light per area will be the same. With regards to the ISO setting, then, it's the amount of light per area that matters, not the total amount of light on the sensor. But with regards to noise, what matters is the total amount of light on the sensor, not the amount of light per area (regardless of the ISO setting). Thus, for a given scene and shutter speed, we'd use a different ISO setting at f/1.9 on FF than we would at f/1.2 on crop (since the light per area on the sensor would be different), but the noise would be the same (because the total amount of light on the sensor would be the same)....Show more →
This is correct as long as the sensors are equally good at coverting light to a digital signal with similar noise. It will be completely true when cropping the same sensor to a smaller part of that sensor. It won't be true when comparing modern sensor to older sensors before the technology matured or when comparing sensors that convert light to digital signal in different ways (e.g., CMOS to CCD, or CMOS to Foveon).
