p.1 #1 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
I have the canon 35mm F1.8, its a fun little lens to travel with; but After getting 85mm F1.2, I was blown away by how much better it was than 85mm F2;
Based on popular sentiment, the Canon 35mm F1.4 VCM is only a marginal upgrade over the 35 1.8; But the current previews of the Ziess are showing it to be an pretty incredible lens; I have never used a manual focus lens, so that is a bit concerning; I mostly do wildlife so am a bit concerned with manual focus would work well enough in a dynamic situation. Thoughts?
p.1 #2 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
I very recently bought a used Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 T* Planar ZE lens--the original one for EF mount. I was curious to try a manual focus lens. With my EOS R's focusing aids, it's quite easy to use. The aids include a handy focus guide, focus peaking and the option to go to 100% magnification if you need to zoom in. I believe that if you've got a newer camera than the EOS R, you can also use manual focus with eye tracking, that way the camera handles the tracking while you do the focusing. I'm not sure about that, but I think I've read that somewhere. I haven't attempted it in any really dynamic situations, but I've found the experience to be very pleasant. I would go so far as to say that the lens is a joy to use!
I think manual focus works well for some people, and less so for others. I can see how it might be frustrating. I'd think twice about going manual if you think dynamic situations might be the default. There is a good reason why the Flickr groups for these manual focus lenses are full of static subjects.
p.1 #3 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
Considering... Ordered the day it was announced.
As to your query I would not recommend trying to learn manual focus by starting with an expensive Otus lens especially when you say dynamic situations. If you want to try then do as bcguy did with a more reasonably priced lens.
Although one can shoot dynamic situations even with focus aids you will find more missed shots than nailed shots. Unless the wildlife is stationary you will have to quickly adjust your focus, or use focus trap shooting where you prefocus and when the wildlife enters that area you take the shot. Again you will have many missed shots.
Although I use many manual focus lenses if I am shooting dynamic wildlife I will reach for an AF lens unless I don't have any with me then I will use what I have use best practices and hope for the best.
Mar 04, 2026 at 02:51 PM
Steve Spencer Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: On
p.1 #4 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
burningheart wrote:
Considering... Ordered the day it was announced.
As to your query I would not recommend trying to learn manual focus by starting with an expensive Otus lens especially when you say dynamic situations. If you want to try then do as bcguy did with a more reasonably priced lens.
Although one can shoot dynamic situations even with focus aids you will find more missed shots than nailed shots. Unless the wildlife is stationary you will have to quickly adjust your focus, or use focus trap shooting where you prefocus and when the wildlife enters that area you take the shot. Again you will have many missed shots.
Although I use many manual focus lenses if I am shooting dynamic wildlife I will reach for an AF lens unless I don't have any with me then I will use what I have use best practices and hope for the best. ...Show more →
I am considering it. I like manual focus lenses and this one looks interesting and a top performer. It isn't high on my list, however, because of its size and I can get the Voigtlander 40 f/1.2 that is much smaller and still and excellent performing lens. I might get it in five years or so. I will probably get the Canon EF 35 f/1.4L II, which I did have for awhile and liked very much, and then only add the Otus ML 35 to replace either the Voigtlander 40 f/1.2 or the Canon EF 35 f/1.4L II>
p.1 #5 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
Starting with manual focus with a cheaper lens is good advise. It just might not be your thing. It is very much much easier with the mirrorless bodies than with DSLR´s, yes. And with experience it becomes a natural. But only if you like it, the Craft.
I have well over 30 MF lenses, mostly Contax, Hasselblads and Zeiss ZE´s. Love the colour and rendering. Some of the Contaxes are simply bad on our modern demanding sensors, some really good. There is a benefit to the very best lenses, the lenses with most everything corrected. The field of sharp focus becomes very visible in the viewfinder compared to lesser lenses.
I got my first, and likely last, Otus, the 100/1.4, a year ago. Looking at the sharp focus plowing through the landscape is stunning in the viewfinders of the R5 and R52, but even in the 5DsR. The same goes for the otusesque 135/2 Aposonnar and the Milvus 35/1.4 too to a degree. It might be easier to find love for the MF world with a close to perfect lens. From this PoV the new Otus 35 might be a nice choice indeed.
The most important aspect of MF to me is that it slows me down. After a while I relax, start to See, Hear, Feel. Very refreshing once in a while as fast action AF with long zooms tend to be where I find myself, BIF, DIF, 30fps... MF is medicine, good medicine! Photography can be so much more that getting nice images with some luck. It can be a better Life, put both simply and correctly. MF provides that to me.
p.1 #6 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
Z250SA wrote:
The most important aspect of MF to me is that it slows me down. After a while I relax, start to See, Hear, Feel.
Yeah, I really like this.
As someone who learned on manual focus gear, there was a certain "flow" that has always been missing for me in the autofocus era.
It's hard to explain, but I found that acquiring focus manually off the focusing screen engaged a different part of my brain that did not fight with the part that was concerned about subject and composition. I could follow focus almost intuitively while paying attention to the subject.
By contrast, the cognitive load required to think about and manage active AF points and/or tracking modes and worrying about whether the camera is focusing on the right place seems to frequently get in the way of that for me.
Maybe this is just nostalgia. But I think sometimes it would be fun to go buy a 5D Mark II, install the Canon Super Precision Matte Eg-S interchangeable focusing screen that I still own, and use it to focus the old fashioned way: by eye! I know Canon's EVF manual focusing aids are fantastic and more accurate, but something appeals to me about the simplicity of the old school OVF approach.
Mar 04, 2026 at 07:12 PM
AmbientMike Offline • • • • • • [X]
p.1 #7 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
thedutt wrote:
I have the canon 35mm F1.8, its a fun little lens to travel with; but After getting 85mm F1.2, I was blown away by how much better it was than 85mm F2;
Based on popular sentiment, the Canon 35mm F1.4 VCM is only a marginal upgrade over the 35 1.8; But the current previews of the Ziess are showing it to be an pretty incredible lens; I have never used a manual focus lens, so that is a bit concerning; I mostly do wildlife so am a bit concerned with manual focus would work well enough in a dynamic situation. Thoughts?
35/1.4 VCM in focus beats Zeiss oof I'd bet
The Canon actually looked quite good on Opticallimits test. People complained about distortion but 3-4% not unheard of on film lenses, even, and isn't bad in the era of computational imaging
p.1 #8 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
bcguy wrote:
I very recently bought a used Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 T* Planar ZE lens--the original one for EF mount. I was curious to try a manual focus lens. With my EOS R's focusing aids, it's quite easy to use. The aids include a handy focus guide, focus peaking and the option to go to 100% magnification if you need to zoom in. I believe that if you've got a newer camera than the EOS R, you can also use manual focus with eye tracking, that way the camera handles the tracking while you do the focusing. I'm not sure about that, but I think I've read that somewhere. I haven't attempted it in any really dynamic situations, but I've found the experience to be very pleasant. I would go so far as to say that the lens is a joy to use!
I think manual focus works well for some people, and less so for others. I can see how it might be frustrating. I'd think twice about going manual if you think dynamic situations might be the default. There is a good reason why the Flickr groups for these manual focus lenses are full of static subjects....Show more →
I have the same lens bought over 17 years ago. It was challenging to use with the 2008 EOS 5D Mark II and even with the 2015 EOS 5Ds R.
With RF bodies like the bcguy's EOS R and R1, R5 Mark II & R7 it's a wonder of an EF mount manual lens to use.
Be aware that the EOS RP and R100 do not have the processing power or firmware implementation for the "three-triangle" Focus Guide.
At over 42% of the original $1799 MSRP from 3 years ago... it's something to consider considering it appears to be the most desirable 3rd party manual focus RF mount lens.
p.1 #9 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
The 35 1.8, I found to be barely usable at times and a frustrating experience (along with the 50 1.8 and other stm Canon lenses). Horrible stm motors that shuddered and hunt on multiple r series bodies. I tried 3 copies. Bad fringing too. But for $250 used...not bad.
The VCM 35 1.4 I have a hard time imagining it's not leaps and bounds better? Never had anything but basically perfect results with L series VCM RF glass.
p.1 #11 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
The catch with getting a 'cheap' manual focus lens to practice on the R system is that in order to use the 'three triangle' focusing aid (the best option over peaking and magnification if you want focus precision while still being able to view the entire image area), the lens has to be chipped EF mount adapted to RF, or native chipped RF mount. This pretty much limits you to Zeiss ZE lenses and the handful of recent Zeiss Otus ML and Voigtlander lenses released in RF mount.
Another somewhat more niche option is the new Shoten Kobo LM-CR-M-E adapter. It's Leica M to Canon RF, chipped. I just got one and it indeed will bring up the 'three triangle' manual focus aid with my R5II and any non-chipped M mount lens. Because it's Leica M to Canon RF, you can also adapt many SLR system lenses to it with a second adapter. For example, Nikon F to Leica M on top of the Shoten adapter. You can program up to 10 'slots' in the adapter's memory for your most used lenses, which will relay focal length information to the camera for proper IBIS implementation and also save the custom lens name to EXIF for later reference purposes.
It's a slightly clunky process with how you switch between lenses in the adapter's memory, but options are limited for Canon RF mount and this is the first chipped adapter that will bring up the 'three triangles' manual focus assist feature.
If you haven't seen it, the 2026 CP+ Voigtlander speculation thread over on the Alt board has some early impressions about the Zeiss 35/1.4 Otus ML from a couple FMers who were at CP+ last week. This thread by Juha specifically, has a link to full-resolution sample images: https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1884379/18#16994362
At over 42% of the original $1799 MSRP from 3 years ago... it's something to consider considering it appears to be the most desirable 3rd party manual focus RF mount lens....Show more →
Thanks - very helpful; I will be in Japan in June, so its tempting to considering buying there, but given the warranty issues,I suspect I will end up paying the US premium.
p.1 #13 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
bcguy wrote:
I very recently bought a used Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 T* Planar ZE lens--the original one for EF mount. I was curious to try a manual focus lens. With my EOS R's focusing aids, it's quite easy to use. The aids include a handy focus guide, focus peaking and the option to go to 100% magnification if you need to zoom in. I believe that if you've got a newer camera than the EOS R, you can also use manual focus with eye tracking, that way the camera handles the tracking while you do the focusing. I'm not sure about that, but I think I've read that somewhere. I haven't attempted it in any really dynamic situations, but I've found the experience to be very pleasant. I would go so far as to say that the lens is a joy to use!
I think manual focus works well for some people, and less so for others. I can see how it might be frustrating. I'd think twice about going manual if you think dynamic situations might be the default. There is a good reason why the Flickr groups for these manual focus lenses are full of static subjects....Show more →
Thanks - I am looking for something to complement my 85mm for wider situations and hoping to find something that gives just as remarkable a rendering; The rest I can learn and grow into and given so many here being able to use MF lenses well, I am confident that if I get it, I can get quite familiar with it over time.
Mar 05, 2026 at 10:09 AM
AmbientMike Offline • • • • • • [X]
p.1 #14 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
My opinion for years has been that optical purity mf lenses aren't going to be better optically if you miss focus.
One example, one of my OM Zuiko 50/1.8's really good, better than EF 50/1.8 II. I mostly used the 50/1.8 II, though because it had af, and if you miss, there goes the advantage, I'd bet. Besides the 50/1.8 II a good lens anyway
I use mf all the time, but 35/1.4 seems like more of a wedding and event lens. Id rather have af for that. Granted , if you're going to do mf, years ago it seemed like the better the lens the easier to focus, not gonna be as fast as the af lens, though
p.1 #15 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
thedutt wrote:
Based on popular sentiment, the Canon 35mm F1.4 VCM is only a marginal upgrade over the 35 1.8... Thoughts?
I guess I would say, be sure to contextualize the "popular sentiment".
The major issues that critics have with this lens are vignetting and heavy distortion. The distortion is so pronounced that Canon forces digital corrections on for this lens in camera and in DPP. By contrast, the Sony’s 35mm F1.4 GM and the Canon EF 35mm F1.4L II have next to no distortion.
Of course, the added context here is that the digital corrections are an intentional part of the optical formula; the lens is actually designed wider than 35mm to account for the FOV compression after corrections. This is done, presumably, to achieve certain other goals Canon had for this lens like a specific size (all the VCM primes share basically the same external housing) and minimal focus breathing.
Regardless: the end results, after corrections are applied, are still excellent, despite what "theoretical losses" should exist. I mentioned this on another thread, but this lens measures a bit better in the corners wide open than even the EF 35mm f/1.4L II, once considered a gold standard.
So, depending on whether you are a "lens purist" or not, you may feel differently about this lens. I am sure this is what accounts for the mixed reviews.
Leaving distortion aside for a moment, in other areas this lens is a vast improvement over the RF 35mm f/1.8 STM: internal focusing, robust mechanical build, weather sealing, lightning fast AF, etc.
So, if you are curious, maybe try to rent one or get one on loan from CPS to see for yourself if it meets your needs. The Zeiss is no doubt amazing, but the ability for a lens to autofocus when you need it to is a rather significant feature.
Mar 05, 2026 at 10:42 AM
AmbientMike Offline • • • • • • [X]
p.1 #16 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
The distortion complaints seem ridiculous to me. UWA zooms like 17-40, 16-35/4, and 16-35 III have close to the same distortion on the wide end, 3-4% range. My understanding is that's correctable
Some of the Sony zooms are close to 9% (!!!) on part of the range. So complaining about -3.86% as many lens corrections as there are, makes little sense
Opticallimits test of the 35/1.4 makes it look like possibly the best out there, for sharpness, assuming using af.
p.1 #17 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
thedutt wrote:
Thanks - very helpful; I will be in Japan in June, so its tempting to considering buying there, but given the warranty issues,I suspect I will end up paying the US premium.
Have you used your US warranty in the last decade or within the 2020s?
Is out of warranty repair for grey units vs US units the same?
If I was still shooting birds I'd save bundle getting a RF 1200mm f/8L IS USM in JP
p.1 #18 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
AmbientMike wrote:
The distortion complaints seem ridiculous to me. UWA zooms like 17-40, 16-35/4, and 16-35 III have close to the same distortion on the wide end, 3-4% range. My understanding is that's correctable
Some of the Sony zooms are close to 9% (!!!) on part of the range. So complaining about -3.86% as many lens corrections as there are, makes little sense
Opticallimits test of the 35/1.4 makes it look like possibly the best out there, for sharpness, assuming using af.
I think you and I are on the same side with regards to this lens. But that said, the distortion is not insignificant. I am not sure what it is in percentage terms, but this image from Dustin Abbott's review of this lens shows the uncorrected vs. corrected results:
This is far beyond what has traditionally been normal for a 35mm focal length design. So, I think that it's fair that some people might see this and be critical.
I don’t know what is going on over at Canon, but it seems like their engineers have just given up on trying to correction distortion optically. I have been shocked by how much distortion has been left in their lenses to be cleaned up by software…and that has included a number of L series lenses
I don't know if his opinion has changed since then. Other makers are also relying on computational imaging in their lens designs and perhaps he views this as a more acceptable practice today (or maybe not!).
In any case, the only thing I really take issue with is when people characterize this is being a "flaw" or Canon being "cheap" rather than an intentional design choice. You can still dislike this modern approach without claiming the lens is poorly designed.
p.1 #19 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
The problem with this much distortion correction, is that the corners never really sharpen up...
Mar 05, 2026 at 03:02 PM
AmbientMike Offline • • • • • • [X]
p.1 #20 · New Ziess RF 35mm F1.4 Lens - anyone considering it
garyvot wrote:
I think you and I are on the same side with regards to this lens. But that said, the distortion is not insignificant. I am not sure what it is in percentage terms, but this image from Dustin Abbott's review of this lens shows the uncorrected vs. corrected results:
This is far beyond what has traditionally been normal for a 35mm focal length design. So, I think that it's fair that some people might see this and be critical.
I don't know if his opinion has changed since then. Other makers are also relying on computational imaging in their lens designs and perhaps he views this as a more acceptable practice today (or maybe not!).
In any case, the only thing I really take issue with is when people characterize this is being a "flaw" or Canon being "cheap" rather than an intentional design choice. You can still dislike this modern approach without claiming the lens is poorly designed.
It's -3.86% according to optical limits vs -3.56% on the 16-35 III. And close to 9% on the 20-70 & 16-35/4 Sony.
Yes it looks really bad in a test chart, but I don't consider this amount of distortion to be that big of a deal. The EF 35/1.4 II has very low distortion if thats what someone wants, <1%. I like Dustin Abbott's reviews but dont agree with everything he says, especially in this case he has gone too far imo
I'm not sure what system people are going to shoot, these days, if they have issues with 3-4% distortion.
