eeprete
Offline
• • • •
Upload & Sell: Off
|
As an early adopter of this lens, I want to love this lens in every way possible. After all, when spending $1500 of my hard earned money, I expect a significant return on "investment" and expect exceptional results "out of the box" (as I am sure many others do too). There is nothing that can make you feel worse than having to take you two day old Mercedes in because the steering is out of alignment, so with premium products (and prices), we've all rightfully come to expect premium quality with no exceptions to the rule.
However, as I have used this lens over the last several days, I have learned just how hard it is a lens to control (seems harder than even my 85L to me). Depth of field at 1.2 is so thin on subjects that it can make one's success rate question their photographic skill, and in turn also question their purchase I am sure. Without a doubt, some of this too, has resulted in the typical "questionable QC" and "is it $1300 better" questions that seem to have overrun this thread and others elsewhere.
Truth be told, even I (who has no problem dropping any coin on anything "I want") had some similar feelings over the last few days. As a result, I forced myself to use my 50/1.4 exclusively one night this week and for Christmas Eve, and I then shot exclusively with my 50/1.2 today, Christmas Day. While my results and report are not nearly as extensive as W. Castleman's, I hope my perspective can offer some insight to those that are on the fence about this lens as this is simply a real world test, where I can't control every aspect of every shot.
As I said in a prior post, build quality is excellent, and what we should rightfully expect. Optically, it too is excellent, however can be very difficult to control. Although there are posts that can attest to this lenses sharpness with static subjects, when dealing with people (and especially infants that won't stand still), the focal plane is so shallow that the slightest movement will give you OOF images that will simply get deleted and leave you banging your head against the wall. To use this lens for it's real intent and purpose, you will likely need a lot of patience or some very still subjects (even with AI servo, it was a challenge).
I still stand by my opinion that the 1.2 is a better lens. I don't think it's $1300 better, heck I don't even think it's $900 better, but it IS better. But if I want better than my 1.4 I dont have another other choice, do I? But in a strange and peculiar way, I don't mind the pricetag as I know I've spent more on worse things in life (like I tell my wife, I don't drink, I don't smoke, this is my vice. heck, I even frequently pack lunch).
Anyway, here are a few shots over the last several days of my 11 month old daughter whom staying still is not an option. Whether you like the images or not, or think they are good or think they are @#$, I am hoping these offer others some insight and an objective comparison to how each can perform in a real world scenario.
(Please bear in mind all posted images might even be a tad softer than what they really are as my image processing script I have on my site softens images ever so slightly).
In order they are:
50/1.2 at 1.2
50/1.2 at 1.6
50/1.4 at 1.4
50/1.4 at 2.2
http://www.pretedesign.com/data/images/gallery_images/user_id_10/HG9Q3569.xxl.jpg
http://www.pretedesign.com/data/images/gallery_images/user_id_10/HG9Q3556.xxl.jpg
http://www.pretedesign.com/data/images/gallery_images/user_id_10/HG9Q3120.xxl.jpg
http://www.pretedesign.com/data/images/gallery_images/user_id_10/HG9Q3133.xxl.jpg
|
