Thanks for the adapter pics Marc. The main difference I see with the Chinese made Nikon-EOS adapters are:
1. Some have a cutout on the edge that is painted red for lens alignment. Others forego the slit and have a round red dot on the flat surface.
2. Some have spring clips like you post, others have slotted rails, like most other XX-EOS (and the Fotodiox) adapters have.
Your adapter is the same as mine (painted cutout, spring clips; often referred to as 'F-S' becuase package labled as such). I bought mine from a USA guy - maybe it was an earlier batch. Not only was infinity way off, but the left side was soft on every lens I tested with it. Could be a reason to buy directly from China - you get the latest production which may have worked out some issues.
shot same scene with canon 24-105 lens also..it seems to be a good one prety sharp all the way to the edges so thats good but thought I'd post lower left comparisons between the zeiss and the canon at 35mm:
So..whatever the veracity of my testing..this is as controled as I get what are my thoughts on the zeiss lens.
Well I love the way it works..really smooth focussing and very well made..feels good to use it.
Personally I like manual focus lenses..I prefer the way it slows me down and returns me to the craft of picture taking..what these primes are used for and this is a wonderfull example of this to use.
I think I have got the adapter sorted out..see other thread..but what of the image quality.
the previous shots on the sunny day had a really nice look and feel to them which I think is important for this type of use.
it seems to be really nice and sharp all along the edges and even into the corners..certainly at F8 where I will use it most and less so as you go down but still very good i think...more so than I remember my contax zeiss 35mm was.
the ca is certainly worse than the canon zoom..how is it on the canon primes I wonder?..as this 35mm prime will be used for interiors / exteriors so the less ca the better.
So I prefer the primes as it makes me work as I like but is the image quality better to justify the expense of this over the canon zoom..and if so as most say the canon 35mm L prime is better than their zooms then I can assume the canon prime to be equal to the zeiss then which of those is the better option..the zeiss for the manual focus feel etc or the canon prime for ease of use (no stop down focussing) which would give more shooting flexibility.
So I do not doubt at 24mm a prime (zeiss zf / canon L etc) will be much better than the canon zoom but at 35mm..I am not completely convinced yet.
Compared to the canon zoom the difference in image quality does not seem as big as I would have expected..for me though I could not say a definate until I have shot with both in good light with a subject with mixed distant infinity focussed and closer subject matter at F8 / F11 and printed corner and central crops of a 16x12 and 24x20 print to really see the value of this lens.
so this morning I shot another test image to compare the zeiss zf 35mm on canon 1ds against my canon 24-105 zoom..this is shot in the way I would use this lens.(note they are both resized to 50mb)
I am only posting centre crop as the cotner comparisons were posted yesterday:
tripod
mirror up
shutter release
F8
distant and middle distance subject in same frame
great light
raw
processed in C1
soft look sharpening in C1
unsharp mask in PS (amount 60%, radius 1 pixel, threshold 4..for those that want to know):
sized upto to 50Mb
saved jpeg 5 to fit here
I don't think the Zeiss looks as sharp as it should at F8. Actually looks like its slightly out of focus. But then I don't see where it is actually sharp anywhere in the frame so it just looks soft compared to the Canon. I would have expected better from the Zeiss.
By the way, Have you examined the Zeiss file on the far left and right to see if its sharper than the Canon at closer distances? Perhaps you missed focus on the Zeiss?
the shots from yesterday.non sunny with plants, pots, etc..are with focus about 2 metres away so they should show the corners of both lenses..my shots from a few days ago show the lower, middel and uppe strips of the zeiss and do show very good sharpness across the whole frame especailly at F8 and to my eyes not much softening into the corners.
with both lenses I did a few shots so I could select the sharpest..autofocus on the canon produced the same on each version, on the zeiss there wer no differences I coudl make out..in todays shots both lenses were focussed on the buildings in the centre of the images...about 25 metres away from the camera.
