Nah, I found 3 of them a couple of weeks ago at on line camera stores in the used dept. Also they sell regularly on ebay.
Alf Beharie wrote:
Maybe, but they are rarer than hens teeth and rocking horse sh*t put together so there is'nt much chance of being able to obtain one.
An example of the busier bokeh of this lens, I like it, but I can see how something like the Sigma 50/1.4 that totally loses the background can be "technically" considered better. I won't get into my misgivings regarding that lens though, lest I sound like a broken record.
The 58/1.2 Rokkor is known to have non-round highlights when used wide open. Doesn't look very pleasing to me.
Alf Beharie wrote:
Ouch!...Those OOF highlights are extremely distracting!...I noticed that in other Rokkor shots so I guess its just a normal phenominon for that lens.
I haven't had the non-round highlights in most of my Rokkor 58 shots. It does it from time to time, but not that often for me. I'm wondering if it's a combination of certain focus distances and the distance of the highlights from the background. Most of the time, the bokeh on the Rokkor 58 is simply spectacular. Note the f/1.2 shot above with the rose petals and the candle...round bokeh there. The large print of that shot makes the bokeh look even better...it's really, really nice.
I have noticed there is one relatively new member to this board that takes any opportunity to slam the Rokkor. If you post a Rokkor shot, you will no doubt get some grief about "your Bokeh". Getting rather tiresome, I must say. Actually it deters me from posting images around here. Is that what you are looking for, Beharie?
That bokeh is simply stunning, but arguably itīs in a place where it shouldnīt be. The way the Rokkor bokeh twirls around various shapes, especially highlights, is the most wonderful thing I have seen bokeh-wise. Who says bokeh highlights have to be round anyway? I think round shaped bokeh highlights would have made exactly the same difference in this image. The highlights could be considered a distraction in themselves, not the shape they come in.
But I think we should throw our Rokkors away and get ourselves some nice old 55mm manual canons instead - with round bokeh. That should clean up this board from these dangerous bokeh radicals daring to shape differently, finally unifying all posted images in a bokeh utopia, where backgrounds and foregrounds are subdued and forced into a shapeless and nonthreatening oblivion, perfectly in compliance with the recently announced Bokeh 451 Regulations Act.
ovredal73 wrote:
I have noticed there is one relatively new member to this board that takes any opportunity to slam the Rokkor. If you post a Rokkor shot, you will no doubt get some grief about "your Bokeh". Getting rather tiresome, I must say. Actually it deters me from posting images around here. Is that what you are looking for, Beharie?
That bokeh is simply stunning, but arguably itīs in a place where it shouldnīt be. The way the Rokkor bokeh twirls around various shapes, especially highlights, is the most wonderful thing I have seen bokeh-wise. Who says bokeh highlights have to be round anyway? I think round shaped bokeh highlights would have made exactly the same difference in this image. The highlights could be considered a distraction in themselves, not the shape they come in.
But I think we should throw our Rokkors away and get ourselves some nice old 55mm manual canons instead - with round bokeh. That should clean up this board from these dangerous bokeh radicals daring to shape differently, finally unifying all posted images in a bokeh utopia, where backgrounds and foregrounds are subdued and forced into a shapeless and nonthreatening oblivion, perfectly in compliance with the recently announced Bokeh 451 Regulations Act....Show more →
I'm no Rokkor hater, but I have seen many instances where the OOF highlights are disk shaped when the lens is used wide open with bright highlights (most noticeable at the edges of the frame). There was a website thaty documented this and the owners conclusion was that it is caused by a hardware/mechnical limitation built into the lens. I can't find that site now, but the even the Rokkor Files site shows the disks. The OOF highlights aren't very bright in the 100% crop he shows, but if you look in the lower right of the full frame picture you can see one large disk in the lower right hand side:
I have seen photos from a Rokkor 58/1.2 that clearly had gaussian background bokeh and bad foreground bokeh, and definately did not produce sharp images wide-open (which would indicate undercorrected spherical aberration, explaining the fabulous bokeh).
I think this is the mythical Rokkor lens everyone talks about. Perhaps not all Rokkor 58/1.2s are born equal. However I can't remember where I saw this: it may all be just a wonderful dream, and I certainly haven't seen it here.
As far as I can tell everyone seems to think their rokkor is the unicorn: but this little boy is seeing donkeys.
In this thread and in the other threads where ovredal and cogitech have posted images, the rokkor seems to be both sharp AND have good bokeh. While sharpness is quite objective, I guess bokeh is not. What some people see as "busy" others see as "great". I really like what I see from the rokkor AND from man others
Edit: This is my version of fast 50 bokeh btw :P not very alternative yet though..
The cat-eye shape bokeh highlights come from the off-axis light getting truncated by parts of the lens, mechanically. this is commonly seen on really wide fast lenses, e.g. the Canon EF 85 1.2L and 50 1.0L show this behaviour. Not really any way around it, given the optics and mechanics involved.
I'm bumping this thread up in order to keep it alive, as I hope to post some examples of a converted FD 50L, soon. This has been a long, long ordeal for me and I hope to confirm web references of the likewise qualities between the current EF 50L and the FD version, with the possible kicker of better close up performance due to the floating design.
In the meantime, and I know there aren't too many EF converted FD50Ls out there, post 'em if you got 'em.
Here are a few Noctilux shots from a concert a few weeks ago. Probably at f1.2 and various ISO. I had the camera on auto-iso so that I didn't end up shooting at a high ISO when the lighting was bright enough for a lower ISO.
hmmm... I guess this character is no more tedious than the guys that keep trying to say the "bokeh is simply stunning," in spite of photos that clearly show *difficult* bokeh... don't you think?
We also have to assume that bokeh posts that come with glowing words are the *best* shots coming from the lens... doesn't look that good to me.
All lenses have different qualities and uses, so I'm not slamming the Rokkor... in fact, I'd buy one and try it out if I found a bargain somewhere, but I'm not so wowwed by all the "stunning" bokeh samples floating around here to pop for one at the current going rate... and if I thought the bokeh was actually that beautiful I would in a second.
I'm sorry, but your slam against anyone not loving the Rokkor's bokeh prompted this reply... You can think the lens is "simply stunning," fine, but allow for others to have a different oppinion.
Keep posting examples that you think are stunning, but accept that not everyone will see them that way.
ovredal73 wrote:
I have noticed there is one relatively new member to this board that takes any opportunity to slam the Rokkor. If you post a Rokkor shot, you will no doubt get some grief about "your Bokeh". Getting rather tiresome, I must say. Actually it deters me from posting images around here. Is that what you are looking for, Beharie?
That bokeh is simply stunning, but arguably itīs in a place where it shouldnīt be. The way the Rokkor bokeh twirls around various shapes, especially highlights, is the most wonderful thing I have seen bokeh-wise. Who says bokeh highlights have to be round anyway? I think round shaped bokeh highlights would have made exactly the same difference in this image. The highlights could be considered a distraction in themselves, not the shape they come in.
But I think we should throw our Rokkors away and get ourselves some nice old 55mm manual canons instead - with round bokeh. That should clean up this board from these dangerous bokeh radicals daring to shape differently, finally unifying all posted images in a bokeh utopia, where backgrounds and foregrounds are subdued and forced into a shapeless and nonthreatening oblivion, perfectly in compliance with the recently announced Bokeh 451 Regulations Act....Show more →
I love the rose one though. 
