Great images, guys. Thank you all to keep this old thread going. It is still the most enjoyable FM thread after all these years to me.
somehow, It is very difficult to browse through old thread though. I seems always back to this 18 pg after a few mins.
I run a full cycle come back to my old friend ZF. Just need get use to wrong focus direction. Really really love the rendering of old planar 50 and 85, now I think I know how I can handle these two better
Great images, guys. Thank you all to keep this old thread going. It is still the most enjoyable FM thread after all these years to me.
somehow, It is very difficult to browse through old thread though. I seems always back to this 18 pg after a few mins.
I run a full cycle come back to my old friend ZF. Just need get use to wrong focus direction. Really really love the rendering of old planar 50 and 85, now I think I know how I can handle these two better
It is great to see your works on ZF lenses again ! Who would have known ? Your shots are justifying the good / bad old Zeiss design. It is all in the hands of the chefs how they enhance the best of the ingredients.
It is great to see your works on ZF lenses again ! Who would have known ? Your shots are justifying the good / bad old Zeiss design. It is all in the hands of the chefs how they enhance the best of the ingredients.
Luka
Hi, Luka, Thank you for your kind comment. I hope I can contribute this thread continuously and please share more with us your Zeiss shots as well.
Over past 5 years, Zeiss lenses' meaning has change quite a bit. They are at least no longer winning traditional test chart compare to other modern offers, and they are always manual. I have seen many offers beat or equivalent to zeiss for raw optic at cheaper price with AF myself.
However, I think both Planar have win me back: they are small for the speed offered compare to modern lens. After browse images took with both Planar I had in the past, I realize these are the tool I have been ask for: compromised in f1.4 (not bad for low light or shallow DOF use) and render beautifully once stop down with exceptional handling. The images have some kind of purity to my eyes. If there is some confirming bias, let it be Ultimately, the tool I want to pick up has to pleasing my eyes.
One thing both planar do best is mid distance bokeh once stop a little down. It is not ultra smooth (gaussian blur) or funky looking but just pleasing and true to my eyes.
a few 50 planar shots: f2, f5.6, f8. All with D850 use full res.
zhangyue wrote:
However, I think both Planar have win me back: they are small for the speed offered compare to modern lens. After browse images took with both Planar I had in the past, I realize these are the tool I have been ask for: compromised in f1.4 (not bad for low light or shallow DOF use) and render beautifully once stop down with exceptional handling. The images have some kind of purity to my eyes. If there is some confirming bias, let it be Ultimately, the tool I want to pick up has to pleasing my eyes.
I sold all my ZE lenses except 50 & 85 Planars and 21 & 28 Distagons, 3 of these were said to be worst performers from ZE/ZF series back in the days (135 I also kept but for different reasons). The best 50mm lens for my use is ZE 1.4/50, modern lenses have not really inspired me.
Few photos from holiday a month ago. I typically use 50mm for boke shots, but when I have less flat surroundings than at home Finland I like to shoot landscapes as well.
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/6.3, 1/200s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/7.1, 1/500s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/8.0, 1/320s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/6.3, 1.6s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/2.8, 1/400s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Only bad thing is that all of my ZE-lenses require modified camera, the standard sensor cover glass is too thick on Sony cameras. So I'm done if my modified cameras will die, and they are already quite old, I did buy them in 2013/2014.
Wow, Planar 50/1.4 parade in this page. SO DELICIOUS you guys ! I loved my planar ( contax - broken. Color was a bit on the cool side, which I like the Z version probably a bit more ), I thought about getting Milvus, then in the end I got something else ( Nikon 58). From whatever the reason, I am more drawn to Gauss rendering. I am getting the itch again to reacquire the 50 planar, and possibly 85 at some point.
The 50/1.4 ZE is definitely my favorite lens for flower closeups! I really love its rendering for that. It goes against "common knowledge" to use it at close range, wide open, but that's exactly what I do, in favor of rendering vs absolute sharpness. I got the 85/1.4 ZE too, thinking that it would render like a longer 50, but it's not similar at all. Disappointing, and I sold it a few months ago.
I should use the 50/1.4 for some stopped-down landscape this year. I always use one of my other 50s for that, and I do like its rendering for that use too. The examples above are lovely.
Samuli Vahonen wrote:
I sold all my ZE lenses except 50 & 85 Planars and 21 & 28 Distagons, 3 of these were said to be worst performers from ZE/ZF series back in the days (135 I also kept but for different reasons). The best 50mm lens for my use is ZE 1.4/50, modern lenses have not really inspired me.
Samuli
I agree, 50 and 85 are two least favorable lenses out of classic line but also happen to be the ones I am really interested. I feel the rendering are just beautiful. I personally have no interest for new milvus 50 and 85 for many reasons.
The both planar lenses are not perform well on Sony surprise me, what you see with stock Sony camera?
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thrice wrote:
35mm ZM Distagon with 5m PCX and 52mm CPL
Sony A7RII
3 image stitch.
Beautiful image, the person really show off the scale.
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DannyBurkPhoto wrote:
The 50/1.4 ZE is definitely my favorite lens for flower closeups! I really love its rendering for that. It goes against "common knowledge" to use it at close range, wide open, but that's exactly what I do, in favor of rendering vs absolute sharpness. I got the 85/1.4 ZE too, thinking that it would render like a longer 50, but it's not similar at all. Disappointing, and I sold it a few months ago.
I should use the 50/1.4 for some stopped-down landscape this year. I always use one of my other 50s for that, and I do like its rendering for that use too. The examples above are lovely....Show more →
Other than 50 is a little funky WO at certain condition, I feel 50 and 85 are brothers in terms of rendering with traditional double gauss design with minimal glass counts.
My usage for both are now 90% between f2 and f8, less than 10% WO so far and also for future. Especially with D850, before f2, both lens are show its age which could be good or bad depend on how you use them. but f2.2 is very safe aperture that always give me some satisfied images.
zhangyue wrote:
I agree, 50 and 85 are two least favorable lenses out of line but also happen to be the ones I am really interested. I feel the rendering are just beautiful. I personally have no interest for new milvus 50 and 85 for many reasons.
The new lenses seem to have harsher rendering, at least the 50, the 85 might not be as bad. I don't understand why Zeiss has designed new lenses to have high contrast boke.
zhangyue wrote:
The both planar lenses are not perform well on Sony surprise me, what you see with stock Sony camera?
50mm the problem is outward field curvature and astigmatism. If I would only shoot landscapes (thou with Canon I have shot some alpine landscapes @ f/4.5 [due to extreme wind], which really would not work on standard A7) & flowers/close-ups I could not care less. But my problem with these two rendering "features" has been that it brings stuff into focus, which should be in background boke. It's pretty easy to see if you shoot subject 3-5m distance with close-by background with f/2.2. In addition to background boke you may notice it on foreground if your composition has placed planar ground with texture to bottom of frame; the corners focus past the ground and foreground looks odd (many people mix things and don't understand difference between "soft corners" vs. field curvature, and astigmatism is even more difficult to understand).
85mm is rarely giving any issues, but focus plane corners are better with large apertures when shooting with thinner sensor cover glass at large apertures. Reason most likely is increased astigmatism.
All your photos on this page were close-ups. Issue is reduced and really hard to reproduce when shooting close-up due to lens extension (reduces ray angle) and totally blown out boke due to large difference between focus distance and background distance and more abstract nature of boke in close-up photos. So if you avoid mid-distance boke shooting, Sony thick sensor cover glass generated issues should not bother you very often.
Samuli Vahonen wrote:
I sold all my ZE lenses except 50 & 85 Planars and 21 & 28 Distagons, 3 of these were said to be worst performers from ZE/ZF series back in the days (135 I also kept but for different reasons). The best 50mm lens for my use is ZE 1.4/50, modern lenses have not really inspired me.
Few photos from holiday a month ago. I typically use 50mm for boke shots, but when I have less flat surroundings than at home Finland I like to shoot landscapes as well.
Only bad thing is that all of my ZE-lenses require modified camera, the standard sensor cover glass is too thick on Sony cameras. So I'm done if my modified cameras will die, and they are already quite old, I did buy them in 2013/2014.
bushwacker wrote:
You going back to Canon if they release a full frame mirrorless late this year or next year?
As I don't change lenses outside home I currently have 3pcs of Sonys with standard sensor and 2pcs with Kolari v2 thin filter modified - so would be no problem to slip in one Canon body in the mix... If one of the Kolari v2 cameras break down, Canon mirrorless will become option, then it depends on sensor quality, Alt-lens compatibility, Canon attitude towards other manufacturing lenses for their mount and price. Canon at the moment doesn't have any lens I would be interested, and I'm highly doubtful that their design compromises will match how I would compromise.
Things will change if Canon makes fast 28mm lens with nice boke and good focus plane, what seems to be impossible for Sony/Zeiss to do. I originally sold all my Canon glass in 2009 because I hated the colors and rendering, but most recent lenses with Nano coatings don't seem too bad, so it's possible they one day make interesting lens.
Original A7 was great because it was
a) cheap as dirt
b) low weight
c) small size.
Now looking current models they don't anymore have b) and c), but A7mkIII is still cheaper than 5D/6D/whatever Canon current full frame non-Pro body is, however not so much that I would call it anymore significant advantage. Back in 2013/2014 I actually paid less for A7 and A7r than cheapeast full frame Canon back then.
However reasons must be very strong if I buy Canon body; I can't stand Lightroom/ACR RAW-processign and I don't have full Capture One, just the Capture One for Sony.
Damn should not think Canon; I just remembered how great the custom menu was in 5DmkII, and now I miss it (again)... After all the iterations Sony has still not done it properly.
Few re-posts from last summer & FE-mount megathread:
Carl Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50 ZE @ f/5.6, 1/80s, A7(Kolari v2) @ ISO 100
Carl Zeiss Biogon T* 2.8/25 ZM @ f/5.6, 1/15s, A7r @ ISO 125, OptoSigma SLB-50-2500PM + Hoya Pro1 CIR-PL 82mm - I will sell this lovely lens, Zeiss Loxia 2.4/25 is half stop faster and has better boke.
Samuli Vahonen wrote:
The new lenses seem to have harsher rendering, at least the 50, the 85 might not be as bad. I don't understand why Zeiss has designed new lenses to have high contrast boke.
50mm the problem is outward field curvature and astigmatism. If I would only shoot landscapes (thou with Canon I have shot some alpine landscapes @ f/4.5 [due to extreme wind], which really would not work on standard A7) & flowers/close-ups I could not care less. But my problem with these two rendering "features" has been that it brings stuff into focus, which should be in background boke. It's pretty easy to see if you shoot subject 3-5m distance with close-by background with f/2.2. In addition to background boke you may notice it on foreground if your composition has placed planar ground with texture to bottom of frame; the corners focus past the ground and foreground looks odd (many people mix things and don't understand difference between "soft corners" vs. field curvature, and astigmatism is even more difficult to understand).
85mm is rarely giving any issues, but focus plane corners are better with large apertures when shooting with thinner sensor cover glass at large apertures. Reason most likely is increased astigmatism.
All your photos on this page were close-ups. Issue is reduced and really hard to reproduce when shooting close-up due to lens extension (reduces ray angle) and totally blown out boke due to large difference between focus distance and background distance and more abstract nature of boke in close-up photos. So if you avoid mid-distance boke shooting, Sony thick sensor cover glass generated issues should not bother you very often.
Thanks for the explanation. That is disappointing given I might get Sony in the future using those ZF glasses. TBH, I am extremely happy with D850 performance on pretty much everything. Size are perfect manageable.
I have no doubt new Milvus 50 and 85 offer more raw performance over planar. However, first of all, they are way bigger and heavier. And then they are not clear the CA problems both Planar have, better though. And also the new Milvus seems changed coating(greenish) compare to Classic (magenta), since I also have Milvus 35 and 18, I might slightly prefer classic for skin tone without detail testing so far.
For the way I use both Planar, Milvus will offer no benefit. It is a trade off and I have my pick. Plus, I always have OTUS 55 around if I want perfection.
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mike reid wrote:
Light dusting of snow on this peak in Iceland. Zeiss 28 Otus
Ultimately, the tool I want to pick up has to pleasing my eyes. 
