Samuli Vahonen wrote:
...and not liking the shallow DOF, this island was quite far away and the other island was almost at same distance, but somehow DOF covers just the island close by (naturally won't show up in internet thumbnails but could not even print A3 wide version without seeing that the other island is very blurry
Agreed. This lens seems to show about the amount of blur that you'd expect from the focal length at any particular aperture, but seemingly very little depth of field in terms of actual sharply defined subject depth. Maybe it's due to the extreme sharpness in the plane of focus, but I'm also struggling with its limited DoF.
I'm also seeing somewhat less than perfect longitudinal-CA correction with this lens as compared to the 100/2.8R Macro (with a hint of green background fringing), but still, it's a great great optic with stunning sharpness across the entire frame even at f/2.8.
Samuli: Other than the DoF issue, how is this lens meeting your long-sought rendering requirements for this focal length? Also, do you find that your STA-1 tripod mount isn't all that rigid? I find that even after really tightening it to remove the initial flex where it clamps to the lens, that it still tends to flex between the ring and the base plate, which leaves me wondering whether I'll use the ring for much other than as a convenient base for hand-holding.