I like to photograph dark, naturally/softly lit interiors of heritage homes and edifices in general, where large aperture values and quality colours/bokeh is everything, and high sharpness and lack of various aberrations is of secondary importance.
To that end, my 24L MkI, 35L, 50Ls and 16-35L MkII to some extent, perform wonderfully for me. I don't do much landscape photography anyways.
Here is the type of imaging where my 24L wide open does well enough for me.
For landscapes I might go for the Zeiss. If you also do architecture I would go for the TS-E 24 II, a lens which I own. One of the disadvantages of the TSE-24 II is that I'm hesitant to use it in the rain. I use the TSE-17 in rainy weather in the past and experienced issues with the shift mechanism afterwards.
Philippe, absolutely wonderful images demonstrating how the Zeiss glass really works! I agree with you as well, even though I am more inclined to provide opinion based on the more trivial aspects of the differences.
Peter, if you are seriously interested in learning about Zeiss ZE optics, I recommend subscribing to Lloyd Chambers' Zeiss Guide to ZF / ZE lenses. He does not dismiss any optics because it is Canon not Zeiss, he gives very extensive reviews, and provides both real world sample images, detailed comparisons, and well written descriptions.
In the case of the ZE 21, he did not compare it directly to the 24L II, but he did to the 16-35 L II, and the ZE 21 won easily. OTOH, he also gave rave reviews to the 24L II and TS-E 24 II in the Advanced Photography guide.
Regarding color and microcontrast, I do see a consistent difference between a bunch of Zeiss images and a bunch of Canon images, and I think the Zeiss is better, with higher contrast and better color separation, especially the ability to render flowers in the magenta - blue color range. But it is not like Canon cannot produce a single image that will not shine.
Out-of-focus rendering or bokeh is one of the areas where the easiest noticeable differences are, and I recommend just trying to find as many examples as you can. One single comparison is not going to tell the story there.
On the alternative board, you will see lots of excellent images from the ZE 21. Not to take anything away from the glass, but I will have to point out that the photographers also deserve credit for excellent work and post-processing, especially how they downsize for web. You see the impact of that when test images are provided by photographers not giving care to that, the images don't have the same wow and pop factor.
Regarding build quality, the ZE really makes a Canon L look and feel like a plastic toy, and if you don't want to take pictures, you can play with the smooth focus ring all day
BUT, in reality, I prefer a weather sealed plastic Canon, with a plastic lens shade. I just had my ZE 21 sent in to Oberkochen for repair, at 230 euro, after an impact on the lens hood than knocked the outer barrel loose. The Zeiss metal lens shade is very stiff, and a flexing lens shade like Canon's would probably have saved the lens.
Another trick the ZE 21 does well is close range focus. With a magnification of 0.19 you are approaching the semi-macro range, with shallow DoF, but with a wide perspective. The 24 mm Canon alternatives also do the same trick, of course, but with a less wide perspective.
Here is one example showing some color and bokeh with the ZE 21 on the 7D, at f/2.8, cropped for aspect ratio only.
philber wrote:
Peter, if you ask people who shoot Zeiss lenses why they choose them over Canon or Nikon, sharpness is very far from being the top motive. By and large, it is colours and microcontrast, which, again as a generalisation, are shared throughout the Zeiss range. .
Thank you, Philber.....well made points, and very fine images.
alundeb wrote:
Another trick the ZE 21 does well is close range focus. With a magnification of 0.19 you are approaching the semi-macro range, with shallow DoF, but with a wide perspective. The 24 mm Canon alternatives also do the same trick, of course, but with a less wide perspective.
Here is one example showing some color and bokeh with the ZE 21 on the 7D, at f/2.8, cropped for aspect ratio only.
Thank you, Alundeb.......your image looks like it was taken with a longer lens......very nicely done for a 21mm lens.
Can I run the risk of the wrath of the Zeiss users here and ask a quick question?
I'm not denying the Zeiss images are beautiful and seem to have a unique look, but could some of the images I have seen (In the Zeiss thread in the Alt forum) have gained this look via very good post processing technique using curves etc? I'm still getting my head around PP so it might just be my untrained eye.
I've seen images from Canon lenses including the 24L II that look just as good so this could be clever PP as well?
It'd be nice to see unaltered RAW files, but that's not practical due to size.
Sir_Loin that is a good question. There may be a good deal of substance in your assertion. Let me just provide two observations I do for myself:
1) I see a difference in contrast even at thumbnail sizes when wieving folders with raw files, one folder with Canon and one folder with Zeiss.
2) I see a difference in contrast even in the viewfinder.
Now, the difference is small, but noticeable. Since human perception is so strange and loaded with expectaions, it may be that my imagination plays a part in it, but I don't think it is only that.
Sir_loin, if anyone can replicate the look from a Zeiss les with clever PP, no-one will cheer louder than Zeiss owners. Then they can go back to lighter, AF lenses. Alas, despite many claims, no-one has produced the goods yet.
Interesting...I am on my POS Dell Latitude work laptop with washed out LCD screen, and perusing all the photos in this thread without first looking at what lens took the photos, the photos which appear to have the most pop/bang look/microcontrast/3d look/unquantifiable, intangible quality are breitling's first few photos taken by (to my big surprise) the much maligned 16-35L II
Philber,
None taken! I used LR for those images and nothing else and I adjusted the highlights rendering on those. That's what you may call flat, probably. I just don't like blown hightlights too much. Dull colors? I set that at low setting and I adjusted the WB, too. Just FYI.
I have plenty Zeiss 21mm shots (for the price I paid, I better, huh ). Like you said, different location, different lighting, etc lead to different effect of the IQ. I used to poo poo people (ignorants ) that could not tell the Zeiss look and now, I could just look back and laugh at my position. To each his own. I am not trying to convice you that Canon or Nikon images are better than images taken with Zeiss optics, they are not but it would be hard press for Zeiss users to tell that they could pickout Zeiss images taken under the same conditions and at the same location from those using current crop of Canon/Nikon lenses. I was a Zeiss fan before and now frankly, I admit I won't be able to. YMMV.
alundeb wrote:
Interesting view, Dawei. I am not going to comment on that specifically, since I have posted one of the images.
Which leads me to suspect lighting and PP make the biggest difference, as the last 3 photos from Breitling's series seem less popish than your photo
So it seems like the lens isn't the pivotal item
The 16-35LII is so maligned it often feels like a crud lens haha
I can't comment on whether there is an intrinsic "magic" to zeiss lenses as I have never used one, but I can understand where this view may come from, I often feel that the look of my 85L is very different from my other lenses, and of course, the 200L just has so much pop straight out of the camera, in good light, often no PP at all is needed.
Maybe if you shoot the same scene with both lenses and compare them directly. Since it won't be about resolving details, the difference in the FOV shouldn't matter much though it would be better to eliminate as many variables as possible. Wider FL also means more of the scene going through the lens and being metered for by the camera. White balance should also be identical to see the difference in colour render. Same aperture and point of focus should be used.
Until much of the variables are eliminated, there's no point of doing any comparison and making claims that one lens is better than the other.
BTW, those last four samples of the 21mm shots seem to be very low in contrast, any exposure blending or maybe even HDR treatment done?
Joshua, when I saw your post I did not know what lenses your images came from. I read some lines that you have owned a Zeiss distagon, and then I scrolled down and looked at the images. One thought struck me immediately (other than being very nice and sharp images, thanks for posting!):
The last one is not nearly as good/sharp as the 3 others.
