wickerprints wrote:
Indeed. I have always been deeply impressed by the performance of the ZE Distagon 21/2.8. The corner performance is quite remarkable. It's only real flaw is the complex mustache distortion, which I think is forgivable given modern digital image processing technology.
Yes, it is correctable. Still, if you avoid architectural shots with lines lining up with the sides, and if you correct before using it to stitch, it is close to perfect. The 100MP is also great.
The 50/2 MP in particular also impresses me, again mainly for its performance at f/2; but to be fair, I only mention it because it seems like no one else is making a really decent 50mm lens these days!
I am partial to the Sigma 50/1.4 for wide open portraits, but will pick up a 50MP for everything else.
If you're happy with Zeiss, be happy with it. But a lens--any lens--only projects the image you choose to let it see.
I use my Zeiss lenses for different things than my Sigma and my Nikon lenses. For what I use them for (sharp, relatively close up detail shots, and interiors in the case of the 21), they are great.
Steve Spencer wrote:
Sorry, I can't help myself here because I study cognitive dissonance. What wickerprints initially described--glamorizing the positive aspects of something you have chosen and failing to see or fully acknowledge it's faults--is what is a classic example of cognitive dissonance and it is a well known psychological phenomenon and we probably all do it to at least some extent at least some of the time. Sour grapes--or denigarting what you cannot attain as in the classic Aesop fable--could be argued to result from cognitive dissonance, but is not a classic example of it. Neither is there clear evidence demonstrating under what circumstances the phenomenon occurs. Simply put as a psychological phenomenon it is much more poorly understood. ...Show more →
a conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other belief
Denial of reality in favor of an unsubstantiated belief hardly equals to inconstancies in one belief. It's cognitive resonance if anything (I just made that up).
Cognitive dissonance is an uncomfortable feeling caused by holding conflicting ideas simultaneously. The theory of cognitive dissonance proposes that people have a motivational drive to reduce dissonance. They do this by changing their attitudes, beliefs, and actions.[2] Dissonance is also reduced by justifying, blaming, and denying. It is one of the most influential and extensively studied theories in social psychology.
Experience can clash with expectations, as, for example, with buyer's remorse following the purchase of an expensive item. In a state of dissonance, people may feel surprise,[2] dread, guilt, anger, or embarrassment. People are biased to think of their choices as correct, despite any contrary evidence. This bias gives dissonance theory its predictive power, shedding light on otherwise puzzling irrational and destructive behavior
. A classical example of this idea (and the origin of the expression "sour grapes") is expressed in the fable The Fox and the Grapes by Aesop (ca. 620–564 BCE). In the story, a fox sees some high-hanging grapes and wishes to eat them. When the fox is unable to think of a way to reach them, he surmises that the grapes are probably not worth eating, as they must not be ripe or that they are sour. This example follows a pattern: one desires something, finds it unattainable, and reduces one's dissonance by criticizing it. Jon Elster calls this pattern "adaptive preference formation."[1]...Show more →
The "buyer's remorse" thing fits quite well, but blind denial does not. For his example (trying to justify an expensive purchase by overstating the positive aspects of the thing) would more be confirmation bias.
douglasf13 wrote:
What's interesting to me is that DxO also has one of the most popular lens correcting softwares, so I wonder how this software and their Mark lens scores correlate?
That's the question I suggested as well, in the last thread we had on DxO lens testing. Their results really do beg the question.
Feb 17, 2011 at 06:53 PM
Lars Johnsson Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
carstenw wrote:
My theory also involves nasty language My ZF21 and ZF.2 100 are brilliant, and anyone who tries to tell me otherwise is out of their mind. The 105/2.5 is also extremely good though.
Remember that they test the Zeiss 100 at f/2. If it where tested at the same aperture as the Nikon, the result would be a lot different
Whether you are pro Zeiss or negative Zeiss is not the issue - One side will never convince the other side - so we might as well quit with the name calling and diatribes! The proof is in the pudding as my father used to constantly say. Look at the threads of the Zeiss lenses (pick any of them) and then look at the corresponding thread of the Nikon. Consider then what you have seen. I did this 2 weeks ago to a photo novice - I didn't say a word - just took her through a 5-10 whirl of pictures. At the end I ask what she thought? Without pausing she said, "Wow there is really a difference in the pictures. The 2nd set (Zeiss) is soooo much better than the 1st (Nikon) set. No lab is needed when this happens!!! The proof is in the pudding.
Delatant wrote:
Whether you are pro Zeiss or negative Zeiss is not the issue - One side will never convince the other side - so we might as well quit with the name calling and diatribes! The proof is in the pudding as my father used to constantly say. Look at the threads of the Zeiss lenses (pick any of them) and then look at the corresponding thread of the Nikon. Consider then what you have seen. I did this 2 weeks ago to a photo novice - I didn't say a word - just took her through a 5-10 whirl of pictures. At the end I ask what she thought? Without pausing she said, "Wow there is really a difference in the pictures. The 2nd set (Zeiss) is soooo much better than the 1st (Nikon) set. No lab is needed when this happens!!! The proof is in the pudding.
that is only a worthwhile test if the same photographer took the pictures in both sets. from this forum that would be a very impoverished set for the nikon just in terms of number of pictures to select and number of photographers. i'm sure there are photographers out there who can make a coke bottle look better than any of my lenses in my hands.
Feb 17, 2011 at 07:37 PM
Lars Johnsson Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
Delatant wrote:
Whether you are pro Zeiss or negative Zeiss is not the issue - One side will never convince the other side - so we might as well quit with the name calling and diatribes! The proof is in the pudding as my father used to constantly say. Look at the threads of the Zeiss lenses (pick any of them) and then look at the corresponding thread of the Nikon. Consider then what you have seen. I did this 2 weeks ago to a photo novice - I didn't say a word - just took her through a 5-10 whirl of pictures. At the end I ask what she thought? Without pausing she said, "Wow there is really a difference in the pictures. The 2nd set (Zeiss) is soooo much better than the 1st (Nikon) set. No lab is needed when this happens!!! The proof is in the pudding.
You are wrong here
If the photos are better in one thread than in the other, it depends on the photographer. Any photographer that shows good pics on the web with Zeiss glass, can also do that if using good Nikon glass.
And I'm also sure that if they show you ten pics, you can't tell us which ones are Zeiss or Nikon
Feb 17, 2011 at 07:42 PM
Steve Spencer Online • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: On
denoir wrote:
I'm not a psychologist but, not acknowledging faults seems to me like the exact opposite of cognitive dissonance. To use one definition: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cognitive_dissonance
a conflict or anxiety resulting from inconsistencies between one's beliefs and one's actions or other belief
Denial of reality in favor of an unsubstantiated belief hardly equals to inconstancies in one belief. It's cognitive resonance if anything (I just made that up).
The type of dissonance that arises after a decision is called post-decisional dissonance and it was actually the first type of cognitive dissonance demonstrated in the lab in 1956 by Jack Brehm. Festinger in his original book on cognitive dissonance theory devoted a whole chapter to this type of dissonance. According to Festinger the dissonance arises between the thought "I chose this," and the thoughts it has some bad qualities or it's positive qualities aren't that great. These thoughts are psychologically inconsistent with the choice and thus produce dissonance. To reduce this dissonance one exaggerates the positive aspects of what is chosen and minimizes the negative aspects of what is chosen. That the theory and hundreds of studies have shown this phenomenon in the last 55 years.
Anyway, my source for the sour grape link to cognitive dissonance was wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
It is unfortunate that wikipedia used the example as the sour grapes effect is hard to replicate in the lab and thus is poorly understood as I said above it could be understood as dissonance, but that is far from known at this point.
If you know the multiple characteristics of the drawing style of two different lenses ... say an the Oly 28/3.5 vs. the Nikon 28/2.8 vs. the C/Y 28/2.8 ... people can often times pick them out from a blind comparison with pretty good accuracy. We've seen it many times on shoot-outs here before.
Photographers who know their lens' drawing styles typically play to those strengths and minimize the compromises made in design. Zeiss has tendency to strive for micro contrast, Nikon for center sharpness, others for their bokeh, etc.
With a lineup that includes Oly, Nikon, Canon, Zeiss & Mamiya ... and an eye on Leica's, Voigtlanders and Rokkors ... I don't have any brand allegiance to say 'better', but rather choose glass for its drawing style that aligns with subject matter and shooting style.
RustyBug wrote:
If you know the multiple characteristics of the drawing style of two different lenses ... say an the Oly 28/3.5 vs. the Nikon 28/2.8 vs. the C/Y 28/2.8 ... people can often times pick them out from a blind comparison with pretty good accuracy. We've seen it many times on shoot-outs here before.
only with shots of the same thing though and only when they know what the options of possible lenses are. interestingly, people on this forum and the nikon forum failed miserably at identifying whether identically taken shots were done with the zeiss 100/2 or nikon 105/2.5 except in shots where one could count the number of aperture blades in the oof highlights.
I never expected my Zeiss lenses to be sharper. I expected them to have fewer artifacts, annoyances or quirks which sometimes only shows up under some circumstances. Things I look at would include:
distortion
astigmatism
reasonably even performance across the frame
reasonably even performance across different focusing distances
reasonably even performance across the zoom range (e.g. the N Vario-Sonnar 24-85 does very well here)
chromatic aberration, especially annoying is the lateral category thereof
You have to use a lens in the field to evaluate all of these. No test is going to cover them all.
Many years ago (in the film days) I thought a 4x6 machine print is not going to differentiate between lenses because the mathematician in me told me the Frontier minilab scanned my film and retain only 1.5 megapixels of information and every modern lens will meet that with ease. Not to mention the minilab's heavy-handed processing was expected to be a great equalizer of all things. I was wrong. Even an untrained eye who had no brand loyalty can easily pick out a G-Planar 2/45 from e.g. a Pentax zoom lens. This is not supposed to be possible in theory with only 1.5MP of information.
A good enough lens for me is not the one which has the best MTF, but one which I have not outgrown and found its limits yet. I have to use a lens to be able to tell.
If I do not possess a lens but I need to make an informed decision on what to buy, I would rely far more on the feedback of the knowledgeable folks on this alternative forum than on an MTF curve. This forum (as opposed to numerous others) is where the real users congregate.
As to the brand loyalty question, again the same line of thought that it is more important to perform consistently than to perform the best: Zeiss as a brand gets such a big loyal following simply because it has never made a really bad optic. You can always find numerous cases where a competitor wins over Zeiss e.g. Mamiya 210/4 ULD would perform better than a Contax 645 Sonnar 210/4.
Bo-Ming/conurus
Feb 17, 2011 at 08:11 PM
Lars Johnsson Offline • • • • • • • Upload & Sell: Off
RustyBug wrote:
If you know the multiple characteristics of the drawing style of two different lenses ... say an the Oly 28/3.5 vs. the Nikon 28/2.8 vs. the C/Y 28/2.8 ... people can often times pick them out from a blind comparison with pretty good accuracy. We've seen it many times on shoot-outs here before.
Yes sure
Especially when he wrote "pick any Zeiss lenses and then look in the Nikon thread"
And then showed the photos to a photo novice that said "Wow there is really a difference in the pictures. The 2nd set (Zeiss) is soooo much better than the 1st (Nikon) set
My bad ... maybe I should have written "knowledgeable' people ... not referring to novices. A novice could be "WOW'd" with Rokkors, Oly's, Voigts, Leica's, etc. that were shot to show off their drawing style strengths ... i.e. easily impressed by the noticeable difference.
I didn't say everyone had the knowledge & eye to be able to differentiate glass, but there are definitely members of FM that are very good at it.
sebboh wrote:
only with shots of the same thing though and only when they know what the options of possible lenses are. interestingly, people on this forum and the nikon forum failed miserably at identifying whether identically taken shots were done with the zeiss 100/2 or nikon 105/2.5 except in shots where one could count the number of aperture blades in the oof highlights.
Failed miserably? How do you figure that? Quite a few people got it correct. Most missed on the third lens (Hasselblad) but separating the Zeiss from the Nikon was far from impossible.
Anyway, here's a simple test that I think most people here can pass. The images come in pairs. Guess which is Canon and which is Zeiss. All were shot at the same aperture. In the first test the lenses have different focal lengths while in the last two the focal length is the same.
Yes indeed, Delatant, this is my take home message also - other people, other than what might pass for the cognoscenti, see it. And they are hardly ambiguous in their reactions.
I am starting to wonder whether any or all measurement gives us more than an impoverished summary of what good lenses can produce, truly a limit case. The results are so much more eloquent in their expression than any set of measurements may be capable of representing.
sebboh wrote:
zeiss 100/2 or nikon 105/2.5 except in shots where one could count the number of aperture blades in the oof highlights.
The 105/2.5 can be an easy one for me when it combines close focusing with foliage bokeh in the BG because of it's nervous bokeh from that distance and the way it renders the greens.
I don't know of any other lens that looks like it does when shot in that scenario ... an easy give away for me ... but of course, that wasn't what that lens was designed for.
There are many that I can't distinguish, but once someone has become intimately familiar with the drawing style of a lens, they can usually 'key into it' with regularity. Without that intimate familiarity, it is a different matter.
Failed miserably? How do you figure that? Quite a few people got it correct. Most missed on the third lens (Hasselblad) but separating the Zeiss from the Nikon was far from impossible.
quite a few people preferred the nikkor though, yes of course, differences were visible. i admit i didn't go through and count (nor do i feel like doing it now) how many people chose one or the other. the tests todd did were even more ambiguous in terms of peoples response (people in those probably had different biases as well).
philip_pj wrote:
Yes indeed, Delatant, this is my take home message also - other people, other than what might pass for the cognoscenti, see it. And they are hardly ambiguous in their reactions.
I am starting to wonder whether any or all measurement gives us more than an impoverished summary of what good lenses can produce, truly a limit case. The results are so much more eloquent in their expression than any set of measurements may be capable of representing.
this has not been my experience showing uninterested parties (non-photographers) doubly blind sets of various brands against each other. those images weren't matched across brands though. i'm sure if i told them to examine identically shot images they would be able to find some differences.
My ZF21 and ZF.2 100 are brilliant, and anyone who tries to tell me otherwise is out of their mind. The 105/2.5 is also extremely good though.