Lovely photos! I've been very tempted by the 55mm f1.2 too. My main interest is to shoot it with film but with my FM2N, it focusses wide open where it's not the sharpest and I'm struggling as is with the 50mmf1.4. I also like the compactness of my 50mmf1.4 AFD, will be seeing if I can get results I'm happy with after trying an entire roll at f2 (hopefully in-focus!) then grab the AIS version for a better feel with the mf.
kwoodard wrote:
I’m a huge fan of the Nikkor 55/1.2 AI. It’s my most used MF lens, and my favorite of all the 50-55mm lenses. I have two of them in case one has an issue down the road. It’s great on film and digital.
Two examples… First is on film and second is on my old D700.
Yogifi wrote:
I am interested in the CV 58mm f1.4 (for people shots on film) -- sorry I know we are well off-topic now. And part of that was because it seemed rather sharp wide open! At least compared to the 55mm f1.2 nikon and cv on the philipreeves review.
I did a quick side-by-side comparison indoors now and it's not obvious. I could very well be jumping the gun like I do sometimes but I will do an outdoor test in better light tomorrow to make sure.
Versus the 50mm f1.4 to rule out light, and vs 40mm f1.2 to rule out focal length causing the difference in feeling of transparency.
Lovely photos! I've been very tempted by the 55mm f1.2 too. More so the CV one just because of marginal improvements in the 60 years since (and chances of getting one in better condition) but I think they tried to make it very similar and it should be close between them.
My main interest is to shoot it with film but with my FM2N, it focusses wide open where it's not the sharpest and I'm struggling as is with the 50mmf1.4. I also like the compactness of my 50mmf1.4 AFD, will be seeing if I can get results I'm happy with after trying an entire roll at f2 (hopefully in-focus!) then grab the AIS version for a better feel with the mf.
Back to my 40mm ultron thing, I think most of the problem was forgetting to apply the lens correction manually, I'm used to it auto-applying with with my CV lenses on Sony. Once I applied it, it was a lot better, and nothing really stood out in terms of transparency, but they all do look differently at f2 and even f4. I'll do the outdoor comparison still as it's kind of hard to tell with my cluttered desk comparison, I'll post it anyway in case it takes me some time to do the outdoor one, don't want to leave people who actually read this hanging.
Did my best to correct various things so they match up and lens corrections are applied on all them. CV Nokton and Ultron have been cropped to the field of view of the AFD, all at F2 mounted to the a7cii.
Voigtlander 40mm f1.2 Nokton e-mount
Nikon AF 50mm f1.4D
Voigtlander 40mm Ultron s-II-N
I don't see an issue with "transparency" with the corrections and all balanced out, though there is something there, at f2 anyway.
To me the Nokton and Nikon look more natural than the Ultron, I don't know how to describe it but it is was wide open for the ultron, though this is cropped. I compared only the two CV lenses at f4, and it's harder to notice any issue. At f2 you notice this almost strange brightness with the ultron at the center compared to the nokton. I had to raise the exposure on the Nokton by 0.7 to match the overall image more too.
Here's the uncropped of the nokton and ultron at f2.
Uncropped f1.2 nokton (@f2 still):
Uncropped f2 ultron (@f2 still):
Sorry I know it's not the best comparison, perhaps someone with more experience might find it more useful. Thought I'd share for those curious as I did get dm'd about it after mentioning it. When I look at the 40mm f1.2 and 40mm f2, uncropped and f2 with lens corrections, I like the 40mm f1.2 a lot more.
Something is just off with the ultron for me that I'm struggling to explain, it's harder to look at. But this is again wide open for it and I can't tell as easily at f4 (I didn't test f2.8). It probably won't matter for film and that's what I have it for. I like the AFD more (than the ultron) but 50 is a bit more restrictive for general walkabout.
