In the previous page youtube video, at around 13mins30secs, there was a non-tripod portrait comparison photo at f1.4 between the fle and the distagon with the subject in the midzone, and the difference was quite dramatic.
He does say f2 and it's fixed though and has the sample for that too and it looks good enough at f2 for the portrait.
With the FLE you'd need the hood on right, due to flare so the length isn't that much shorter but you probably would feel the weight and girth difference (I imagine). It's nice being nimble.
It's also probably balancing better on the a7cii than digital m but can't say for certain.
Doesn't make much difference to me as I wouldn't get the fle to use on Sony. I'm also not sold on digital leica quite yet, and I'm a bit lost in general with film at the moment.
But it's not smooth sailing using the zeiss on Sony either. Without PCX, need to stop down to like 5.6/8 for the edges to look decent (if they're on the same plane as the subject). With the PCX filter, you do get a midzone dip - but it's not massive (compared to the performance without PCX on Sony - as opposed to comparing PCX on vs native m sensor). f2.8 I notice the difference the most when zoomed in on an a7cii raw at 200% but this is tested at like 5-8m distance. F2 and F1.4 I'd expect to be worse (and it is) but without PCX (at least on Sony) it doesn't look brilliant either there, so it's less noticeable until f2.8 and then after that clears up a bit. All when looking at 200%.
At 100% on a large screen, it's a little noticeable at f1.4 when flipping between on and off images when really looking for it. Otherwise seems okay at 100% (33megapixel a7cii) in the test scene I have at least.
I'm still undecided if I ought to take off the pcx for larger aperture people shots with someone in the midframe - it seems to be fine but need more time. Might be losing a little magic for those shots with the pcx on - if I didn't know it probably wouldn't matter. It's not a big deal putting it on and off, just a filter and I don't use the hood with it.
And it doesn't seem as noticeable as the fle wide-open midzone dip on native m vs distagon in that youtube video comparison, but admitedly that's all I've based the fle's midzone 1.4 performance on and it didn't seem to be a rigorous test, with the subject position shifting but the difference does seem significant. I suspected possibly missed focus with the fle there but I'm going to assume not.
Jan 27, 2026 at 11:16 AM
Previous versions of Yogifi's message #16975196 « Zeiss 35mm 1.4 zm still my preferred 35 »
