Lens Envy

qleak · Mar 21, 2015

480sparky said:
tirediron said:

Could be, but then why have we had 50mm as a "standard" for so many years, and WHY such a huge jump in price? I could see an extra $1-200, but $1200??????

Click to expand...

Same reason we call it f/2.8 when its' really f/2.82842712475....

Perhaps a 'true normal' 35mm lens is 53.193875739102785765mm.

In terms of replicating the normal human field of view it's actually in the opposite direction.

The Panorama Factory -- What is 35mm equivalent focal length makes a lens "normal"

Pentax makes a 44 mm lens, unfortunately, they don't make a full frame camera lol

fjrabon · Mar 21, 2015

qleak said:
480sparky said:

tirediron said:

Could be, but then why have we had 50mm as a "standard" for so many years, and WHY such a huge jump in price? I could see an extra $1-200, but $1200??????

Click to expand...

Same reason we call it f/2.8 when its' really f/2.82842712475....

Perhaps a 'true normal' 35mm lens is 53.193875739102785765mm.

Click to expand...

In terms of replicating the normal human field of view it's actually in the opposite direction.

The Panorama Factory -- What is 35mm equivalent focal length makes a lens "normal"

Pentax makes a 44 mm lens, unfortunately, they don't make a full frame camera lol

The problem with even saying that "x focal length is a normal human field of view" is that there is no right answer when it comes to "replicating the human field of view" because it completely depends on how you define the human field of view, and no matter how you define the human field of view, it shifts as your rate of saccades shift. If you're intensely focused on one thing, you do literally get "tunnel vision" as your rates of saccades decrease, and the fact that your eyes are only particularly detailed in the very center makes it something almost like 9omm with a very non-detailed, greyed out outer portion of view receding outside of that 90mm. If you're kind of nervously scanning for danger, your field of view might be as wide as something like 23mm as you repeatedly stitch together portions of the image as your eyes dart around.

Our field of view is constructed by something like a continuous stitching of images together from a relatively small field of sharp, colored vision. We can detect movement in a much wider range than we can detect form or color, and we use the detection of movement to tell us to shift our saccades back to a part of the scene and "redraw" it in our internal stitched image.

BillM · Mar 21, 2015

Just at a quick glance I'd pass due to the horrible CA. LR could fix it, I have a Tamron with the same green fringe and it handles it ok. But the Zeiss Derrell posted a link too is stunning !!!

Derrel · Mar 21, 2015

When I was a boy and first getting into 'serious' photography, I used to have nothing except a cheap Russian made 35mm SLR and its god-awful 58mm f/2 Auto-Cosmogon lens...the focal length is nice and semi-selective. It might not seem like much of a difference between a 50mm and a 58mm, but it's my recollection that a number of Nikkor 50mm lenses are actually 48.5mm in true measured focal length at infinity focus, and therefore might even be a bit shorter at closer focus distances. So...a 58mm lens and a Nikkor 50 that's say, actually 48.5mm is a significantly different lens length.

Focal length is really quite a big deal in the semi-wide to normal and short-tele range...even a few mm difference has a big difference in the way photos actually look.

As far as a lens with a strong central image area and then very weak peripheral regions, the 35/1.4 Nikkor, the older manual focus lens, has this issue very much; so did the 85/1.4 AF-D; both have very sharp central areas, with a marked decline in the sharpness and light fall-off toward the edges. The old 85/1.4 AF-D was often called "the cream machine" for its superb bokeh and its image character on people photos. I had a 35/1.4 back in the 80's...it has a very useful niche. I "get" what the design parameter does. a lens with strong curvature puts a visual stamp on images; but that can backfire on some images. Look at some of the sample photos that have multiple people, and look closely at how SOFT people off to the sides of the frame can look. Look at the pictures, and you can see, this is NOT meant for general use stuff at wide f/stops; the edges are like three times softer than the central area...I kept the 85/1.4 AF-D because it has weak edges, but for high-resolution, I use my newer 85/1.8 G, which is very clinical, not "pretty". I got rid of the 35/1.4 years ago.

You want a Lensbaby?

I think the longer focal length of this 58mm lens is, at least in part, an effort to get the 58mm x 1.5 APS-C crowd to do the math, conclude that this is the new, high-speed eighty-five-millimeter equivalent, and then shell out $1,700 for it. The price is part of the higher profitability on lower total sales that Nikon has been able to achieve for multiple quarters over the past few years. Nikon has steadily been moving toward making more high-profit items in this new, constricting camera and lens market. Nikon has done an amazing job of keeping profits up, or even increasing, on lower and lower sales volumes.

pixmedic · Mar 21, 2015

just get a Konica 57mm f/1.2 with an adapter and save yourself $1100.

Oly E-PL5 with Konica AR 57mm f/1.2 by pixmedic, on Flickr

OR pick up an 85mm /f.4D, which is probably the best portrait lens ever that wasn't a 135mm f/2

pixmedic · Mar 21, 2015

I just looked at the link to the pixel peepers site.
lot of pictures taken with all the best cameras...D4s, D8xx's...
im underwhelmed at the bokeh rendering.
shot wide open...UNimpressed.
lot of weird haloing, horrible transitions from in focus to out of focus areas...
(look at the cat, boy in green outfit, woman in red, woman in blue)
portrait wise, i would NOT shoot this lens wide open. ever.
stopped down to f4 and higher, the pictures look sooo much better.
but for a $1700 lens?

syaudi · Mar 23, 2015

I'm one of those lucky ones who have a father considerably interested in photography and prefers to buy glass at the higher end of the scale - I've borrowed all of his lens at one point or other. for the longest time I had this massive lens envy for the 85mm f/1.2L II, which my dad happens to have bought in 10/10 condition for less than retail (somehow don't ask).
after using it for a while I found it that while it does surpass my expectations in producing excellent images and bokeh rendering, 85mm was just too constricting for my tastes and style, so I quietly set aside my dreams of owning an 85mm and settled for my current lens, the 55mm FL f/1.2.

now I lust for the Canon 50mm f/0.95.