Are 35mm compatbile Carl Zeiss lenses as good as they claim to be?

[polyglot]

Well obviously. If you shoot at f/8 on grainy film, there's no point buying anything more than a consumer f/5.6 zoom. You're only going to get the benefit of these lenses on ultra-sharp films, e.g. TMX, and near wide-open. Any other case is either diffraction- or grain-limited.

 

[benjiboy]

It's interesting to reflect that the majority the great photographers we all admire used equipment to become legends that most rank amateurs these days wouldn't give house room.

 

[agw]

Okay, so I have and (more or less) regularly use the ZF.2 50/1.4, AF-D 50/1.4, and Ai 50/2. Among them, I like the ZF the most, and the AF-D the worst. Actually, my copy of the AF-D suffers from some "blue dot" phenomenon, where under certain (outdoor) lighting conditions and apertures a blueish circular haze can be seen in the image center. This is most noticeable on digital sensors, but can sometimes also be seen on color film. This makes this lens pretty much useless for me, except for indoors use.

In a side-by-side comparison at infinity, the ZF clearly beats the AF-D at all apertures up to f/8. The image borders and corners are noticeably worse on the AF-D until f/2.8. However, the ZF shows some "haze" due to residual spherical aberration, i.e. the sharp image is overlaid with some hazy shine. This is gone by f/2.8.
In the same comparison, the Ai 50/2 is about on par with the ZF from f/2.8 on, and sharpness wise slightly better at f/2 due to the lower amount of spherical aberration.

However, where the ZF.2 really shines is the range f/2.8-f/5.6 at medium distances, where you'll get a beautiful "popping" rendering emphasizing the subject's 3-dimensional structure. Here, the Nikkors just cannot compete IMHO. And, this is not an artifact of digitally emphasizing image sharpness - it works on Rollei Retro 100 with Rodinal as well (or maybe even better). On the other hand, the ZF.2 is not a good available-light lens for wide open night time use - lots of coma make it practically impossible to correctly render point-light sources wide open.

The ZF.2 50/1.4 is my only Zeiss lens for 35mm. I got it, since the performance of the AF-D was so much hampered by the blue dot. If I hadn't lots of good choices in other focal lengths, I'd probably add one or two more ZF lenses at other focal lengths, however, given their price point, it's hard to justify adding one that's redundant to my other glass, as long as that performs "good enough".

So, yes, I think the ZFs are significantly different from the Nikkors, but whether they're better depends on ones usage.

As for the ZFs being MF only, yeah, that's a pity to some extend - most modern focusing screens (post-AF era) don't allow for proper manual focusing. On the F5 it's no problem to change the screen against an A type, for example, but on the digital bodies proper manual focusing is pretty difficult. I'm still thinking of filling my 85mm-portrait-lens-gap with a ZF.2 85/1.4, but the difficulty to properly MF this on some of my bodies makes this decision pretty difficult...

 

[polyglot]

Okay, so I have and (more or less) regularly use the ZF.2 50/1.4, AF-D 50/1.4, and Ai 50/2. Among them, I like the ZF the most, and the AF-D the worst. Actually, my copy of the AF-D suffers from some "blue dot" phenomenon, where under certain (outdoor) lighting conditions and apertures a blueish circular haze can be seen in the image center. This is most noticeable on digital sensors, but can sometimes also be seen on color film. This makes this lens pretty much useless for me, except for indoors use.

That's interreflection between the rear element and the film/sensor. Doesn't happen with B&W films since they have a matte finish, but (glass) sensors and some chromes are nice and reflective. The Minolta AF 50/1.4 suffers from the same problem, which is why Sony redesigned that lens first-up when it bought the Minolta camera division.

 

[chip j]

my contax G slides have a sparkle to them that my Nikkors do not have.

 

[PaulMD]

If you have the cash to blow and you want to, why not?

I wouldn't expect huge performance increases, however. Photozone has some fairly rigorous lens tests, they're not ranking significantly higher than other good glass wide open and most lenses are pretty good by f/4 or f/5.6 anyway. Film is less demanding than digital, I doubt you could blind-test against another good lens at higher than random accuracy. The placebo effect is HUGE here, on some level your brain tries to search for something, anything to justify why the luxury (read: "better") product is better and deserves its price tag.

For example, take the Distagon 35/2. It's a $1200 lens that is matched pixel for pixel by a $400 Samyang 35/1.4. The Samyang develops essentially the same resolution as the Distagon at f/2, acceptable bokeh, plus you get a brighter viewfinder, more accurate focusing, and the capability to go to f/1.4 if you need it. Yeah, it's a bigger, heavier lens but the image is everything, right? Are there enough differences to drop 3x the price on the name-brand?

http://www.photozone.de/nikon_ff/587-zeisszf3520ff?start=1
http://www.photozone.de/nikon_ff/658-samyang3514fx?start=1

That said, there are still gems in the Zeiss lineup. Their 100mm Makro Planar is great from what I've seen. On the other hand, kind of hard to justify that kind of price tag when I can pick up a Nikkor 105/2.5 for $150 that's also razor sharp and all that jazz. If it was good enough for 50 years of Nikon professionals, it's good enough for whatever I can throw at it.

 

[Henning Serger]

As a multi-format shooter (MF Hasselblad, 35mm Nikon F5) this question is aimed at the 35mm range, not medium format.

I own two Carl Zeiss lenses for my Hasselblad - really pleased with them etc. However, my Nikon body has Nikon lenses only. I've read on the web and watched on YouTube lots about Carl Zeiss lenses that fit Nikon bodies. An extreme and expensive example is the 55mm Distagon with 12 lens elements that costs about £3K I gather. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mEj6CqZWMk&list=UU6t7IQyBM77KVoCUPfuveOA&index=2

Anyway, my question is whether the more 'normal' Carl Zeiss lenses are really as good as they claim to be (I can't afford that 55mm one so not even interested in that!)? It's obvious that they must be better than your standard Nikon lenses, but are they so much better to justify the cost? I've never used one and never seen a non-biased side-by-side comparison of a shot taken with, for example, the 50mm 1.8 Nikon or even the 1.4 pitted against a comparable CZ lens? Curious to know if it's worth spending about twice as much?

(and, out of interest, are those side-by-side comparisons in the video linked above accurate, or exaggerated marketting tricks?)

Hello Ted,

sorry for being a bit late in the game with my answer, but I think I can give some helpful information.
I am a multi-format shooter as well, and in 35mm Nikon is my main used system for more than 30 years.
You have asked about the 1,8/50 Nikon versus 50mm Zeiss ZF glass for Nikon.
I am using the Nikkor 1,8/50 AI-S (the better long barrel version with 0,45 min. focus distance), the 1,8/50 AF-D, and for four years now also the Zeiss Makro-Planar 2/50 ZF.
Besides using the Zeiss in my daily photography, it is also our standard test lens in our optical lab for film and sensor tests.

What are the differences between these three lenses?
Advantages of the Zeiss are
- much better performance at f2 (much better resolution and contrast) compared to the Nikkors
- a bit better performance at f2,8 (resolution, contrast)
- more even sharpness across the whole frame at from f2 - f8, the Zeiss is better at the borders compared to the Nikkors
- no chromatic abberation
- nicer bokeh
- better build quality
- a bit less distortion (compared to the AI-S, my AF-D sample has less distortion than the AI-S)

Advantages of the Nikkors
- less vignetting at f2
- lower price

In our resolution test at f5,6 both the Zeiss and the Nikkors achieved the diffraction limit of white light with 240 - 260 lp/mm on Spur Orthopan UR / Adox CMS 20 film (object contrast of 1:4).
That are outstanding values. You would need a 200 MP FF sensor to get the same resolution in digital under the same test conditions.

Each lens manufacturer has some "jewels" in his lens programme, and some lenses which are not so good.
That is also the case with Zeiss.
The 2/50 Makro is excellent, and the 2/100 has an even better reputation. Also the 2,8/21 belongs to the best 35mm SLR lenses available.
On the other side the 2,8/25 for example is one of the weaker lenses in the current Zeiss programme.

Here you may have a look at tests of most of the Zeiss lenses:
http://www.photozone.de/nikon_ff
http://www.photozone.de/canon_eos_ff

Just as an important additional information: The photozone tests are based on 50% MTF tests with digital sensors. If you test the lenses with higher resolving films (like slide films, T-Grain BW films, BW microfilms) you get higher resolution values if you use object contrast above 1:3.

Best regards,
Henning

 

[schewct]

With regards to the 35mm, I would say the changes that Carl Zeiss lenses' effect on the picture quality would not be significant compared to Carl Zeiss on the Medium Format.