The best 50 ever?

Mick Fagan · Apr 30, 2006

55 2.8 micro nikkor does it for me. I bought it new, finally last week I had it serviced after about 20+ years of quite hard work. The iris blades were sticking after a shoot in the sun for a couple of hours when the temp was at 43ºC in the shade. Apparently these early versions were assembled with animal based lubricant, whatever that means. The later and current lenses are apparently lubricated with synthetic (?) modern stuff that doesn't wither in excess heat.

I once had to copy 5,000 odd slides in a short time frame, really what the lens was designed for. On top of that it was my lens for about 85% of all my picture taking for the first ten years of ownership, before I started to gather an array of nikon & sigma glass.

I also have a nikkor 1.8, which is faster, but doesn't cut the ice as far as edge to edge goes.

Mick.

JohnArs · Apr 30, 2006

Hi
I'm voting for my Micro Nikkor f 2.8 60mm it blows my 50mm 1.4 away re sharpness and this is proven by 2 german mags MTFs and not only my dreaming eyes!
If I want the ultimate sharpness its the Micro if I need the speed its the 1.4 50mm wich I very seldom is in use since I have a fast 28mm f 1.8!
All is subjektive but not the MTFs.
Armin

David A. Goldfarb · Apr 30, 2006

Voigtlander 50/2 Ultron for me on the Vitessa L, but they also made it for the Prominent.

Ted Harris · Apr 30, 2006

Did I miss something? I don't think I saw a single mention of the venerable Dual Range Summicron from the late 50's through '60's. I always found it to be far superior to any other 50 I worked with in the days when I was still shooting 35mm. The glass on the modern Contaxc G's also came close but I would gowith the Summicron.

timbo10ca · Apr 30, 2006

Being new to the world of photography, I went with the Canon 50 f1.4 as I'm shooting EOS and this was the recommended normal lens. I have mixed experiences with it (having trouble with auto focus, and can't fine-tune because there is no split circle on my focusing screen), but it seems generally like a nice sharp lens. I've used it with most difficulty stopped to f/22, which apparently will cause a lens to soft-focus and at widest apperature in low light where it has trouble with autofocus. Does *anybody* out there consider this lens to be top 50, or is it simply the best I can do with my camera?

PhotoJim · Apr 30, 2006

timbo, the EF 50/1.4 is considered to be one of the best 50s out there but my recollection of Popular Photography's tests was that it was not that great at f/1.4, even though it was possibly one of the best ever made at the middle apertures.

At f/22 you start to get diffraction issues and lose sharpness. This is due to the nature of optics and has nothing to do with your lens in particular. (The smaller the format, the worse the diffraction, so if you shoot with a 4x5" camera, f/22 is ok ).

AF usually has a bit of focus error - it's too bad that you can't mount the lens on a manual focus body for some testing. (I have a bit of a Nikon bias and here is one point where you could more easily answer this question if this were a Nikon problem.)

benjiboy · Apr 30, 2006

Happy

tony lockerbie said:
Trolling through the various discussions I'm always interested in peoples thoughts on the quality of lenses, particularly the so called standard 50mm. So which do you consider to be the best of the best? The Leitz summicron or f2 planar from the Contarex spring to mind. Maybe a f2 Nikkor or 1.4 Takumar take your fancy, love to hear your thoughts.

I don't know which is the absolute "best" 50mm standard lens Tony, I'm very happy with with my Canon FDn 50mm f1.4, most of the major marque manufacturers make excellent flagship lenses of this focal length, the lens I have is the best because it fits my cameras.

Dan Fromm · Apr 30, 2006

Satinsnow said:
Ya but Dan,

it is always good to hash it out again, every once in a while! Some of us don't remember the time frame from the 60's to the 80's, big blur, with lots of fun in between!

LOL

Dave

Yeah, yeah, yeah, those years were a time of considerable blur. And quite possibly there are people here who weren't around back then. They can't be expected to know that the question's been buried, with stake through its little heart for safety, for decades.

But what really gets me is replies of the form "I have x and its pretty good." I mean, the question was about which one stood out. Those of us with just the one aren't qualified to answer.

Cheers,

Dan

Richard Wasserman · Apr 30, 2006

Ted Harris said:
Did I miss something? I don't think I saw a single mention of the venerable Dual Range Summicron from the late 50's through '60's. I always found it to be far superior to any other 50 I worked with in the days when I was still shooting 35mm.

Ted,
I put in a vote for the Dual Range. I think it's a great lens, very sharp, not too contrasty, and just has a nice, nice look to it. That and a 35mm Summicron 4th version are about all I use in 35mm.

Richard Wasserman

Dan Fromm · Apr 30, 2006

tony lockerbie said:
Yes, probably has been argued black and blue but it's always interesting to see where people are at. I have no problem with getting good quality with 35mm and I have heaps of them from Zenits to Contarexes. The mark of a good lens is the maximum aperture performance and the gong here usually goes to Leica. My personal favourite at the moment is the 50mm f2 Septon on my Bessamatic, tack sharp but with a little of that old fashioned quality that marks the good German lenses.

Tony, if you had meant to ask which is best wide open you should have. IIRC, there aren't differences big enough to worry about among modern (NOT triplets or tessars) f/1.7 - f/2 normal lenses for 35 mm SLRs.

I don't mean to insult you, but if you see differences in use between your 50/2 Septon and other good 50/2s for 35 mm SLRs, you suffer from wishful thinking or you're hallucinating. Might you be stuck back in the early '70s? Dave wasn't entirely joking about the blurred decades.

timbo10ca · Apr 30, 2006

PhotoJim said:
timbo, the EF 50/1.4 is considered to be one of the best 50s out there but my recollection of Popular Photography's tests was that it was not that great at f/1.4, even though it was possibly one of the best ever made at the middle apertures.

At f/22 you start to get diffraction issues and lose sharpness. This is due to the nature of optics and has nothing to do with your lens in particular. (The smaller the format, the worse the diffraction, so if you shoot with a 4x5" camera, f/22 is ok ).

AF usually has a bit of focus error - it's too bad that you can't mount the lens on a manual focus body for some testing. (I have a bit of a Nikon bias and here is one point where you could more easily answer this question if this were a Nikon problem.)

I just bought an EOS 3, which has split circle focusing screens available- but I don't know if it still maintains the AF boxes, which I also like... but I'm getting off topic.

Tom Hoskinson · Apr 30, 2006

I have a Dual Range 50mm Summicron - great lens, but I like my 65mm Leitz Canada Elmar better.

I will have to do a shoot-out between these 2 Leitz lenses and my new M mount Zeiss ZF 2.0/50mm Planar.

mcgrattan · Apr 30, 2006

To be honest, I've never found focusing manually on my EOS 650 -- which has a plain ground glass screen -- particularly difficult. It's harder with some lenses than others but I don't particularly miss the split-image spot in the middle.

Some lenses the focus just seems to 'snap' into place when you get it right -- I have a Chinon 55mm f1.7 lens which is incredibly easy to focus and a Rikenon 50 f1.7 which takes fantastic pictures (on other screwmount cameras) but which seems harder to focus manually on the plain ground-glass.

My own favourite 'normal' lens is probably the Industar 61 L/D in LSM mount. Not as fast as my SLR (M42) lenses but there's something about the look of the images that I really like.

Dave Parker · Apr 30, 2006

Dan Fromm said:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, those years were a time of considerable blur. And quite possibly there are people here who weren't around back then. They can't be expected to know that the question's been buried, with stake through its little heart for safety, for decades.

But what really gets me is replies of the form "I have x and its pretty good." I mean, the question was about which one stood out. Those of us with just the one aren't qualified to answer.

Cheers,

Dan

Dan,

I surely agree,

Over the years I have shot:

Pentax
Chinon
Minolta
Canon
Ricoh

With a samttering of others for a short amount of time in there, but I like the Minolta's best of all, Until such time as I started shooting wildlife several years ago, most of the shooting I did, was with 50mm lenses....

Sure has been fun, now at times it seems like work!

LOL

Dave

Claire Senft · Apr 30, 2006

I have a Contax RTSIII with a 50mm 1.4 Planar, This is one area, wide open performance, that the vacuum back earns its keep. Wide open the lens camera combo is capable of really nice results which only gets better with stopping down.

Uncle Bill · Apr 30, 2006

I have been really happy with the following 50's in my amateur Photography career:
Nikkor f1.5 f2,
Zuiko F1.8
M42- Takumar F50 1.4
Leica Summicron Collapsable f2
Canon LTM 50 f1.4
Carl Zeiss Jenna Sonnar F2
Jupiter 8 (kiev)

There you go, I did not put in the 55 Takumars as they are, well 5mm off the mark but they are some of my favourites.

Bill

gnashings · May 1, 2006

Bentley Boyd said:
I don't know which is the absolute "best" 50mm standard lens Tony, I'm very happy with with my Canon FDn 50mm f1.4, most of the major marque manufacturers make excellent flagship lenses of this focal length, the lens I have is the best because it fits my cameras.

OFF WITH HIS HEAD!

How dare you assault the majesty of this thread with your simplistic opinions!
If, and its a big IF, you are allowed to live in the light of this blunder, you are to leave at once and not return unless you have at least 50 different 50mm lenses tested, your findings backed with mind boggling mdf charts and lines per mm, colour rendition and contrast at variations so minute as to not be distiguishible by the human eye!!! Also, try to have early, middle of the run and late examples of each lens if you really want to be taken seriously.

just my sense of humour of course... please don't shoot

Peter.

PS However, feel free to verbally abuse me for the pre-teen levels of emoticon abuse. That I deserve...

T42 · May 1, 2006

Hello Bill and Forum.

I have a similar experience. I am of the view that most popular brand name 50 primes are good. I don't count bricks, so my sentiments are not based on any absolute science, nor on MTF charts, but just on what I think I see in the images I have made.

I have these:

CZJ Tessar 50mm f/2.8 single coated (1951?)
Summicron Collapsable 50mm f/2 (1954)
Nikkor 50mm f/2, (1960's)
M42 - Yashinon 50mm f/1.7 (1967)
Jupiter 8 (Soviet Sonnar) (1969)
Nikkor 50mm f1.4 (1970's)
Rokkor 50mm f/1.7 (1980's)

For most applications, I would about as soon shoot with the cheap Jupiter 8 as with the costly Summicron. Any of the listed lenses is up to the task for normal shooting. I don't have a favorite.

Henry

Soeren · May 1, 2006

No this ain't about D****** it's one of the early "Sunday Morning Photographer" articles.

http://luminous-landscape.com/columns/sm-02-09-22.shtml

Cheers, Søren

Ole · May 1, 2006

Anyone tried an Industar-61 L/D? I have, and I was surprised!

benjiboy · May 1, 2006

gnashings said:
OFF WITH HIS HEAD!

How dare you assault the majesty of this thread with your simplistic opinions!
If, and its a big IF, you are allowed to live in the light of this blunder, you are to leave at once and not return unless you have at least 50 different 50mm lenses tested, your findings backed with mind boggling mdf charts and lines per mm, colour rendition and contrast at variations so minute as to not be distiguishible by the human eye!!! Also, try to have early, middle of the run and late examples of each lens if you really want to be taken seriously.

just my sense of humour of course... please don't shoot

Peter.

PS However, feel free to verbally abuse me for the pre-teen levels of emoticon abuse. That I deserve...

Hi' Peter, if being abused to pre-teen levels turns you on " I hope your rabbit dies, and you can't sell the hutch " . Life's too short mate, I prefer to spend whatever time and money I have available to learn more about how to improve my photograpy, not my M.T.F curves, or micro-negative image contrast. I use Canon F.D. lenses and rely on their knowledge and expertise in lens manufacture.
Best Wishes.

ricksplace · May 1, 2006

I have used quite a mixed bag of 50's over the years too. My favs are my 1.4 SMC Takumar, industar 61 and the 50/f2 Xenon on my Retina IIIc (now there's a lens no-one has mentioned yet).

butterflydream · May 1, 2006

I would vote for all the Tessar design lenses, Tessar, Elmar and Industar.
Late "Red scale" Elmar is one of favorites, but very early uncoated Nickel Elmar also makes nice B&W photos.

titrisol · May 1, 2006

I think I like most of the 50s I have, Nkkors, Takumars, Rokkors, Tessars, etc.
but the Super Takumar 55/1.8 is the one i love the most.

gnashings · May 2, 2006

Bentley Boyd said:
Hi' Peter, if being abused to pre-teen levels turns you on " I hope your rabbit dies, and you can't sell the hutch " . Life's too short mate, I prefer to spend whatever time and money I have available to learn more about how to improve my photograpy, not my M.T.F curves, or micro-negative image contrast. I use Canon F.D. lenses and rely on their knowledge and expertise in lens manufacture.
Best Wishes.

Not my rabbit!!!!
I am glad someone does those tests... but I think that the engineers at Canon probably have a pretty good handle on that end of it - so I am with you here, in case anyone didn't get that out of my previous (admittedly smart-assed and sarcastic) post. Oh, one more thing: I had a 50mm SSC 1.4, it was stolen. Now I have the 50mm 1.4 nFD. I like the feel of the old lens better, but optically, I'll be damned if I can tell the difference... I can tell the difference between those and my 1.8, but only under certain very specific conditions. 99 times out of a hundred its better than I am.
And I am in an anonymous program in order to control my use of smiley faces in what I type... lest I become a teen-age girl.

Peter.

The best 50 ever?

Mick Fagan

JohnArs

David A. Goldfarb

Moderator

Ted Harris

timbo10ca

PhotoJim

benjiboy

Dan Fromm

Richard Wasserman

Dan Fromm

timbo10ca

Tom Hoskinson

mcgrattan

Dave Parker

Claire Senft

Uncle Bill

gnashings

T42

Soeren

Ole

Moderator

benjiboy

ricksplace

butterflydream

titrisol

gnashings

The best 50 ever?

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