24mm Zeiss good but not great, second thoughts on NEX?

Jonas B said:

SLRGear uses an un-known format dependent factor for multiplying their resolution readings. This doesn't work. For example, you get the odd result that a 4/3 sensor format lens, say one of the 25/1.4 lenses, seemingly gets better result than a 50/1.4 lens for FF cameras. That is an odd result as other review methods, when checking sharpness as in LP/IH in the finished image, shows the FF and the 50/1.4 has a higher resolution.

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You have to be more specific and quote what is the basis of your claims. Quick check on photozone shows that 4/3 Panaleica 25/1.4 has a significantly higher resolution compared to FF Canon EF 50mm/1.4 USM in LW/PH ( that is in comparable units).

http://www.photozone.de/Reviews/159-canon-ef-50mm-f14-usm-test-report--review?start=1
http://www.photozone.de/olympus--four-thirds-lens-tests/509-leica25f14?start=1

So, in fact, in this case SLRGear results appear to be consistent for cross format comparison.

fermy said:

So, in fact, in this case SLRGear results appear to be consistent for cross format comparison.

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If you want to see the effect he's talking about, look at the NEX Zeiss 24mm on tested on the NEX-5 and compare it to the Sony Zeiss 85mm f/1.4 tested on the A900 in the SLRGear tests. These lenses are about the same in the center of the frame in blur units at similar apertures.

In reality, it would be ridiculous to make the claim that they are as sharp as each other. The full-frame camera + Zeiss lens will humiliate the NEX-5 combined with any lens you care to put on it. The NEX-5 just isn't capable of resolving that much.

"Blur units", whatever they may be, do not compare across formats.

--
A rose by any other name is still a chicken.

fermy said:

Jonas B said:

SLRGear uses an un-known format dependent factor for multiplying their resolution readings. This doesn't work. For example, you get the odd result that a 4/3 sensor format lens, say one of the 25/1.4 lenses, seemingly gets better result than a 50/1.4 lens for FF cameras. That is an odd result as other review methods, when checking sharpness as in LP/IH in the finished image, shows the FF and the 50/1.4 has a higher resolution.

Click to expand...

You have to be more specific and quote what is the basis of your claims. Quick check on photozone shows that 4/3 Panaleica 25/1.4 has a significantly higher resolution compared to FF Canon EF 50mm/1.4 USM in LW/PH ( that is in comparable units).

http://www.photozone.de/Reviews/159-canon-ef-50mm-f14-usm-test-report--review?start=1
http://www.photozone.de/olympus--four-thirds-lens-tests/509-leica25f14?start=1

So, in fact, in this case SLRGear results appear to be consistent for cross format comparison.

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Are you doing this on purpose? You linked the result of 50 mm on an ancient 8 MP Eos 350D camera?? I'm not in anybodies side but you're miss leading also.

Here's on FF (The FF wins)
http://www.photozone.de/canon_eos_ff/564-canon50f14ff?start=1

--
Cheers, Reza

kev777zero said:

it's a matter of choice; do you want higher DR + two less stops of ISO noise + better DOF (NEX),or do you want better optics (M4/3)?

I made the latter choice first, only to have regretting it & switching to NEX.

Click to expand...

I really think NEX users do not live in reality. They have their own dream world where Sony is going release an EVF for the NEX 5 and also release a bunch of "great" new lenses in the next few months.

Now we have a silly claim of "2 less stops of ISO noise"! I have used a GH2 and NEX 5N an can tell you in the REAL world that is completely false.

In fact the Sony A65 and A77 seems to have MORE noise than my GH2 and the NEX 7 is only 1/2 a stop better than those cameras which means it amy equal the GH2.

As for DoF, NEX gives that up with smaller apertures. F/3.5 for a prime lens? F/6.3 for a zoom!

So, what we do know is that the m43 lenses are significantly better than the NEX lenses. Virtually every review has proven that....oh and there are a lot more m43 lenses too!

Everdog said:

kev777zero said:

it's a matter of choice; do you want higher DR + two less stops of ISO noise + better DOF (NEX),or do you want better optics (M4/3)?

I made the latter choice first, only to have regretting it & switching to NEX.

Click to expand...

I really think NEX users do not live in reality. They have their own dream world where Sony is going release an EVF for the NEX 5 and also release a bunch of "great" new lenses in the next few months.

Now we have a silly claim of "2 less stops of ISO noise"! I have used a GH2 and NEX 5N an can tell you in the REAL world that is completely false.

In fact the Sony A65 and A77 seems to have MORE noise than my GH2 and the NEX 7 is only 1/2 a stop better than those cameras which means it amy equal the GH2.

As for DoF, NEX gives that up with smaller apertures. F/3.5 for a prime lens? F/6.3 for a zoom!

So, what we do know is that the m43 lenses are significantly better than the NEX lenses. Virtually every review has proven that....oh and there are a lot more m43 lenses too!

Click to expand...

my bad I had the EPL1 so I can't speak for GH2 (one of the few m4/3 cameras w/out that crappy 12mp sensor). I had some of the oly zooms & the pana 20mm 1.7, over a year. I liked it but compared to a 5N kit I think m4/3 (at least the olympus side) is really not competitive.

lens selection+optics quality is overrated when you can't pay for them. most people can take decent photos without dropping a couple grand. In real world comparisons I don't really see much of a difference in the NEX kit/pancake lens & the m4/3 ones; both of them uses in-body corrections anyways (I do miss the 40mm equiv POV though).
--



http://www.wix.com/drkevinlyu/photography

Fermy: You have to be more specific and quote what is the basis of your claims. Quick check on photozone shows that 4/3 Panaleica 25/1.4 has a significantly higher resolution compared to FF Canon EF 50mm/1.4 USM in LW/PH ( that is in comparable units)...So, in fact, in this case SLRGear results appear to be consistent for cross format comparison.

Fermy Photozone has begged readers for years not to try to interpret any resolution numbers between tests on different cameras. For this reason they have finally (as of this week) STOPPED publishing numbers for their lens resolution test results. A sample post from one of the 'Zone's forum, from one of the main Photozone staffers:

mousefire: Why not show resolution data just as M43's? That will show a resolution potential of different systems...

Photozone's Markus: Because the LW/PH numbers have often been used for direct comparisons, even though we clearly stated that this is invalid . And in addition: because the numbers we publish have wrongly been accused, in one case even publicly by a competing site, to be invalid. -- Markus /

Plus let me appeal to your sense of logic, and remind you that SLRgear publishes the results from looking at camera JPEGs . Of course such results have some relevance to people who are using in-camera JPEGs, but as others here have said, it's not a healthy basis for making quantitative cross-camera comparisons as to a lens' precise resolution potential .

And as others here have also implied, all we really care about is how sharp a print looks from a certain sensor, we don't care about theoretical line pairs per millimeter resolution. Thus if I'm using an 8x10 inch view camera, and my lens "only" resolves 10 lines per millimeter, it really is a good lens for that format. I will not get 8 times sharper prints from my APS-C-coverage-only Rodagon 28mm enlarger lens, that will do 80 lines per millimeter.

Meaning someone shouldn't get the Sony eMount 24mm if they see someone on this forum post a carefully focused unsharpened tripod raw photo from a production lens, where they don't like the resolution, and they can also see next to it an unsharpened tripod raw photo from another lens of the same focal length on the same camera of the same scene, and that second lens image looks higher-resolution to them. If you haven't seen that kind of careful comparison, you don't really have accurate information for predicting how much you will like or dislike a certain lens' resolution.

I saw a fabulous photo from an old Canon 24mm F2.8 lens on this forum (Alupang's?), I know that it's a sharp lens even at F2.8, much more meaningful to me than reading test numbers.

An even quicker look at photozone -at the top of their opening page on lense tests- gives us this warning:

Please note that the tests results are not comparable across the different systems! This does also apply for the new EOS tests based on the EOS 50D because of differences in the sensor system (e.g. AA-filter) as well as different RAW-converters.

fermy said:

fermy wrote:

You have to be more specific and quote what is the basis of your claims. Quick check on photozone shows that 4/3 Panaleica 25/1.4 has a significantly higher resolution compared to FF Canon EF 50mm/1.4 USM in LW/PH ( that is in comparable units).

http://www.photozone.de/Reviews/159-canon-ef-50mm-f14-usm-test-report--review?start=1
http://www.photozone.de/olympus--four-thirds-lens-tests/509-leica25f14?start=1

So, in fact, in this case SLRGear results appear to be consistent for cross format comparison.

Click to expand...

So, in fact at least photozne explicitly warns against the sort of comparison you are trying to make

Everdog said:

kev777zero said:

it's a matter of choice; do you want higher DR + two less stops of ISO noise + better DOF (NEX),or do you want better optics (M4/3)?

I made the latter choice first, only to have regretting it & switching to NEX.

Click to expand...

I really think NEX users do not live in reality. They have their own dream world where Sony is going release an EVF for the NEX 5 and also release a bunch of "great" new lenses in the next few months.

Now we have a silly claim of "2 less stops of ISO noise"! I have used a GH2 and NEX 5N an can tell you in the REAL world that is completely false.

Click to expand...

http://www.dxomark.com/index.php/Cameras/Compare-Camera-Sensors/Compare-cameras-side-by-side/%28appareil1%29/737 |0/%28brand%29/Sony/%28appareil2%29/677|0/%28brand2%29/Panasonic/%28appareil3%29/438|0/%28brand3%29/Nikon

Overal score:

GH2 60
5N 77
D700 81

Sensor size still shows a trend here

Re DR, 5N is 1.5 stops better and ISO is nearly double better the GH2. It has to be given the sensor size.

Everdog said:

In fact the Sony A65 and A77 seems to have MORE noise than my GH2 and the NEX 7 is only 1/2 a stop better than those cameras which means it amy equal the GH2.

As for DoF, NEX gives that up with smaller apertures. F/3.5 for a prime lens? F/6.3 for a zoom!

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hehe.. No problem, I use my Leica 35 lux M and ZM 50 f/2 Planar on 5N. I dont like using AF lenses. I need only a digital back for the lenses.

Everdog said:

So, what we do know is that the m43 lenses are significantly better than the NEX lenses. Virtually every review has proven that....oh and there are a lot more m43 lenses too!

Click to expand...

Agreed.

But instead of critisizing on NEX like you always do, a wiser thing to do is just enjoy your GH2. Your posting history doesn't show you haven't any love for NEX.

Personally, the 2x crop of that tiny sensor is handicap for me; too much dof, low DR+high ISO, lower per pixel sharpness, poor shadow recovery, less latitude in PP etc etc. But I dont go in m43 forums preaching how crappy their sensors are?

--
Cheers, Reza

Everdog wrote:

First mister Everdog, may I ask you why you are on this forum? Y ou show in every post that you don't own, don't like and don't wanmt a Nex camera. So what are you doing here?

I find that all the mirrorless cameras give great IQ. On M43 the lens quality might be a little better, on the Nex the sensor quality might be a bit better. So my opinion is: go with the camera you like best and stop trolling arouind.

Everdog said:

kev777zero said:

it's a matter of choice; do you want higher DR + two less stops of ISO noise + better DOF (NEX),or do you want better optics (M4/3)?

I made the latter choice first, only to have regretting it & switching to NEX.

Click to expand...

I really think NEX users do not live in reality.

Click to expand...

Well why are you making such stupid and untrue statement?

I think that most (I know not all, but the same goes for some people who use other cameras) are living in the reality. They know that the Nex have less lenses then the M43, they know Sony is comming with some new lenses in the next few moth ( the 55-210 zoom, the 50mm 1.8 stabilizes prime, maybe some more interesting lenses next year) They know that a terrible flood ended production in one of Sonys facturies, they know all that.

Everdog said:

They have their own dream world where Sony is going release an EVF for the NEX 5 and also release a bunch of "great" new lenses in the next few months

Click to expand...

Please tell me why this is not the reality. The 50mm 18 lens is the fastest lens with OIS in the world. The first looks are great. The 55-210mm zoom looks very good for its price. So some great lenses will come...

Everdog said:

Now we have a silly claim of "2 less stops of ISO noise"! I have used a GH2 and NEX 5N an can tell you in the REAL world that is completely false.

In fact the Sony A65 and A77 seems to have MORE noise than my GH2 and the NEX 7 is only 1/2 a stop better than those cameras which means it amy equal the GH2.

Click to expand...

But the Nex 5n, that you claim you used, is better in high ISO, when scaled down to the same resolution the Nex7 is not much worse then may other cameras. The Nex 7 shines at lower ISO... Lets compare apples with apples.

Everdog said:

As for DoF, NEX gives that up with smaller apertures. F/3.5 for a prime lens? F/6.3 for a zoom!

Click to expand...

This is a lie and you know it. Show me a lens that is Stabilized with 75mm eq. FL with 1.8 appertture on your belovesd GH2. Sony's 50mm lens is that, and it gives great DOF. To get the same with your M43 you need what apperture?

The 24 mm 1.8 Zeiss lens will give more control over depth of field then any 36mm eq lens on the M43...

Everdog said:

So, what we do know is that the m43 lenses are significantly better than the NEX lenses. Virtually every review has proven that....oh and there are a lot more m43 lenses too!

Click to expand...

Yes there are a lot more m43 lenses then E-mount lenses, we all know. But I think you will find it very hard to find ANY real life difference in pictures taken with a M43 camera with the best M43 lens compared to a picture, taken at the same time, with the same settings (both at low ISO) with any E-mount lens at the same eq. focal length, when the last is croped to a 43 picture.

Pleas Everdog go back to the forum of the camera of your choice and stay there, You won't find me there telling lies over the M43, don't do that here please.

kev777zero said:

my bad I had the EPL1 so I can't speak for GH2 (one of the few m4/3 cameras w/out that crappy 12mp sensor). I had some of the oly zooms & the pana 20mm 1.7, over a year. I liked it but compared to a 5N kit I think m4/3 (at least the olympus side) is really not competitive.

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I tried a PL1 over a year ago, and up to ISO1600 it was very good. You can't use it any higher than that though.

kev777zero said:

lens selection+optics quality is overrated when you can't pay for them. most people can take decent photos without dropping a couple grand. In real world comparisons I don't really see much of a difference in the NEX kit/pancake lens & the m4/3 ones; both of them uses in-body corrections anyways (I do miss the 40mm equiv POV though).

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Also, I should say that the NEX 5N sensor is very, very good. ISO3200 is perfectly usable. People here seem to think I hate the 5N, and yet for over a year I have stated that NEX is Sony's future. I think the goal is to replace the Alpha line.

First of all, don't buy a camera you don't like.

I find it silly that people are buying a camera without handling it first, but that is maybe just me.

Second, the most important thing about a lens is how well it performs as a total with the camera. There is more then sharpness when it comes to IQ, like abberation, vignetting, color, distortion, etc.

I will never pay $1000 or more for a prime lens. The only lens that I own that is over a $1000 is my 70-400 G zoom lens. A great lens. But that is just me, I know many people here are willing that amount of $$ for a prime.

The review you mentioned tells you in the end this:

Considering the price, you would hope that the Sony 24mm ƒ1.8 Sonnar T* ZA didn't disappoint - and happily, it doesn't. Sharpness is excellent even wide open , and other factors such as chromatic aberration, distortion and corner shading are well-controlled. The 24mm ƒ1.8 proves to be an able companion to the NEX camera.

So this is a very good lens indeed, no matter what some on this forum might want to tell you...

viking79 said:

This has already been discussed and has its own thread:
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1042&message=39853788

Eric

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Eric, you give people way too much credit.

It is pretty obvious which lens is better when they talk about how one lens is tack sharp at F/2 and the other other lens is not tack sharp ever.

We are not talking about corners either. In the center, a good lens should be able to be tack sharp.

Some thoughts on lens versus sensor quality:

I have the XZ1 which is one of those "premium" compact cameras with a superb lens and a small sensor. The lens is so good that it outresolves the sensor and you can process the raw file to increase quality by a large amount. But in regards of color rendition and dynamic range, the sensor sets hard limits the lens cannot compensate.
And doing the raw file is hard work, though I learned a lot from this.

Now I know that M43 are supposed to be way better than the XZ1, but they are similar in that the sensor, not the lens seems to be the limiting factor.

The 5N with a kit lens in contrast shows the limits of the lenses especially wide open at 100%. However, when I look at the pictures, they just sort of show the world as I see it looking out of my window - natural.

My point being (and I am going to be stoned for that) perceived image sharpness can be adjusted easily in post processing, but noise and highlight clipping of a limited sensor are much harder/impossible to correct.

A real eyeopener for me was taking on impulse the JPG OOC test pictures from my Minolta 70-210/3.5-4.5 zoom which are low in contrast, sort of bland. I opened them in Photoshop, opened light tool (CTRL-L) and saw that upper and lower contrast didn't reach the end of the scale (I know it is not a great lens). Simply moving the limits, a little USM and suddenly the picture looked perfectly nice. I didn't even use the raw file.

There is so much potential in the files given by the 5N that getting good pictures is rather easy.

cxsparc said:

My point being (and I am going to be stoned for that) perceived image sharpness can be adjusted easily in post processing, but noise and highlight clipping of a limited sensor are much harder/impossible to correct.

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I don't think you understand photography. Highlight clipping is due to over exposure most of the time. Some cameras with the best sensors are prone to highlight clipping. You need to adjust your settings to avoid it.

Also, noise is an issue on maybe 5% of most images taken? (how often do you shoot over ISO3200?) And even then SW can easily fix it. It may remove some detail, but a bad lens will remove more..and that is on EVERY image.

Everdog said:

It is pretty obvious which lens is better when they talk about how one lens is tack sharp at F/2 and the other other lens is not tack sharp ever.

We are not talking about corners either. In the center, a good lens should be able to be tack sharp.

Click to expand...

Definition of TACK
1 : a small short sharp-pointed nail usually having a broad flat head
2a : the direction of a ship with respect to the trim of her sails

2b : the run of a sailing ship on one tack c : a change when close-hauled from the starboard to the port tack or vice versa d : a zigzag movement on land e : a course or method of action; especially : one sharply divergent from that previously followed
3 : any of various usually temporary stitches
4 : the lower forward corner of a fore-and-aft sail
5 : a sticky or adhesive quality or condition

We use definition one. Notice this isn't a technical term.

Pretend the m4/3 lens would focus on the NEX. Mount the lens to the NEX and you will see the corners are much darker and unusable and you have to crop to approximately m4/3 sensor size to get a usable image.

Can you really say the m4/3 lens is better? It won't function on the Sony NEX.

Eric
--
I never saw an ugly thing in my life: for let the form of an object
be what it may - light, shade, and perspective will always make it
beautiful. - John Constable (quote)

See my Blog at: http://www.erphotoreview.com/ (bi-weekly)
Flickr Photostream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/28177041@N03/ (updated daily)

Hi, the argument about 24mm lens tend to be more difficult to design seems to creep up a lot but I never found out why that is. Can someone explain it to me or direct me to somewhere to read more about it? Thanks

Everdog said:

It is pretty obvious which lens is better when they talk about how one lens is tack sharp at F/2 and the other other lens is not tack sharp ever.

We are not talking about corners either. In the center, a good lens should be able to be tack sharp.

Click to expand...

I wonder why you only see one part of the review and forget the rest. I will show you the conclusion of the review, that tells it all. Remember IQ is mor then only how sharp a lens is. And remember this lens is tested on a camera that don't correct for lens defects and your beatifull m43 is corrected always... (when not corrected there are more defects in your lens then there are in the Zeiss)
Conclusion

Considering the price, you would hope that the Sony 24mm ƒ1.8 Sonnar T ZA didn't disappoint - and happily, it doesn't. Sharpness is excellent even wide open , and other factors such as chromatic aberration, distortion and corner shading are well-controlled. The 24mm ƒ1.8 proves to be an able companion to the NEX camera.

Can you please tell how bad this lens is when it has "excelent sharpness" and all kind of other lens defects are well-controlled?

Don't come with the crap that M43 has in camera lens correction, a corrected lens with serious defects that are corrected is not a better lens with "exelent sharpness" just for being a little sharper (The difference will be hardly noticable in real life pictures)

gfrensen said:

Everdog said:

It is pretty obvious which lens is better when they talk about how one lens is tack sharp at F/2 and the other other lens is not tack sharp ever.

We are not talking about corners either. In the center, a good lens should be able to be tack sharp.

Click to expand...

I wonder why you only see one part of the review and forget the rest. I will show you the conclusion of the review, that tells it all. Remember IQ is mor then only how sharp a lens is. And remember this lens is tested on a camera that don't correct for lens defects and your beatifull m43 is corrected always... (when not corrected there are more defects in your lens then there are in the Zeiss)
Conclusion

Considering the price, you would hope that the Sony 24mm Æ’1.8 Sonnar T ZA didn't disappoint - and happily, it doesn't. Sharpness is excellent even wide open , and other factors such as chromatic aberration, distortion and corner shading are well-controlled. The 24mm Æ’1.8 proves to be an able companion to the NEX camera.

Can you please tell how bad this lens is when it has "excelent sharpness" and all kind of other lens defects are well-controlled?

Click to expand...

Don't tell Everdog this. He is M4/3 troll and was hoping Zeiss will turn out to be a dud. It didn't. It's now one of the best 36mm eqv FF lens on any mirrorless camera.

Good question, why is it much harder to design an excellent-sharpness wide angle lens than a similar sharpness "normal lens". The short answer is, look down at the ground, at a newspaper at your feet. Perhaps it is 1.5 to 2 meters away from you. See what you can read while you are staring straight down at the newspaper. Now, with your head still pointed in the same direction, have someone move the newspaper 6 meters or 20 feet away from you. See how much of the newspaper you can read then. You will find that as your required "angle of view" that you must have with your eyes, to read the newspaper as it scoots farther away from you, becomes quite large. If the newspaper's far enough away, you will need some way eventually of seeing almost 90 degrees off to one side, to read it. Quite difficult, especially without moving your head.

Thus as the angle of view of a lens increases, it very quickly becomes much harder for the back of the lens to "see off to one side" and pick up a sharp image from, say, the edge of a relatively large sensor with an edge quite far away. Then when you realize that the sharpness of the image that a lens can see at the sensor plane, and project out its front, is the same as the sharpness of the image that a lens can see out its front and project out its back, onto the sensor plane, all becomes clear. Or at least as bright and clear as the fourth power of the cosine of the angle of view will allow. Physics joke.

Continuing tripod fun with pre-SSC (1971 model) Canon FD 50mm F1.4, in some ways a perfect lens if you don't count monstrous 370g weight, and size, and lens coatings and lack of automatic features. Think at F4 or F5.6 in rather dimly lit restaurant. The hardest part of photos like this is always, always, getting rid of disproportionately-glaring lint and dust on dark clothing, which is hard to get clients to understand they should pay for.