Poll: what is your preference? 24-70 II @28mm or Zeiss 2/28 ZF

billythek wrote:

Rick Knepper wrote:

billythek wrote:

Note that I am not all that impressed with either photo, but I guess that is because we are looking at the results of RAW files with minimal processing.

These are not intended to pose as finished photos. Other than ACR's standard 25%/.05 radius sharpening (that I use for capture sharpening), there is zero processing (other than to matched WB of several degrees). I've supplied jpeg, tiff and RAW for those who wish to apply their own standard PPing regimen. It's good to know that the thought crossed your mind. In my next posted comparison, I will mention the PPing or lack thereof so that the intention is clear.

I admit I took the lazy road before and just compared the jpegs that were posted (at "original" size).

So I downloaded the cr2 files and went through my normal flow, and these do look more like I'm used to seeing from my 24-70II.

I still can't see a dimes worth of difference between the two. The Zeiss is sharper in the lower right corner, but the Canon looks better to me in the lower left corner.

I figure the foliage shouldn't be compared, since there appears to be a slight breeze looking at the ripples on the water.

The buildings look the same to me. I don't see that either is sharper than the other. The brickwork looks the same, at least to me.

The one noticeable difference is that the Canon appears more underexposed than the Zeiss. I see the Zeiss as being at 2.0 in the Exif, but I assume the camera is just not reading that correctly?

Thanks. Another thing I should mention on future comparisons involving my Zeiss ZF lenses when used on Canon cameras: The EXIF only reports the base aperture of the lens regardless of the actual aperture. For non-CPU lenses, Nikon has a nifty set-up and the aperture gets reported properly.

In general, I like the image from the Canon better, but maybe onlu because the Zeiss appears overexposed to my eye. The histograms for the two lenses look significantly different, so it is not simple to adjust them to match just by adjusting the white point, etc.

So I'll stick with "I can't see a difference", even though there are several. Overall, I don't think the differences matter much.

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- Bill