Oh, Dante/Petkal, Shhh: 50 f1.2

Thanks MDJAK, i think those tests , particularily if the bill is held up will tell a lot of this lens. If you have time , take the odd one focussing at a decent distance as this is another area the 1.4 falls down for many.

Monte Zucker is great. I attended his seminar with Eddie Tapp last weekend. Sadly, he announced that just days prior to the seminar, he had been diagnosed with a terminal form of cancer. I don't know the details or nature of the cancer, but he did say he had been told that he only has a year to live. They ended the seminar with a slide show of Monte's work past and present done to the tune of "You are so Beautiful" by Kenny Rogers, an embrace between him and Eddie, and a standing ovation from all in attendance. It was a very emotional evening.

He told us it is pancreatic cancer. I saw him again today at the PhotoPlusExpo at the Javits Center. he received a standing ovation there also.

I retested the 50 f1.2 today. I'll be posting a link to shots shortly.

Should I PP them in any way, standard sharpening, etc., or do you want to see them right out of the camera?

me

Could you do a couple of before and after PP? (not that I want much...) (...well except this lens for Christmas)....

Your wish is my command.

BTW, Ronald, unless I'm mistaken, which I don't believe I am, the front element of the 35 looked larger to me. Just an aside.

mark

Stay tuned. I'm working on 'em. I shot 240 pictures today.

I'm not going to say that I'm anxious to see them, but I am!

http://www.pbase.com/m​djak/various&page=3

the first shot is of a Canon rep. Full exif data is below each of the three pictures.

Second two are a $20 bill, first unsharpened, second sharpened.

first shot is 1.8, shot of bills are 1.2

Interesting, upon opening the shots in camera raw, I received a warning that my software does not support printing of bank notes. How the heck did it know what it was seeing? Twilight Zone material.

me

f1.8 is definitely sweet on that lens! I think it's better than the 1.8 at 1.8!

If you post anymore from that lens, will you link 'em? And thanks so much for doing this!

Mark - Thanks for sharing these. The "distance2" at 1.2 is promising.

Well, plain and simple, I suck at testing. I even brought my tripod so there would be as few side issues as possible. But today it was so crowded, they didn't allow me to use my camera, so I couldn't put their camera on the tripod as I didn't have an allen wrench to take off my RRS QR plate.

The last two shots, first unsharpened and second sharpened, both at 1.2 (obviously) I believe show this to be a very good lens wide open.

I tried my best to take note of its focus speed today, and it locked on as I moved around without delay, never hunted and never overshot the focus.

The rest of the day I used my 85L and got some decent shots, though I did notice it to be slower focusing than the new 50. (I don't have the new, improved 85, though I have tried that. I feel the new 50 is even faster focusing that the new 85)

me

Permagrin wrote in post #2217288
f1.8 is definitely sweet on that lens! I think it's better than the 1.8 at 1.8!

If you post anymore from that lens, will you link 'em? And thanks so much for doing this!

They are all on www.pbase.com/mdjak (under the VARIOUS gallery, on page 3 and 4.)

With the canon rep where did you intend focus. It looks to struggle a bit at F1.2 closeup but by converse of the F1.4 seems to behave better with distance. At F1.8 it seems to have its act more or less together. Thanks a million for posting the results.

Looks very promising. I think that the $20 shots are hampered a bit by noise, elsewise, they'd be crisper. 1.8 looks very good, better than the 50/1.4 at that aperture. The shot of the Canon rep at 1.2 is sharp on the focus plane, and also demonstrates the shallowness of the DOF. I notice that the background highlights are rendered quite smooth wide open. This is shaping up to be a nice lens.

Pardon me while I drool.

BTW, thanks for posting these shots!

http://www.pbase.com/m​djak/various&page=4

Another distance shot, sharpened, 1.2, and then a crop of it @100 percent.

me

MDJAK wrote in post #2217151
BTW, Ronald, unless I'm mistaken, which I don't believe I am, the front element of the 35 looked larger to me. Just an aside.

Eh...either way, they're both 72mm. That's extra weird that the glass on the 35 looked bigger, considering if they're both the same filter size, and the 35 has the border around the outside of the glass before the actual barrel, the 50 must be tiny (unless it was just an illusion of size).

The shots look fantastic to me. Great saturation and contrast, nice even unsharpened, and 1.2 looks ten times better than the 1.4 wide open. The DoF is just sooooo thin, I think people look at the wrong parts to judge for sharpness. Being able to use a lens (besides the 35L) at 1.4 and get respectably sharp shots is awfully nice.