Beyond L; is Zeiss better?

This may have been asked before so my apologies if so.

I've assembled a pretty decent collection of Canon L lenses that I'm truly happy with and that I've paid a small fortune for. While assembling this collection, I never even thought about third party lenses as I never heard too much about other manufacturers like Carl Zeiss, who have enjoyed a pretty stellar reputation over the years.

Are Zeiss Lenses vastly superior to Canon's L lens line up? Is there even a ready to go line up from them to directly compete or are these products ones which have been designed for other camera systems and then need to be modded to fit on Canon bodies? More to the point, if such lenses are available from Zeiss, are they vastly superior or just marginally better in terms of sharpness or color rendition?

To keep this discussion in focus, let's take about primes only in the more popular focal lengths like 35, 50, 85 and 135mm lengths.

Cheers!

I'm interested in this topic as well. I've been told the Zeiss lens is an amazing piece of glass, but I've never heard any comparisons with the L lens. And as much as Ive drooled over lenses on B&H.com, I don't recall seeing any Zeiss lenses listed in the lens section for Canon bodies.

The Ghost of FM wrote in post #6164476
Are Zeiss Lenses vastly superior to Canon's L lens line up?
Cheers!

Yes, I shot Canon Ls for over a decade. My favorite was always the 135 2.0 but it doesn't hold a candle to any of the Zeiss F mounts.

The Ghost of FM wrote in post #6164476
Is there even a ready to go line up from them to directly compete or are these products ones which have been designed for other camera systems and then need to be modded to fit on Canon bodies?

They're designed for Nikon F mount. You can get a Nikon F-mount to Canon Eos adapter. Some people have reported problems with the 5d mirror hitting some of the Zeiss lenses...but I've tried it on a 10d, 40d, and a couple of Marks with no problems. Some of the adapters have caused problems the Canon electronics...I don't really know which ones did that...but I used the high end novoflex and never had any problems. Just telling you what I know

The only thing that stinks about using Zeiss on Canon is that you have to stop down the lens. For example: If the lens is stopped down to F8 then it will be really dark through the viewfinder....so most people will focus with the lens at wide open and then stop it down for the photograph. It's only like this on Canon...If you use the Zeiss on Nikon then you can set the lens to F8 or other aperture and see just fine through the viewfinder. There is no need to stop down when using the Zeiss on nikon bodies.

The Ghost of FM wrote in post #6164476
More to the point, if such lenses are available from Zeiss, are they vastly superior or just marginally better in terms of sharpness or color rendition?

They're superior in every way. Metal Construction, precise manual focus, control of Chromatic aberrations, neutral but still vibrant color, edge to edge sharpness etc. I've owned all of the Zeiss F mounts and they slay Canon's lineup.

There is some really bad information on forums about Zeiss. A lot of people report problems with CAs but that's because they are overexposing the highlights. With proper exposure and control of highlights it's pretty hard to get the Zeiss lenses to flare or have any noticable CAs.

Are Zeiss lenses for you....are they for everybody? I'd say definitely NO. I don't think people should consider Zeiss unless they are finding problems with CAnon. I shot canon for a decade and tooks lots of great photos. I made lots of money off of my Canon Ls. IT took a long time for me to really see the limits of Canon lenses and that's what prompted me to switch to Zeiss. But if I had used the zeiss before understanding the limitations of my Ls then I probably wouldn't have been impressed. It took me a long time to build the eye necessary to really appreciate Zeiss.

BTW - I don't even shoot canon anymore. I switched to Nikon bodies solely for the reason of shooting Zeiss.

Just one man's opinion...I'm sure that others will have a different experience.

Gentleman Villain, your username is indeed apt Open a can or worms, why dont ya?
I'd say you would have to be very observant and quite a perfectionist to find continual fault with Canon L's. It would only be a small portion the shooting world where an upgrade to Zeiss lenses would render a noticable difference, and it would be an even smaller number where that difference would actually matter.

But I guess it does beg the question, why doesn't Canon get their arse in gear? I suppose cost is a major part of that. From what I've read on these forums even just your garden-variety telescope has vastly surperior optics to Canon lenses, mainly due to much more stringent quality control and manufacturing accuracy. If Canon were to attempt to ramp up production like that the consumer would most likly see a massive price jump in the lenses. And once again, for what it's worth, there would only be a small select few whose work would really benefit from such an improvement in quality. Most of us might notice slighly sharper edges, perhaps, but hey, that's what ACR's for, right?

Canon lenses are probably perfect for 98% of Canon users. I think once somebody starts getting seriously into Zeiss it's probably an indication that he/she might be happier in another system altogether.

One thing that Canon has going for it is that the lower contrast is much more forgiving on skintones. There are a lot of applications where ZEiss lenses may just be too sharp for the subject.

Gentleman Villain,

Thanks for your very informative response!

You mentioned the Zeiss lenses needing to be stopped down to f/8 in order to use them on a Canon body. Why is is? And, if you are stopping down a prime to those sorts of settings, wouldn't they all take on the sort of higher praised accolades that you're attributing to the Zeiss lenses?

Follow up question; As these lenses would be used via adapters, I'm assuming there would be no auto focus any longer, correct?

Cheers!

Gentleman Villain wrote in post #6164848
Canon lenses are probably perfect for 98% of Canon users. I think once somebody starts getting seriously into Zeiss it's probably an indication that he/she might be happier in another system altogether.

One thing that Canon has going for it is that the lower contrast is much more forgiving on skintones. There are a lot of applications where ZEiss lenses may just be too sharp for the subject.

This is a good point. Trying to coax image quality that is beyond what 'L' lenses can deliver out of a DSLR by solely using expensive, manual-focus, third party lenses makes little sense. The very, very slight benefits you'll gain by using some modern Zeiss lenses over their Canon counterparts, pales in comparison to the benefits you'll gain from upgrading to a medium format system or learning advanced post-processing techniques.

I know a bit about the Zeiss lenses built for Contax (C/Y Mount), so that's what this is about.

It depends on what Zeiss you get. I, for instance, have one of their "lower end" (if that phrase can be used to describe Zeiss optics) C/Y (aka Contax) MF film lenses (135mm f/2.8), which is easily adaptable to Canons. I got it used on eBay for $190 and it's a great lens for the price (considering its comparison is my 75-300 Canon). It's colors and contrast are amazing and when focused right it's wall-to-wall sharpness is superb. I don't know how it compares to Canon's 135L, but it's an amazing lens despite it being at the bottom of Zeiss's spectrum.

As far as MFs go, your best off converting C/Y mount lenses of which there is a wide range (a list of them can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.or​g …ses_for_Contax_​SLR_Models) both in models and price (ranging from $150 to $4,500). But Zeiss also offers AF lenses, which were meant to be paired with Contax's failed DSLR line. The G-Mount I beleive they are called (http://en.wikipedia.or​g …ontax#Lenses_fo​r_G-Series), can be converted fully (with AF, metering...) to Canon's mount by Conrus's services (http://en.conurus.com/​index.html). Although I have not used it, it seems to have gained quite a reputation.

But what it all comes down to is personal preference. What I recommend is try out one of Zeiss's lenses (middle of the spectrum I suggest), see how you like it and go from their. I'm glad I have one in my bag, but I can't say if you will prefer them to L's as the two types of lenses are so different.

So that's all I know pretty much, you should also check out the Zeiss/Canon Archive on the site. Hope this helps.

-Henry

To my way of thinking, the ideal thing about having a Canon DSLR is being able to use alternative lenses when the Canon stable just doesn't trip your trigger. Zeiss, Leica are just a few of the many, many great all-time lenses available. You can get sharper, better, color, contrast (lower or higher,) Bokeh, etc. when you have the others to choose form. See my gear list for just a few ideas. I cannot imagine doing without many non-Canon lenses.

Here ya go.
http://www.fredmiranda​.com/forum/topic/58882​9

Have at it.

I've been down this road -- my take is that, sure, there's better glass around. You'll pay for that difference. And, with few exceptions, you'll be MF as a result.

As horton said, it'll be expensive. Yes, other companies make some nice lenses, and zeiss lenses are really good. However, some Canon lenses outdo anything zeiss has, like the 200 1.8 or 200 2.0. Also, zeiss lenses tend to start at a stop slower than the equivalent canon and nikon lenses, but are really good wide open. However, they are also only marginally better than equivalent nikon or canon lenses when stopped down a lot, and in some cases actually worse.

If you have the money and a camera that can do manual focus pretty well, then go for it. Just remember that for the price of one amazing lens you can buy several very good ones (much like L vs non-L)

I used two Zeiss ZS (m42) mounts (50mm and 25mm) and an East German Zeiss Jena 35mm on my 350D before switching to film, and while I don't have a direct sense of comparison with their L counterparts, I certainly never felt the need to 'upgrade' to L.

The issue is not one specifically of technical qualities, as much as one of characteristic, and that is subjective. For my digital camera, the Zeiss Jena, which I bought for under US$200, was like hooking up a tube preamp to a CD player; not the same as analog, but warmer nevertheless; the tones had a more liquid appeal that offset any other possible deficiencies, which were few to begin with.

Of course, Zeiss is not the only option, and Canon bodies are relatively agnostic when accepting other lenses through use of an adaptor…Olympus, Leica R, and Nikon are just a few of the other lenses that you can mount to a Canon EOS body. One lens that has received considerable praise on this forum for both sharpness and bokeh is the Voigtlander APO Lanther 125mm Macro, which briefly came out in Canon mount. The Zeiss Contax 21mm, which cost around US$3,000 used, is remarkably sharp across the frame.

In regards to "expensive," I've already mentioned the price of my Zeiss Jena, and frankly, my brand new Zeiss ZS 50mm cost about the same as the Canon 1.4; I've never spent more than US$700 on a lens; how many L prime lenses fall below that? To be sure, as the Zeiss 21mm proves, some variants, even secondhand, are very costly; but the notion that all of them are esoteric pieces of glass that will require the selling of one's family is erroneous.

The caveat, however, is that you have to use them in manual focus mode and set the aperture on the lens (as other posters have mentioned since I started writing this). To me, this was not a problem, as that is what I prefer, and unlike most of their modern counterparts, the lenses retain the depth-of-field scale, which I frequently use for street photography. As also mentioned by others (I have to type quicker), build quality is unsurpassed.

Although I am a bit of perverse case, it would make little sense for me to pay for auto focus when instead those funds could be directed at purchasing an extremely well crafted lens designed for manual.

This issue is not which one is better than the other, as much as the fact that competition exists. That said, if you are looking at 200mm or longer, then L is the likely choice…if anyone wants to dispute this, please do; I have no loyalties to the L brand.

I own two Zeiss lenses (Contax mount 50 f/1.7 and 85 f/2.8 ). The 50 f/1.7 is superior in sharpness, color and contrast to the Canon 50 f/1.4 in every way. However, the Canon 50 f/1.4 has superior bokeh. My 85 f/2.8 is as good as any L prime...phenomenal contrast, color, sharpness, bokeh, everything.

That said, the 85L and 135L are better than anything in the Zeiss lineup. Canon's telephotos (200mm + ) are generally better than Zeiss telephotos. On the wide end, however, the Zeiss lineup pretty much crushes anything from Canon. The Contax 21mm f/2.8 Distagon is widely considered the best wide angle lens for 35mm format ever created. Some of the new F-mount Zeiss lenses are fantastic, with the new 85 f/1.4 Planar coming darn close to the 85L, and the two macro lenses are fantastic. The 25 and 35 distagons are pretty special as well.

One thing: Zeiss lenses tend to have a very specific look. They have very high microcontrast, which leads to a certain '3D' look to the images. I happen to love that about them, however, many people don't like that drawing style.

Also, my Zeiss 50 f/1.7 is too sharp and contrasty, and with such mediocre bokeh that I do not use it for portraits unless I have to. It's much better suited to non-people applications. For portraits, I use my Zeiss 85 f/2.8, my Canon 100 f/2, or (most of all) my Rokkor 58mm f/1.2, which has such a nice smooth contrast curve and wonderful bokeh.

The Hasselblad Zeiss 180 is maybe the sharpest lens I've ever owned. I can tell ya some of Leicas M glass is all that to. But ya pay for it. I think I paid like 6 grand 15 years ago for the 180 and some of Leica glass makes Ls look price wise like 3rd party.

Thanks for all the additional responses! Some very good links to additional information for me to look into as well.

What sparked my interest in starting this thread was just to see if I had missed an opportunity to pick up a Zeiss lens in place of the L's that I've purchased along the way for similar money and some of you have indicated that, that wouldn't really be the case as I'd need to up my lens budget quite a bit, which I wasn't really prepare to do, nor was I wanting to give up AF in order to secure some better glass.

As I mentioned originally, I am quite happy with my current lens line up.

Cheers!