Zeiss Otus 55mm f/1.4 APO-Distagon feedback needed

ndwgolf

ndwgolf

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Neil Williams
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Yesterday I was at one of the local camera dealers shop and while making a small purchase I noticed that he had a new Zeiss Otus 55mm f1.4 sitting on the shelf. I asked if I could have a wee look at it so we took it out of the box and the first thing that I noticed was that it was heavy. not 70/200 heavy but probably as heavy as my 14/24mm f2.8. Anyway we talked about price and it worked out pretty much the same price as in the US $4k. When I got home last night I watched some videos on youtube about this lens and it was impressive. So my question to the forum is does anyone on this forum have this lens and if so how do they find it. I did ask a photographer friend of mine that has this lens and he said it spends most of the time in his dry box but when I asked him if he wanted to sell it he said he would never sell it...................that in itself says something.
As always any feedback will be much appreciated
 
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Compare it to the Sigma 50 Art on DXO, I think theres a few Otus owners on here but for me I would prefer the better performamnce of the SIgma!!!
 
I did ask a photographer friend of mine that has this lens and he said it spends most of the time in his dry box but when I asked him if he wanted to sell it he said he would never sell it...................that in itself says something.
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yes, it says your friend has too much money and doesn't take enough pictures :p
 
ndwgolf said:
Guy's
Yesterday I was at one of the local camera dealers shop and while making a small purchase I noticed that he had a new Zeiss Otus 55mm f1.4 sitting on the shelf. I asked if I could have a wee look at it so we took it out of the box and the first thing that I noticed was that it was heavy. not 70/200 heavy but probably as heavy as my 14/24mm f2.8. Anyway we talked about price and it worked out pretty much the same price as in the US $4k. When I got home last night I watched some videos on youtube about this lens and it was impressive. So my question to the forum is does anyone on this forum have this lens and if so how do they find it. I did ask a photographer friend of mine that has this lens and he said it spends most of the time in his dry box but when I asked him if he wanted to sell it he said he would never sell it...................that in itself says something.
As always any feedback will be much appreciated
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twist said:
I think Laudrup has it.
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Twist is correct I've got the Otus. Had it since it was basically released in the UK. Weight wise it is about 24-70 heavy and balances almost the same. It's an incredible performer at f/1.4 right into the corners where the Sigma can't match it. Just an ultra high performance lens. If you wait a few more months they are releasing an 85mm f/1.4 Otus which may suit your style more. Also have a look at the Sigma 50 ART and the Zeiss 55mm f/1.8 on the A7R.
 
The Zeiss 55mm f/1.8 is so sweet... I am tempted to buy one :(
 
Laudrup said:
Twist is correct I've got the Otus. Had it since it was basically released in the UK. Weight wise it is about 24-70 heavy and balances almost the same. It's an incredible performer at f/1.4 right into the corners where the Sigma can't match it. Just an ultra high performance lens. If you wait a few more months they are releasing an 85mm f/1.4 Otus which may suit your style more. Also have a look at the Sigma 50 ART and the Zeiss 55mm f/1.8 on the A7R.
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I got the 55mm Zeiss 1.8 for the a7r already........fantastically sharp lens
 
What body would you use the 55mm otus on, and what are your plans for focussing? :)

I have the CZ 35mm 1.4 Distagon on my 5dM3 - if it weren't for magic lantern it'd be a real pain for me. Fine for stationary subjects, but stuff that moves.. headache:/ (Wide open mind you)

I considered if I were to have this canikon CZ glass on an A7R - but wondered then if it's worth it compared to native zeiss glass for the A7R.. hmm
 
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I am going to have a test try with my mates Otus on Monday on my D800e...............If I can nail the focus looking through the OVF then I will get one, I will also get to try it at night so will see what it is like to focus at night.
I am at the age now where my eyes are not that great and trying to nail my M and Noctilux is now very much hit and miss...........with 90% more miss
 
Definitely try before you buy if you can but you won't enjoy trying to focus it at f/1.4 on a DSLR. The Leica 50mm f/2 APO might be worth looking at before they increase the price by $900 if you want an exceptional 50. The A7R looks to be the perfect mate for manual focus lenses with its focus peaking. If you have the 55 on the A7R I'd be tempted to skip the Otus.
 
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Laudrup said:
Definitely try before you buy if you can but you won't enjoy trying to focus it at f/1.4 on a DSLR. The Leica 50mm f/2 APO might be worth looking at before they increase the price by $900 if you want an exceptional 50. The A7R looks to be the perfect mate for manual focus lenses with its focus peaking.
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I am struggling to nail focus with my M with any lenses......I tried a 1.4 diopter I tried a EVF I just find it hard to nail a face/eyes ...........I am still shooting without glasses as I just need glasses for reading
 
If you're struggling with the M at manual focus then you will really struggle with the Otus and miss a lot of shots at f/1.4. You could stop it down but you lose some of the magic. If you are using a tripod and magnified live view with studio lighting then you will be fine but the Sigma 50mm ART with autofocus sounds tailor made for you. Have a play with the Otus and see what you think.
 
Sell all your DSLR gear and get a Sony A7 / A7R and Zeiss 55mm f/1.8.
As mentioned the Sony has great manual focusing abilities so you could even keep all your Nikon glass and usual MF on the Sony?

Plus it's smeller and lighter.

Few negatives compared to DSLR's are:-
Slower AF Tracking so not ideal for sports shooting.
Poor battery life
Not many native FE lenses available yet

I've moved from a DSLR to a A7, no regrets so far :)
 
ndwgolf said:
Guy's
Yesterday I was at one of the local camera dealers shop and while making a small purchase I noticed that he had a new Zeiss Otus 55mm f1.4 sitting on the shelf. I asked if I could have a wee look at it so we took it out of the box and the first thing that I noticed was that it was heavy. not 70/200 heavy but probably as heavy as my 14/24mm f2.8. Anyway we talked about price and it worked out pretty much the same price as in the US $4k. When I got home last night I watched some videos on youtube about this lens and it was impressive. So my question to the forum is does anyone on this forum have this lens and if so how do they find it. I did ask a photographer friend of mine that has this lens and he said it spends most of the time in his dry box but when I asked him if he wanted to sell it he said he would never sell it...................that in itself says something.
As always any feedback will be much appreciated
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I've looked at images taken with the Nikkor 50mm 1.4, Otus, and Sigma ART. In all honesty, without knowing which was which, I am not confident I'd be able to tell which image was taken with which lens. I was seriously considering the longer focal length Otus when it arrives, purely for studio work, but looking at the 55 images, I'm not convinced it's worth the money. I regularly print up to and beyond A1 as well.

Here's a night time city scape taken on a D800 with the Otus 55mm
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7407/9782168481_51d3851506_o.jpg

Here's a city scape taken on a D800 with a Nikkor 50mm f1.8G
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23953768/_DSC2914.jpg

My image is straight off cam too.. not even a lens profile applied, and certainly no sharpening. I I apply a lens profile, the nikkor shot gets demonstrably better.


It appears that those Otus images have had sharpening applied too. Yes, it's sharper wide open... that's really the only thing I can say about it. I'm wondering how useful that is though.

Does someone want to explain where the extra £3000 is going? reckon it's going on getting great figures on lens test charts only because I can see no reason to actually justify it's price.


I challenge anyone on here who owns one to post up a RAW file that actually demonstrates why it costs £3k. There ya go... the gauntlet is down. Put your mouth where your money is :)


Seriously. The figures are tempting, but when you actually look at real life images taken with various lenses it makes you really question what the hell you were thinking.
 
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Rizvan said:
Sell all your DSLR gear and get a Sony A7 / A7R and Zeiss 55mm f/1.8.
As mentioned the Sony has great manual focusing abilities so you could even keep all your Nikon glass and usual MF on the Sony?

Plus it's smeller and lighter.

Few negatives compared to DSLR's are:-
Slower AF Tracking so not ideal for sports shooting.
Poor battery life
Not many native FE lenses available yet

I've moved from a DSLR to a A7, no regrets so far :)
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Got that already but want to get the Otus if I can make it work
 
Just to add... we know little about you Neil. You may be a very wealthy man, in which case, go for it... but if not... (shrug).
 
You can get the Otus for Nikon mount and then get the Nikon to FE adaptor?
That way you can use it on both? :)
 
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ndwgolf said:
FE adapter is for Sony right.......
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Yes you can buy all kinds of different adaptors to allow you to mount nearly any lens to the A7.
Metabones, Novoflex etc.
The Metabones MK4 adaptor for Canon EF mount also allows Auto Focus albeit a little slower in speed compared to the standard native Sony FE lenses.
All the rest are generally MF only.

I only have the Zeiss 24-70mm f4 at the moment but kind of enjoy using manual focus with it.
So I may get some cheap Minolta/Canon glass with a adaptor.

I find MF on the A7 so easy to use...... never really given MF a though in the past with my Nikon :)
 
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The only time I was ever happy with manual focus with a DSLR was when doing macro/close up or otherwise focusing on something that was very big in the frame. How else are you going to judge focus with a manual lens on an unaided optical system? When zone focusing or hyperfocal manual focus is ok because you aren't trying to achieve critical focus through the VF. Personally I just hated trying to focus manually on something that wasn't massive in the frame with a DSLR. RF's are a joy to use in comparison to a DSLR IMVHO but the real winner for manual focus is IMVHO a Compact System Cameras as you have peaking and a magnified view. Manual focusing with my Panasonic's or Sony A7 is a joy and my hit rate is extremely high, assuming I have the time :D

Personally I wouldn't even consider buying a leading edge manual lens for use on a DSLR but if I was in love with a manual lens I would consider buying a CSC to use it on.
 
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Strangely enough I was watching YouTube video's from Zeiss and happened to watch the Zeiss Otus one. The looked very lush :)
Infact I think the lens is twice the weight of the A7 :eek:
 
Pookeyhead said:
I've looked at images taken with the Nikkor 50mm 1.4, Otus, and Sigma ART. In all honesty, without knowing which was which, I am not confident I'd be able to tell which image was taken with which lens. I was seriously considering the longer focal length Otus when it arrives, purely for studio work, but looking at the 55 images, I'm not convinced it's worth the money. I regularly print up to and beyond A1 as well.

Here's a night time city scape taken on a D800 with the Otus 55mm
https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7407/9782168481_51d3851506_o.jpg

Here's a city scape taken on a D800 with a Nikkor 50mm f1.8G
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23953768/_DSC2914.jpg

My image is straight off cam too.. not even a lens profile applied, and certainly no sharpening. I I apply a lens profile, the nikkor shot gets demonstrably better.


It appears that those Otus images have had sharpening applied too. Yes, it's sharper wide open... that's really the only thing I can say about it. I'm wondering how useful that is though.

Does someone want to explain where the extra £3000 is going? reckon it's going on getting great figures on lens test charts only because I can see no reason to actually justify it's price.


I challenge anyone on here who owns one to post up a RAW file that actually demonstrates why it costs £3k. There ya go... the gauntlet is down. Put your mouth where your money is :)


Seriously. The figures are tempting, but when you actually look at real life images taken with various lenses it makes you really question what the hell you were thinking.
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The exif on your image said 70mm @ f/5.6. Show us a 50G shot wide open against the Otus.
 
I just checked on Wex, it costs £3169 :eek: is it that much better than the native FE 55mm f/1.8? :)
 
might be worth getting you leica calibrated, me and my dad tried a couple and I think we had barely any dud pics :-O
 
Laudrup said:
The exif on your image said 70mm @ f/5.6. Show us a 50G shot wide open against the Otus.
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If I've made a mistake, then that has to be a shot with the 24-70 f2.8, so if we can't tell between a shot with the Otus and one with a zoom lens, then this REALLY makes my point... and, why would anyone take a shot like this wide open?

I've already admitted it's better wide open, but as I said (and you ignored) how much use is that, and is it worth £3000? As for the shot I posted, why would anyone every shoot something like that wide open? I can only think that the kind of shot you'd want to shoot wide open, edge to edge sharpness is not going to be an issue anyway, as we're talking portraits most likely. However, here's a shot with the Nikkor 50mm 1.8G wide open. I chose this one as the area in focus is towards the edge of the frame. Bear in mind this was probably ISO400 or 800 if I recall.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23953768/_DSC2758.jpg


So.. where's the £3K going? I can see every pore and spot.. that'll print to A1 easily. I was all for buying the 85mm version when it launches, but the more I looked at the images from the 55mm, the more I realised I was probably going to be spending even more than £3K on something that wasn't going to give me anything my Nikkor 85mm 1.4G can't. £3K could buy me a new Epson 7900 for when mine finally kicks the bucket :)
 
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think there's some comparisons online, but it'll show up more in some pics than others, and having great kit is nice, but the idea is to have really good gear so your pictures are going to have better quality, even if its the same picture you could take with a holga ;-)
 
Pookeyhead said:
If I've made a mistake, then that has to be a shot with the 24-70 f2.8, so if we can't tell between a shot with the Otus and one with a zoom lens, then this REALLY makes my point... and, why would anyone take a shot like this wide open?

I've already admitted it's better wide open, but as I said (and you ignored) how much use is that, and is it worth £3000? As for the shot I posted, why would anyone every shoot something like that wide open? I can only think that the kind of shot you'd want to shoot wide open, edge to edge sharpness is not going to be an issue anyway, as we're talking portraits most likely. However, here's a shot with the Nikkor 50mm 1.8G wide open. I chose this one as the area in focus is towards the edge of the frame. Bear in mind this was probably ISO400 or 800 if I recall.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23953768/_DSC2758.jpg


So.. where's the £3K going? I can see every pore and spot.. that'll print to A1 easily. I was all for buying the 85mm version when it launches, but the more I looked at the images from the 55mm, the more I realised I was probably going to be spending even more than £3K on something that wasn't going to give me anything my Nikkor 85mm 1.4G can't. £3K could buy me a new Epson 7900 for when mine finally kicks the bucket :)
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I don't know what you thought you could tell between that comparison. Shot with a D800E vs D800, 55mm vs 70mm, f/2.8 vs f/5.6, 1/15 vs 10 seconds, ISO 400 vs ISO 100. Shot at different times in different places by different photographers. What can you take from that test? That you can't tell the difference between a £1300 professional zoom at optimal aperture vs a prime not at optimal aperture?
Stop down a lot of cheaper zooms to f/5.6 and then ask 'why does the Nikon 24-70 cost £1300?!'

The 50G shot doesn't look particularly impressive. Shoot it again with an Otus or even the Sigma ART and compare them. As for you buying it and now you're not, who cares?
 
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