Zeiss 55mm f/1.4 Distagon (Video)

2013-02-15 • SEND FEEDBACK |
Related: apochromatic, CameraTrends, Zeiss, Zeiss APO, Zeiss Distagon, Zeiss DSLR Lenses, Zeiss Lenses, Zeiss Otus, Zeiss Otus 55mm f/1.4 APO-Distagon

See my previous discussion of the 55/1.4 Distagon as well as the preliminary coverage in Guide to Zeiss.

Dr. Hubert Nasse of Carl Zeiss discusses the development of the new 55mm f/1.4 Distagon in a video over at the Carl Zeiss blog.

Some notes—

• Why is it so big? Because it needs 12 elements to achieve its stunning performance.
• What is really better as compared to a conventional ~50mm lens? The superb high contrast wide open into the corners even in backlighting due in good measure to the great reduction of optical aberrations.
• Are the sample images really at f/4? No, the outstanding image quality occurs wide open at f/1.4 into the corners.
• “The best fast 50mm ever”.
• Development time was relatively short (one year) because of deep experience in building cine lenses.
• Dr. Nasse checked many existing 50mm lenses: “images decorated by a lot of artifacts... contrast is generally low, as opposed to deep blacks wide open with the 55/1.4 with high fidelity reproduction”.

My sense based on the description from Zeiss is that the 55/1.4 Distagon is likely to reach near optimal results by f/2 - f/2.8, which would be a stunning achievement for an f/1.4 DSLR lens. But perhaps most unusual might be the claimed high contrast wide open at f/1.4 which would make it truly unique among f/1.4 DSLR lenses (though the new Sigma 35/1.4 is astonishing at f/1.4)— high contrast at f/1.4 along with pleasing blur is an enticing combination.

Zeiss super-high-spec 55mm f/1.4 for Nikon and Canon DSLRS