Zoom Lenses (Page 4): That was an absolutely terrific response to this thread! Especially the last sentence!😜...

chevman Loc: Matthews, North Carolina

larryepage wrote:

I will not pretend to speak for professional photographers. But as a photographic hobbyist, I will observe that every hobby seems to have its proportion of practitioners that can only be described as perfectionists (or in some cases frustrated perfectionists). They seem to know a little more than others, spend more than others, work a little harder than others, carry their noses a little higher in the air than others...you get the idea. I am also a model railroader. In model railroading, those folks are called "rivet counters." The name is descriptive of the disease. The thing is, those folks generally don't tend to be "better" model railroaders than others. In fact, as often as not, their trains don't run as well as those of less obsessive modelers, because time that could be spent on operational considerations or basic maintenance tasks is instead spent fretting on whether battery compartment grills on a particular locomotive model have 10 rows or 11 rows of openings.

Of course, the idea of model railroading is to represent a full-size railroad in miniature...usually in 1/48, 1/64, 1/87 (actually 1/87.1), or 1/160 scale. A reasonable level of accuracy is necessary to do this with a meaningful level of realism. But in truth, very few people, especially old people, are ever going to see the difference between 10 and 11 rows of holes on a 1/160 scale model.

I would maintain that in the case of today's lenses, there are many things that are more important in the appearance of a photograph than whether a zoom or fixed focal length lens was used, at least most of the time. I would also maintain that where there is a difference, that difference may not even arise from the optical designs. I have two older AF-D lenses...an 85mm f/1.4 and a 180mm f/2.8. I would expect that either of these would produce better images overall than the 70-200mm f/2.8 zoom which covers their same focal lengths. The reason is simple...these lenses are smaller, lighter, more agile, and just generally easier to manage than the 70-200. They likely have a simpler optical design, but that may or may not provide a real-life advantage.

What is not debatable, though, is that the focal length of each of these two lenses is very confining. If it's right for the task, it's great, and each lens will do an undeniably great job. But for either lens, that focal length very quickly becomes not right for the task. Now I also have a 50mm f/1.4 AF-D lens. It also is a fine lens that does a fine job. It also has a wider working area...a wider range over which it can be usefully used. The same is true for my 35mm lens, but the opposite is true for the 300mm f/4 that I bought as my first really long lens many years ago. While it's a very nice lens and was quite reasonably priced (bought new), there just aren't that many times that it gets to come out and play.

For me, the absence of any real MEANINGFUL optical advantage from my fixed focal length lenses, combined with the tremendously greater versatility of my zoom lenses, even the 3:1 zooms, means that the fixed lenses stay in the shelf most of the time. There was a time in the last century when this would not have been true. Zooms thirty of forty years ago really were huge compromises, and were quite expensive besides. But it is no longer the last century. And it is not fair or justifiable to apply 20th century truths or biasws to 21st century lenses. I think it was the Luddites who were pretty famous for doing stuff like that.

I will not pretend to speak for professional photo... (show quote)

That was an absolutely terrific response to this thread! Especially the last sentence!😜

gwilliams6

Canisdirus wrote:

You'd have to give me a source for that.

I know Sony has the best high end zooms in the world right now...but I doubt they are sharper than their prime counterparts.

Sony doesn't make a 200mm prime...sort of an odd duck focal length anyway...though certainly have been made in the past.

The Sony 135mm kills it's zoom counterpart...as does the Sony 90mm.

At what focal length is your example?

Canisdirus, I deal in facts not fiction, so here you are:
I didn't say sharper, I said AS sharp. The first ever zooms by Sony to test as sharp as Sony's best primes.

Here are the MTF-standard sharpness tests results done by SAB: and SAB MTF-Standard sharpness testing was done on the most demanding 61mp A7RIV and 50mp A1 sensors.

The sharpest category is Outstanding, then Excellent, Very Good, Good, Average, Bad: (within each separate category there is no order of first to last in order of how they are listed, all listed in the same category tested equally sharp)

The new 70-200mm f2.8 GM II has tested as sharp as the 135mm f1.8 GM, the 85mm f1.4 GM, the 50mm f1.2 GM. Same for the new 24-70mm f2.8 GM II lens, as sharp as the 24mm f1.4GM, 35mm f1.4 GM, 50mm f1.2 GM .

And I own thirteen of these top E-mount lenses myself for my A1, A7RIV, A7SIII, and these MTF-standard sharpness tests are correct.

BTW the venerable Sony 90mm f2.8 macro is a seven years old optical design, unchanged, and not even the sharpest E-mount macro lens anymore, the Sigma Art 105mm f2.8 DG DN is the sharpest E-mount macro lens nowadays.

https://sonyalpha.blog/2019/11/10/which-lenses-to-maximise-the-potential-of-the-sony-a7riv/

Canisdirus, read and be enlightened. I dont make up stuff, I post facts and the new reality.

Cheers and best to you.

mikegreenwald Loc: Illinois

larryepage wrote:

I will not pretend to speak for professional photographers. But as a photographic hobbyist, I will observe that every hobby seems to have its proportion of practitioners that can only be described as perfectionists (or in some cases frustrated perfectionists). They seem to know a little more than others, spend more than others, work a little harder than others, carry their noses a little higher in the air than others...you get the idea. I am also a model railroader. In model railroading, those folks are called "rivet counters." The name is descriptive of the disease. The thing is, those folks generally don't tend to be "better" model railroaders than others. In fact, as often as not, their trains don't run as well as those of less obsessive modelers, because time that could be spent on operational considerations or basic maintenance tasks is instead spent fretting on whether battery compartment grills on a particular locomotive model have 10 rows or 11 rows of openings.

Of course, the idea of model railroading is to represent a full-size railroad in miniature...usually in 1/48, 1/64, 1/87 (actually 1/87.1), or 1/160 scale. A reasonable level of accuracy is necessary to do this with a meaningful level of realism. But in truth, very few people, especially old people, are ever going to see the difference between 10 and 11 rows of holes on a 1/160 scale model.

I would maintain that in the case of today's lenses, there are many things that are more important in the appearance of a photograph than whether a zoom or fixed focal length lens was used, at least most of the time. I would also maintain that where there is a difference, that difference may not even arise from the optical designs. I have two older AF-D lenses...an 85mm f/1.4 and a 180mm f/2.8. I would expect that either of these would produce better images overall than the 70-200mm f/2.8 zoom which covers their same focal lengths. The reason is simple...these lenses are smaller, lighter, more agile, and just generally easier to manage than the 70-200. They likely have a simpler optical design, but that may or may not provide a real-life advantage.

What is not debatable, though, is that the focal length of each of these two lenses is very confining. If it's right for the task, it's great, and each lens will do an undeniably great job. But for either lens, that focal length very quickly becomes not right for the task. Now I also have a 50mm f/1.4 AF-D lens. It also is a fine lens that does a fine job. It also has a wider working area...a wider range over which it can be usefully used. The same is true for my 35mm lens, but the opposite is true for the 300mm f/4 that I bought as my first really long lens many years ago. While it's a very nice lens and was quite reasonably priced (bought new), there just aren't that many times that it gets to come out and play.

For me, the absence of any real MEANINGFUL optical advantage from my fixed focal length lenses, combined with the tremendously greater versatility of my zoom lenses, even the 3:1 zooms, means that the fixed lenses stay in the shelf most of the time. There was a time in the last century when this would not have been true. Zooms thirty of forty years ago really were huge compromises, and were quite expensive besides. But it is no longer the last century. And it is not fair or justifiable to apply 20th century truths or biasws to 21st century lenses. I think it was the Luddites who were pretty famous for doing stuff like that.

I will not pretend to speak for professional photo... (show quote)

Wonderful note - Thank you!!

Canisdirus

gwilliams6 wrote:

Canisdirus, I deal in facts not fiction, so here y... (show quote)

Never said you made it up...
But I took 5 minutes over at DXO and my posts still stands...they are not as sharp at 90...135...where is the magic?

One would think it would be right on the Sony page...big bragging rights to finally defeat primes...and yet.

Rick from NY Loc: Sarasota FL

Why are we trying to reason with someone who will continue to insist that he is correct and the rest of us are stupid, misinformed or both? Entire thread has devolved into one guy insisting on “proving” he is correct. You know, like the guys and gals who insist that protective filters are the best/the worst idea because they say so.

It’s getting real old…..

Canisdirus

Rick from NY wrote:

Why are we trying to reason with someone who will continue to insist that he is correct and the rest of us are stupid, misinformed or both? Entire thread has devolved into one guy insisting on “proving” he is correct. You know, like the guys and gals who insist that protective filters are the best/the worst idea because they say so.

It’s getting real old…..

Why not simply address me?

I'm not insisting on anything...
But I maintain what is well known still today...primes outperform zooms.
And DXO says so...
Or does data not count any longer?

All of a sudden...this is controversial? Lol...ridiculous.

Any company that can outshine primes with their zooms...would be taking out huge ads saying so.
Or their marketing dept. should be fired.

Rick from NY Loc: Sarasota FL

Canisdirus wrote:

Why not simply address me?

I'm not insisting on anything...
But I maintain what is well known still today...primes outperform zooms.
And DXO says so...
Or does data not count any longer?

All of a sudden...this is controversial? Lol...ridiculous.

Any company that can outshine primes with their zooms...would be taking out huge ads saying so.
Or their marketing dept. should be fired.

Your reply proves my point far better than I could ever hope to. Keeping digging that hole

Canisdirus

Rick from NY wrote:

Your reply proves my point far better than I could ever hope to. Keeping digging that hole

Because I follow data... I am digging no hole.
Everything I posted is accurate.

Sony has the very best zooms on the planet right now...but still cannot match high quality primes in their respective focal lengths.
Does anyone honestly believe Sony is now making their zooms sharper than their primes? C'mon...

The DXO scores can be looked up...they concur...with pretty much all of photography when it comes to sharpness between zooms and primes. Primes win...still. And that's the BEST zooms. The rest...well...worse still obviously.

There are engineering limitations...to this day...a zoom is a compromise from the get go...not a bad one...but still a compromise.

The hobbyists tend to jump for the big zooms... 24-200 or something...thinking they are getting more...they aren't.
Pros know to buy the shorter zooms...to at least cut down on the compromises.

The only zoom I bought for no reason was the old Sigma 18-35mm ... and only because it at least gave me an f/1.8.
That was fine...but I knew going in it wasn't going to be at prime level...which would be an UNREASONABLE expectation.

It is not unreasonable to claim primes beat zooms...in sharpness...in price many times...and light capability.

Compromises in engineering...always.

Warhorse Loc: SE Michigan

ELNikkor wrote:

My friend who has the 18-300 Nikon DX lens on his D7500 gets very sharp images at all focal lengths. For some amazingly sharp photos taken with wide-range zooms, check Ken Rockwell's site.

This is my "walk around" lens on my D500.

OldCADuser Loc: Irvine, CA

mikegreenwald wrote:

My reference will be lenses for interchangeable lens cameras only.

What is your experience?

To go back to my film days, I only had one zoom lens for my Minolta SLR's, a Minolta MD 75-150mm 1:4, and in all honesty, I never used it all that much, but I got it cheap at a garage sale. Besides, I had a Minolta 135mm 1:2.8 which was more practical when I needed a medium telephoto.

As for my digital work, of the initial point & shoot pocket cameras, they were all in the 2X range, which was fine for what I used them for, ie, a pocket/briefcase camera when I was traveling (this was pre-iPhone days).

While it was not interchangeable, which I know was the theme of this thread, it does go to the idea that the only high-ratio zooms that I've used were on the more advanced 'point & shoot', the first being that Minolta DIMAGE 7Hi (the one where the sensor crapped-out) was 7X. Sony replaced it, free-of-charge, with the Sony DSC-H2 which was 12X. And the last camera in this class that I bought, ostensibly for my wife, was the Sony DSC-HX400V, which is a whopping 50X.

But getting back to the interchangeable world (and note that all of my interchangeable lens digital cameras are APS-C), of course when I bought my first DLSR, the Sony A100, it was a full kit camera, which meant that it came with a Sony 18-70mm 1:3.5-5.6 lens and a Sony 75-300mm 1:4.5-5.6 lens. Now these were what they called the A-mount lens. Shortly after getting the camera I knew I needed a wider angle lens and so I bought a Tamron 10-24mm 1:3.5-4.5 lens. I really liked it and for when I was shooting outdoor scenery, it was my go-to lens.

I then upgraded to a Sony A65. Now I only bought the body from a friend, who was moving up to a full-frame Sony, but since this was still an A-mount camera, all of my current lens still worked.

Now I had been so satisfied with that Tamron 10-24mm zoom that I decided to invest in a faster lens for everyday work so I got a Tamron 28-75mm 1:2.8 lens. Now I liked that higher speed, but it's a bit long on the short end of the zoom and the image quality was disappointing, as the focus just seemed a bit off resulting in softer than what I liked images. Now I don't know if this was only when I shooting it wide-open or what. Now I guess it would have been OK if I was shooting portraits or stuff like that, but doing mostly outdoor shots, it really was a disappointment.

Now when I moved to Sony mirrorless cameras, since they were all E-mount, I had to start over with new lens. Again, the first camera I bought, the Sony NEX-3N was a full kit camera which came with a Sony 16-50mm 1:3.5-5.6mm lens and a Sony 55-210mm 1:4.5-6.3 lens. When I upgraded to the Sony a6000, I again only bought the body as it was also E-mount so the existing lens worked. However, I still needed something wider, so I invested in a Sony 10-18mm 1:4.0 lens. I really like it but wish that the long end was a bit longer, but it's proven to be very sharp even when shot wide open.

Now when I decided to upgrade to the Sony a6500, I found one on ebay that was being sold with the Sony 18-135mm 1:3.5-5.6 lens. Now this sort of violates your nothing higer ratio than 4X (it's 7.5X) but I have to say that I really love this lens and it's become my 'prime' lens. While my field bag has room for the 55-210mm lens, when I'm out and about, I generally only use the 10-18mm and the 18-135mm for most all situations.

Now speaking of high speed lens, ever since I moved to the 6000-series mirrorless Sony's I've felt that they've done so well when shooting with a high ISO setting that I no longer feel that I need something faster than what I've got. But saying that, thinking back to my film days when a 1:1.4 normal lens was commonplace, I've had a few situations where shooting indoors where a flash was not allowed, it would have been nice to have something in that 1:1.4 or so range. Since this would be a specialty lens, and since I wouldn't be shooting 'action shoots', I'm willing to go full-manual to save money. Now I realize that this is not within the scope of this thread, but while I'm on the topic, I'm considering a Meike 35mm F1.4 Large Aperture Manual Focus Lens (keep in mind this is for an APS-C camera) which I can get on Amazon for less than $90. Does anyone have any experience with this partuicular lens or any other lens by Meike?

Anyway, I hope my experience with zoom lens helped the narrative, even if I diverted a bit there at the end

stan0301 Loc: Colorado

For general use I would probably use an 8-16 or an 18-300 - for portraits I like the 16-105 - macro 50, 105, and 180 - go to 30x40 with no problem

burkphoto Loc: High Point, NC

mikegreenwald wrote:

My reference will be lenses for interchangeable le... (show quote)

Both my 3:1 Panasonic zooms have been excellent performers, but they’re pro grade glass. My primes are excellent, too. No issues. But I use them within tested and acceptable ranges of focal lengths and apertures.

imagemeister Loc: mid east Florida

Canisdirus wrote:

Never said you made it up...
But I took 5 minutes over at DXO and my posts still stands...they are not as sharp at 90...135...where is the magic?

One would think it would be right on the Sony page...big bragging rights to finally defeat primes...and yet.

First of all, DXO is NOT the be-all end-all of lens evaluations ! - it is more a system approach as it incorporates various sensor specifics ......

As I recall it was way back in 2012 when the first zoom's Imatest numbers were surpassing - that's right SURPASSING some very respectable primes ! - See the 24mm performance of the Canon 24-70 II ! .........https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2012/09/canon-24-70-f2-8-ii-resolution-tests/
Scroll down for the test results and conclusion .....
..

MountainDave

Someday, someone will make a 14-600mm f/1.2 lens that weighs 2 lbs., is sharper than any prime with better contrast, better bokeh, better AF and less distortion than the best prime. Then this argument will be moot. Sadly, I'll be dead.

Canisdirus

imagemeister wrote:

First of all, DXO is NOT the be-all end-all of lens evaluations ! - it is more a system approach as it incorporates various sensor specifics ......

As I recall it was way back in 2012 when the first zoom's Imatest numbers were surpassing - that's right SURPASSING some very respectable primes ! - See the 24mm performance of the Canon 24-70 II ! .........https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2012/09/canon-24-70-f2-8-ii-resolution-tests/

..

No one said DXO was...
I looked at your comparison...how long did you have to dig for it...lol. As you recall...heh.
Compared it to a 3.5 TILT SHIFT prime...oh my...that's competition...not.

Just stop trying to smash a square peg into a round hole...

I will let you all know when a zoom is better than a prime...I will own one if that happens.
I'm not holding my breath.