Speed Freaks Only! What to do re: f/1.2?

shawnino

Half a lifetime ago I had a noct 58mm 1.2 which I mostly shot wide open. Just as I was starting to figure out what it could do with portraiture and dark skies, grad school came along and I sold it. That I didn't lose money should have tipped me off I should have tried to hold it, but whatever--I wasn't doing an MBA.
Fast-forward and here we are. I have some money to spend.
I currently have a perfectly serviceable 50mm 1.4D in my bag.
I rather miss the 1.2 option, but I'm wondering if, on digital, where I can quite comfortably run ISO into the thousands, if the DOF difference will be all that important.

Truth and Nikon Rumors:
--Nikon keeps publishing patents for 1.2 glass.
--Digital Rev lists the venerable 50 1.2 as discontinued. B&H still has it.
--A good copy of the noct will cost me something like four grand.

I've never shot the 50 1.2. Or if I did, I forget. But what I read suggests it's not sharp wide open. My Noct was so sharp wide open it was ridiculous.

So what do I do?
--Forget all this nonsense, use the 1.4D, be happy.
--Get the 50 1.2, be happy.
--Get the noct, be poor awhile, be happy.
--Trust that, surely, Nikon's going to make an AF 50-60mm 1.2 in the next couple years. Wait. Use the 1.4D in the meantime. Be happy.

DenverShooter

I run ISO 6400 regularly on my D4 and D800E and the world hasn't stopped on its axis..

I think the better question is bohek and lens performance.

Denver Shooter

mk2pop

Im guessing your in the USA but theres a site in the UK with a noct for £1850

I cant link to it but check gumtree.com

shawnino

Thanks mk2pop. Canada actually but right now a dollar's a dollar. Hard to know what to do with sellers on those sites.

TaoTeJared

Shawnio I bet I ponder that at least once a day in my dreams. But then I get back to work and then kick myself for shooting wide open and not getting enough in focus and that is usually at 2.8! To shoot well with Fast glass takes a lot of care for sure.

The Noct is legendary and the local store has two on the shelf (going on 3 years at least) priced at $2500+. I have shot with it, Sharp as all get out, but you have to be using a pro body (D800/D4/D3/D700 )for the AF confirm to get close to hitting focus and probably replacing the focus screen would be your best bet. Last time I played with one, I took 25 photos and missed focus on every single shot.

Eye food numbers DOF @ 5 feet (slightly rounded to the 1/16") FX
58mm 1.2 noct @ f/1.2 = 2"
85mm 1.4 @ f/1.4 = 1"
105 2.5 @ f/2.5 = 1 3/16"
105 2.8 @ f/2.8 = 1 5/16"
50mm 1.4 @ f/1.4 = 3"

KR (don't kill me everyone) actually has some good examples and some comparisons with the 50 1.2. Not many actually have had in hand multiple 1.2s for true side by sides. Although I think it could have been better done. Wide open it is better than the other 1.2s, but not that much. If you stack a Zeiss 50mm next to it I'm not sure what that comparison would look like. That is something I would like to see.

Personally I think it is a bit overrated at this point and is made more desirable due to the price and that is was made in small quantities, and no longer made. Call it the Leica effect - many limitations, very high price, few have one, and takes a lot of skill to master it. Don't get me wrong, It is a fantastic lens but I have yet to see a full set of images that are resoundingly better to justify the price. I have seen on flickr people with more money than talent buy it, and their normally ok images, look terribly amateurish.

Don't get me wrong, if they came out with an AF version, I would sell whatever I had to, to get one. But util then, AF wins even if wide open it is slightly softer. The 10 second spent in Post sharpening the image, and 1 minute in softening the background is much easier, and cheaper than the lens.

Just a last note - I have talked to many Canon pros who bought the 1.2s (85 & 50) and sold them soon after due to the difficulty of shooting at 1.2 (missed focuses) and that they normally stopped down to f/2 anyway. As one put it to me "If you are shooting at an angle, want the eye sharp and what you get is only 3 eyelashes that are in focus, what's the point?" Others that I met who have those, have shot with them for years, and pretty much only those, and still say they are learning the lens.

Everyone has been wishing for the AF 1.2 since 1999 - 13 years coming.

Msmoto

DOF is always a subjective issue for me. Here is the 85mm f/1.8 G at F/5.6, and I would say the DOF is about 2, maybe 3 inches, subject about 3-4 feet away. This is about right for me as it gives good facial detail on the street people.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/fantinesfotos/8435562427/sizes/o/in/photostream/

So, the bokeh and DOF on these not-4-me f/1.2 and faster super lenses is maybe a nice thing, but as you stated TTJ, getting them to focus is a bit tricky.

shawnino

Thanks a ton TTJ/msmoto. Great intel as always. Another good portrait msmoto.

I was actually halfways organized with the noct on film by the end.

With you, TTJ: AF version would be a must-have. And not having to burn film might not make the learning curve less steep, but it'd be less expensive.

NSXTypeR

I have a 50mm 1.2 but I barely use it- mainly because I had only used it on the D40. Wide open it was pretty sharp, not great though. It was okay I guess.

I'll have to give it a go on the D7000 to see if the brighter viewfinder makes it easier to focus.

Just curious, what camera body or bodies do you use? Assuming you have a relatively modern body, you really don't need all that speed unless you're shooting bats in a cave.

If you want some samples I'd have to dig around my computer for them.

Paperman

@shawnino

If the point in getting the f1.2 is shallow DOF/bokeh, fine. But if it is the speed/ the wide open f1.2 advantage, then better read that article ( by Mark Duboyov - Lum.Landscapes ) about how digital sensors fail in capturing all light that goes thru at f1.2 - due to extreme angles formed . The Tstop loss at f1.2 is said to be nearly half a stop. I other words, the lens is ( said to be ) not performig as an f1.2 wide open.

shawnino

@NSXTypeR: Thanks! 800E/90 backup. I was never shooting bats in a cave with the noct, but I could get shots at dusk that were better than my eyes.

@Paperman: Thanks! That's really useful. Going to check it out.

macsavageg4

I have a couple copies of the 50mm f/1.2 (AI and AI-S) and the 55mm f/1.2 Non-AI and AI converted. They are all a bit soft wide open. I haven't had the pleasure of shooting with the Noct 58mm f/1.2 but if any of the large list of reviews that I have read say that it is just an amazing lens. The 55mm f/1.2 is nice but it is a bit softer than the 50mm f/1.2 or at least my copies are. The 50mm F/1.2 is a bit sharper and is a nice lens on its own. I honestly haven't shot near enough with it honestly. I have done a little astrophotography with both lenses and they do have a bit of a coma problem until they are stopped down. They both are fun to shoot with either way.

Symphotic

I still have my Noct, which I got 20 years ago in a small camera shop in Kyoto, but I don't use it much. It seems to have been a great lens with film, especially Kodachrome, and especially at night, but I can't recall ever using it at work for anything.
Maybe I'll dust it off and see what the images look like compared to my 50 mm f/1.8, which also has aspheric elements and is my current go to standard prime.

Msmoto

OMG...that is so beautiful....

Symphotic

Shallow DOF was less the point behind the Noct than the almost complete lack of coma aberration: little birdie shapes instead of dots at the edge of the image when photographing points of light. The Noct was great for night time city street scenes.

SquamishPhoto

+1 ^

TaoTeJared

Sigma seems to be on a good run of good lenses - SIGMA MAKE A 1.2 NOCT!!!

heartyfisher

OMG...that is so beautiful....

Yeah its gorgeous!.. My brother had one.. and its a special lense .. the images have a dreamy fairy land feel to it.. however, remember that Digital cameras(Zeiss the exception) cant make use of the F 1.2. Probably why Nikon does not make them..

shawnino

macsavageg4: thanks--useful bits of information there.

Symphotic: that's what I was using it for.

Heartyfisher: are you saying cameras like D800 physically can't use the f/1.2, so I would need to stop any 1.2 lens down regardless?

NSXTypeR

OMG...that is so beautiful....

Yeah its gorgeous!.. My brother had one.. and its a special lense .. the images have a dreamy fairy land feel to it.. however, remember that Digital cameras(Zeiss the exception) cant make use of the F 1.2. Probably why Nikon does not make them..

Are you talking about the artificial ISO boost that the camera bodies do when they're at large apertures? I've heard about that but never really understood it.

Not true about that second bit, Nikon still makes the 50mm 1.2, you can buy it new right now.

Ironheart

Google "offset microlens" as to why digital sensors (most) have issues with the severe angles as you approach f/1. Picture is worth 1000 words right? Apologies to dpreview.

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/LeicaM8/Images/offsetmicrolenses.gif

Golf007sd

I would welcome a some 1.2's from Nikon. A 50mm would be at the top of my list should they bring one to market. I just hope they make it with the same level of performance as the 24mm 1.4G. If so, I will pre-order one right now. As for price...I have a feeling it will be in the $1800-$2100 range. Yes..no?

heartyfisher

Google "offset microlens" as to why digital sensors (most) have issues with the severe angles as you approach f/1. Picture is worth 1000 words right? Apologies to dpreview.

http://www.dpreview.com/reviews/LeicaM8/Images/offsetmicrolenses.gif

Did I say zeiss? I meant leica..that will learn me to post when I am half asleep. :-)

Symphotic

I put my Noct on my D800 and was looking at test fixtures here at work. These aren't real photographic subjects, however, and as I said above, the Noct is, as its name implies, for night scenes, not the glaring lights we have here. So there is nothing to see, really. I do have a client down in San Pedro next to an oil refinery with brilliant and beautiful lights, so if they call me down there this week I'll take may camera along and take some pictures after dark.

UPDATE: The more I look at it, the more I am impressed with the 50 mm f/1.8. Autofocus is very accurate. I can't see coma on the 1.8, and I can on the Noct. At the edges the 50/1.4 is soft, but not the 1.8.

NSXTypeR

I decided against looking up some shots with the D40 and 50mm 1.2 combo and decided to go straight to the D7000.

Wow, what a difference between the D7000 and D40. The D40's viewfinder was like looking up from the bottom of a well- getting things in focus was a hit and a miss. The D7000 has that AI indexing tab and it works great- it even shows the correct F stop in the viewfinder and exif. Plus it has that focus confirmation light and that's a great help. It's very useful to switch to 11 focus points and move it around the viewfinder to help you compose a shot.

The combination is a touch heavy on the D7000, but if you want to slow down or do video on it it looks like a great idea. I wouldn't really go back to a D40 style camera now, especially with that awesome viewfinder.

I don't have anything artsy, but here are some test shots.



At F11 it's plenty sharp.



At this point I had still messed up mounting the lens to the camera. I'm glad it didn't fall off when I was handling the lens. But if you focus correctly, it's still pretty sharp. This was wide open.



At F/2 it's really contrasty.

macsavageg4

Here is a shot from my 55mm f/1.2 built around 1967 that was the fungus clean/rebuild that I mention all the time on here. The subject is Dixie the dog of the house. It was taken with my D7000 @ f/1.2 1/80 ISO 400.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/macsavageg4/6923814854/

I have some of the Houston Space Center taking pictures of stuff of the same vintage on the D800 but I can't put my hands on a link to it.

shawnino

Just revisiting this thread--what a great bunch of images, research, and ideas. Thank you one and all.

I have not bought the Noct. I was about to in May when the latest patents came out. I now very emotionally, childishly, and irrationally believe Something's Coming.