Jörg Krüger
35mm lens comparison #2 (center)
Comparison of some 35 mm lenses, #2
(center)
For this comparison I took pictures with 8 SLR-lenses with 35 mm focal length (description here: flic.kr/p/2qVveaJ) with a DSLR (36MP, full frame), and for each lens with every f-stop (no half-steps, except fully open). Target was an advertising poster in a street, about 70 m away, which was aligned to the center. I took out-of-cam jpgs without any enhancements and fixed white balance, and the crops with the target were transferred directly into this chart. The size of one crop is only 70x90 of an 7360x4912 picture (about 0.02% area), so that is true pixel peeping.
I used fixed combinations of shutter speed and f-stop, so at f4 I always used a 1/250 s, at f5.6 1/125 s, and so on. Unfortunately the sky was not consistently bright, so some rows are brighter or darker.
Flektogon, Skoparex and Auto-Takumar are starting well wide open, compared to the other five contestants. When stopping down the contrast remains constant, the resolution is improving until reaching f8. Probably the best performance provides the Skoparex at f5.6 and f8.
The last four, Lithagon, Travegon and the Yashinons are starting rather soft.
Like expected, all lenses show their best performance in the mid-range. At high f-stops diffraction drives down the quality, very clear at the Lithagon and the Travegon.
The Takumars should have the same optics, in my opinion they have also the same coating. Nevertheless, I have the impression, that the older Auto-Takumar is a bit better, even if I consider the lower contrast due to the higher exposure.
Surprisingly no lens has serious problems with chromatic aberrations, you would see them immediately on the big black arrow on white ground. Sometimes you can see a green or magenta "shadow", but that's all.
To sum it up in short: top group with Flektogon and Skoparex, last group with Lithagon and both Yashinons.
I made a second chart with the poster placed in a corner. The results can be seen here:
35mm lens comparison #2 (center)
Comparison of some 35 mm lenses, #2
(center)
For this comparison I took pictures with 8 SLR-lenses with 35 mm focal length (description here: flic.kr/p/2qVveaJ) with a DSLR (36MP, full frame), and for each lens with every f-stop (no half-steps, except fully open). Target was an advertising poster in a street, about 70 m away, which was aligned to the center. I took out-of-cam jpgs without any enhancements and fixed white balance, and the crops with the target were transferred directly into this chart. The size of one crop is only 70x90 of an 7360x4912 picture (about 0.02% area), so that is true pixel peeping.
I used fixed combinations of shutter speed and f-stop, so at f4 I always used a 1/250 s, at f5.6 1/125 s, and so on. Unfortunately the sky was not consistently bright, so some rows are brighter or darker.
Flektogon, Skoparex and Auto-Takumar are starting well wide open, compared to the other five contestants. When stopping down the contrast remains constant, the resolution is improving until reaching f8. Probably the best performance provides the Skoparex at f5.6 and f8.
The last four, Lithagon, Travegon and the Yashinons are starting rather soft.
Like expected, all lenses show their best performance in the mid-range. At high f-stops diffraction drives down the quality, very clear at the Lithagon and the Travegon.
The Takumars should have the same optics, in my opinion they have also the same coating. Nevertheless, I have the impression, that the older Auto-Takumar is a bit better, even if I consider the lower contrast due to the higher exposure.
Surprisingly no lens has serious problems with chromatic aberrations, you would see them immediately on the big black arrow on white ground. Sometimes you can see a green or magenta "shadow", but that's all.
To sum it up in short: top group with Flektogon and Skoparex, last group with Lithagon and both Yashinons.
I made a second chart with the poster placed in a corner. The results can be seen here: