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1Ds MKIII + Zeiss ZE 21mm Distagon

Henry Goh

Member
Just received my Distagon 21mm this afternoon and was doing some tests indoor. Boy this lens blows my recently purchased 24mm TS/E II out of the water. Once I find some time to shoot some real images with this lens, I'll post them.
 
T

tokengirl

Guest
Boy this lens blows my recently purchased 24mm TS/E II out of the water.
In what way? I have the 24mm TS-E II, and I think it's a spectacular lens (no CA, no barrel/pincushion or mustache distortion, no soft corners, extremely sharp lens overall), so I am curious to hear your thoughts on this.

I look forward to your samples, as I find myself wanting a good 20 or 21mm prime. When I was using my 16-35mm L II for landscapes, I most often used it at 20mm.
 

Henry Goh

Member
The most significant difference for me is the micro-contrast. My quick comparison shows it is very good at that and for me in a very wide lens, it is important.
 

Jack

Sr. Administrator
Staff member
Henry:

When you post images for us, do us a big favor and post an identical images from the 24TSE-2 along side, and with crops too, exact same exposure and processing settings from both lenses, etc, etc. I for one, would be very interested in the direct comparisons!

Thanks,
 

Henry Goh

Member
I have no chance to use the lens in work yet but a quick capture during my break in the office. This is the full image view.


Camera used: Canon 1Ds MKIII ISO200, f/10. Processed in C1 then sharpened in PS CS4 with Nik sharpener.

Crops follow:









Link to the full size jpeg file here
 
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Henry Goh

Member
Yes this is the Zeiss ZE which means it has no aperture ring and it has electronics that allows you to control the aperture from the Canon body like a Canon lens.
 

arashm

Member
Henry thank you for posting
wondering where was your focus point and did you focus via Live View or good old fashion way through view finder?
am
 

Henry Goh

Member
The first cropped image is the focus point. I use a split screen on my 1Ds MKIII and also rely on the focus indicator. I had micro-adjusted the focus but found there was no need as the ZERO setting is dead on. The superb DOF is really nice.
 

Stuart Richardson

Active member
It looks fantastic! I love the zeiss's lack of distortion, and the sharpness is impressive. I am not a canon shooter, so please do not take this as trolling, but is the 1DsIII normally that noisy at ISO 200, or are they some sort of processing artifacts? The file is REALLY crunchy.
 

wayne_s

New member
Zeiss 21 has mustache distortion just like the C/Y version.
Take a look at the line near the ceiling in the back.
These files look extra noisy for iso 200 as if they were underexposed a lot and pushed in post.
Canon 17 and 24 TS-E mk2 have less distortion than ZE 21
 

ftbt

New member
Zeiss 21 has mustache distortion just like the C/Y version.
I have a C/Y 21/2.8. The mustache or gull-wing distortion is inherent to the lens. However, it is easily fixed. One mouse click in PT Lens or Bibble and it is gone. And ... for video applications I have never seen the distortion.
 
A

aprillove20

Guest
Zeiss ZE is great... it has no aperture ring and it has electronics that allows you to control the aperture.
 

pfigen

Member
I have both the new T/S lenses and the older C/Y Distagon 21mm. The new Canon's are right up there in image quality and have virtually no distortion to speak of. It looks like from the image posted above that the new Distagon, even though redesigned, still has the very hard to control mustache distortion. I wonder how effective the new lens distortion tool in CS5 will be in counteracting this, because the trial version of PT lens I used, literally sucked. It made it better in some ways and worse in others.
 
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