Carl Zeiss Sonnar 50/1.5 in Contax mount: AWESOME

[k__43]

this thread seems like a setup for me to go and buy a contax + sonnar
I might sell my ZM sonnar and use the rest of the cash for other stuff.

questions:
The Amadeo adapter focuses to 0.6m I've read, is this correct or what is this dedicated 50mm adapter about? is it coupled that close?
That would be a huge advantage over my ZM sonnar!

How close does the lens focus on a contax body?

 

[raid]

The vintage Zeiss Sonnar 50/1.5 is an amazingly good lens. I have it in Contax mount and also in LTM mount (modified by Brian). The Jupiter 3 is its clone, and you can get a J3 in either mount. The Amedeo adapter makes the lenses much heavier.

 

[brbo]

questions:
The Amadeo adapter focuses to 0.6m I've read, is this correct or what is this dedicated 50mm adapter about? is it coupled that close?
That would be a huge advantage over my ZM sonnar!

How close does the lens focus on a contax body?

The new dedicated Amedeo 50mm adapter does focus down to 0.6m. Or so it says. I never checked the actual distance, but on my M6 (with its supposedly minimum focusing distance of 0.7m ) the new adapter is rangefinder coupled down to last millimeter. No worries about loosing coupling with (too) close focusing.

So, either my M6's rangefinder can follow closer than 0.7m or my Amedeo adapter doesn't quite go to 0.6m. Which is perfect, I was worrried that I will loose rangefinder coupling before coming to the full extention of the adapter.

Otherwise, on Contax body it goes down to 0.9m (I think).

 

[squirrel$$$bandit]

The Amedeo adapter makes the lenses much heavier.

I never minded the weight, though I'm interested to see how much lighter the Sonnetar is. In all honesty, a superfast version of the 1.5 was kind of a dream of mine, back then in '09...

 

[brbo]

Once focused closer than 1m, the 50/1.5 Sonnar should suffer from terrible focus shift...

Well, you need to "know your Sonnar(s)".

I find it easier to compensate for the shift at close range than at distance.

 

[micromontenegro]

I never minded the weight, though I'm interested to see how much lighter the Sonnetar is. In all honesty, a superfast version of the 1.5 was kind of a dream of mine, back then in '09...

I've never had a Sonnetar in my hands, but I would tend to think that the Sonnar+Amedeo combo would still be lighter. Specially if using an East German one. Just an educated guess.

 

[Dante_Stella]

alas my contax 1.5 in amedeo is front focus, i have to "manually" over-focus it. any suggestions ?

raytoei

I have two Amedeo Contax adapters. The more deluxe one is spot on at f/1.5, not unlike a ZM C-Sonnar that has been set for f/1.5. And when you see that, you'd think that the Opton is the best thing since sliced bread. But this adapter is very hard to use with collapsible lenses, since it doesn't have a grip to focus, and you tend to unlock the lens by grasping it.

My dedicated 50mm adapter seems to behave the way you would expect a Sonnar to, which is to front focus a little bit at f/1.5 and come to center around f/2.4. This is the same behavior as the ZM C-Sonnar as delivered. That said, the front-focusing error diminishes very greatly at close distances (1m and under) - pretty much invisible. You could fix this, I think, by filing down the cam very slightly. But there is no free lunch with digital cameras and lenses with spherical aberration.

I am going to repeat this test now that both my Leica digital bodies are back from calibration. Didn't want to have miscalibration as a factor too.

A lot of this is that you are adding a ton of tolerances together by combining an infinitely adjustable Zeiss lens with a helicoid made 50+ years later. Count your blessings that this works at all!

Dante

 

[raid]

The Sonnar can balance nicely between high contrast areas and lower contarst areas in an image.

 

[raid]

 

[raid]

 

[raid]

 

[raid]

 

[raid]

I will use this lens more often. These images brought back some memories.

 

[micromontenegro]

I used to think that the Sonnar was THE 50mm for me. And I still love it to bits, make no mistake about it. But some years ago someone who is posting in this thread gave me the Nikkor version, and my 30-something year affair with the Sonnar went kaput.

The Nikkor-S is THE 50 for me.

L1000187 by Aguaitacaminos, on Flickr

 

[raid]

The Nikkor is a very good Sonnar too. I have it too.

 

[uhoh7]

and I like the lower contrast rendered by these older lenses.

On the 'soft corners at full aperture debate'. It is fairly unlikely that a picture made at full aperture has any important information in it's corners that needs to be sharp, and not a single viewer of any of my pictures has ever commented on my soft corners.

Actually this is not a low contrast less by any standard and was famed for it's excellent contrast. Wide open contrast does drop as with most fast lenses. However here it stopped down without edit on the M9:


jena blue by unoh7, on Flickr

and by comparison the v4 50 Cron a moment later:


L1023008-2 by unoh7, on Flickr

A lot of old lenses have haze and this has lead to generalizations about contrast, when in fact they vary alot.

As to WO sharpness to the edges, few lenses can manage this from any era, compared to how they do at 5.6. But some older lenses simply have soft edges all the way to f/5.6 and the Sonnetar is always soft on the edge.

Sony A7 cameras, un-moddifed, greatly exaggerate this problem of edge softness, especially at infinity. The "softness" is often a field curve which makes it impossible to have both edge and center in focus.

You are right, in many shots, this is immaterial. 🙂

 

[dotur]

J3 in Kiev-Contax mount, OM-D E-M5, via Amedeo & Lumix M mount adaptors.

IL070753-Edit by Ivan Lozica, on Flickr

 

[k__43]

you guys got me hooked - I've bought a contax III w/ a sonnar /1.5
The camera is supposed to work too so I guess I'll make a side by side shoot out with my ZM sonnar soon

 

[bobby_novatron]

k__43 -- you're going to love the Contax III. I own a Contax IIa and it's one of my favourite 'vintage' cameras. Beautiful build quality.

Just to keep this thread rolling, here's another tribute to the Zeiss Opton-Sonnar 50/1.5 ... first a photo of my beloved Contax IIa.

And here's an image taken with this lens ... Fuji Neopan 400, XTOL 1:0

 

[k__43]

I wish I had a opton-sonnar T but I think mine (soon to arrive purchase) is older, but for the price of the set I couldn't resist. If I like the lens I'm selling the camera tho and get an adapter