First Photos with the Canon RF 50mm f1.2 50/1.2 LTM

[edhohoho]

Here are a few shots from my first day with the Canon 50/1.2 on my Epson R-D1. These were mostly taken at f1.2 and ISO 200 to 800 with RAW conversion via Epson PhotoRAW and extremely minimal post processing in Photoshop (mostly cropping, resizing, and very minor brightness/contrast adjustments). No adjustment of sharpness and/or noise reduction whatsoever.

To me, the lens seems sharp enough and out of focus areas are rendered quite smoothly. I like the size of the lens as it handles and balances extremely well on the R-D1. The lens appears well adjusted because I have tried other examples of this lens and when it's off, the main area of focus can get really soft.

Special thanks to Kevin M for sending me such a great lens. I have tried a couple other examples of this lens and this one is the best in terms of function and cosmetics. And since no one seems to know how to leave feedback for RFF sales, let me just say that Kevin is a great seller--true to his word, accurate descriptions, fast shipping and awesome packaging. Needless to say, I will not be utilizing his return policy.

 

[edhohoho]

Here are a couple more shots. In the first shot, the buildings in the background seem to be rendered quite smoothly, but on close inspection near the bottom, there are some "weird spots" likely from small point sources of light in the distance.

The second photo shows some of the "swirly" and somewhat distracting out of focus rendering of the distant tree foliage. This seems similar to what I have seen from Sonnar design lenses like the Canon 50/1.5. There is something about the combination of foliage with the background light and numerous small reflections off the foliage that seems to cause this effect which I find a bit disturbing.

So far I am enjoying the lens. Very fun to use and its rendering of color is quite good too. I have a couple color images from this lens posted on my Flickr set.

 

[maddoc]

I am not the biggest fan of this lens (😉) but I like the photos you took with it quite a lot. Actually it is the first time I see really good photos taken with the 50/1.2 LTM. Very nice ! 🙂

Looking forward to see more photos !

Cheers,

Gabor

 

[edhohoho]

Thanks, Gabor! Yes, I think a lot of people feel the same as you do about this lens. Which is why I wanted to show that given a good example of the lens, it isn't bad at all. Wish I had more time to spend taking pictures with this lens. So far I've only used it that one day!

 

[LeicaTom]

I think that your pulling the real potential out of this lens in your photos, these are some of the nicest shots I`ve seen in a long time with this lens.

I wish that I could try one out with my LEICA M6 and some of my pinup models (sadly no one locally has one to lend to me here) 🙁

I didn`t like the Canon f1.4 on my M6, I felt it was really not sharp enough, but I may have had a bum lens?

I`ve seen photos of the f1.2 shot at f1.4 and the results were very very nice, maybe you should try that as well with yours and show the results.

Tom

 

[Krosya]

I have this lens and i like mine too. I like your pics, but they are so small that it's hard to tell in detail how good it is. Maybe you could post larger ones?
Here is one from mine:

 

[edhohoho]

Thanks for the comments, I really appreciate them. I will try to use this lens more, especially at different apertures, but lately I haven't had as much time as I would like to devote to walking around, snapping photos, and the dreaded post processing.

Actually, it was embarrassing but I didn't know how to insert larger photos because the links from my Flickr weren't working on the RFF message editor for some reason. I tried to insert the links but only X's would appear in the message preview. Luckily Gabor sent me some tips on how to post images from Flickr so I will try to post slightly larger photos later. In the meantime, I basically had to right click the picture from Flickr in order to get a small enough file that could be attached to my RFF messages since the file size requirements on RFF are so small.

 

[raid]

I think that your pulling the real potential out of this lens in your photos, these are some of the nicest shots I`ve seen in a long time with this lens.

I wish that I could try one out with my LEICA M6 and some of my pinup models (sadly no one locally has one to lend to me here) 🙁

I didn`t like the Canon f1.4 on my M6, I felt it was really not sharp enough, but I may have had a bum lens?

I`ve seen photos of the f1.2 shot at f1.4 and the results were very very nice, maybe you should try that as well with yours and show the results.

Tom

Tom,

If we can meet this month, you can try out my 50/1.2.

Yes, the photos shown in this thread are very classy looking. Well done. The Canon 50/1.2 can hold its own against far more expensive lenses.

 

[raid]

The Canon 50/1.4 is sharper than the 50/1.5 and the 50/1.2, but each of these three lenses is somehow special.

 

[LeicaTom]

The Canon 50/1.4 is sharper than the 50/1.5 and the 50/1.2, but each of these three lenses is somehow special.

Well, I guess the f1.4 I had musta been a dog, (or maladjusted) it was mint/mint minus but the photos were pretty soft at full opening, it seemed to be just as soft as a Summarit is, so I figured to part with it before I became too attached to it......
(it helped finance the IIIC K Grey) - it was as I said mint/mint minus with both caps and hood, I got $300 for it - a good deal 🙂)

I figure that the Canon f1.2 would be my LAST fast lens buy, while I have everything else that was majorly used in the 1950`s (the Nikkor`s the Canon f1.5 and the Leitz Xenon and Summarit) and that`s enough for what I need them for in my PinUp photography.....

Hmmm well, maybe finally we can get together, I have to bring my Photo Assistant along, she`ll be the photo subject, she`s a very pretty casual fashion model as well. (you can bring your f2 Leica Sonnar along too ~ she`s used to the Sonnar look, I`ve shot her a few times now with Brian Sweeny`s "hacked" 1938 uncoated f2 and she loves it!)

When are you going to be in the Orlando area?

Drop me a line we can exchange telephone numbers.

Tom

 

[fbf]

Did you guys all remove the infinity lock on the 50/1.4 ? Would it affect anything?

 

[raid]

Nothing special about this large sized image except to me, but they show how sharp the Canon 50/1.4 is.
[images removed]

 

[raid]

This was the first roll with my KEH bought Canon 50mm/1.4 in BGN condition. The lens was used without any adjusting by anyone.

 

[maddoc]

Did you guys all remove the infinity lock on the 50/1.4 ? Would it affect anything?

I kinda like the infinity lock on my Canon 50/1.4 so I won't touch it. 🙂 But I agree, that lens is sharp.

 

[Keith]

I think the crop factor of the Epson's sensor plays a large part here ... I've noticed that my example, which only ever gets used on film bodies, is sharp in the centre but falls away noticably towards the edge of the frame. I'm not saying I dislike this quality in my example but I do think that assessing a lens's true qualities when you're not using all of it's optical real estate is a little pointless.

But I agree ... lovely pics! 🙂

 

[Erik L]

I kinda like the infinity lock on my Canon 50/1.4 so I won't touch it. 🙂 But I agree, that lens is sharp.

how can this be? i only have one lens with infinity lock and it annoys the hell out of me.

 

[raid]

Canon 50mm/1.2:

 

[fbf]

I like the lens a lot but 1. I hate the infinity lock 2. it is not nearly as smooth as my leica lenses. 3. the hood is madly expensive;4. the lens is not "pretty" like sonnar 50/1.5😛

 

[Keith]

Have you ever noticed how one 1800 pixel width image in a thread suddenly makes it a lot less user friendly? 😛

 

[raid]

Have you ever noticed how one 1800 pixel width image in a thread suddenly makes it a lot less user friendly? 😛

Your wish is my command; I just wanted to illustrate the sharpness with a larger file image.