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Distagon 18 torture test
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 5:46 pm    Post subject: Distagon 18 torture test Reply with quote
Flare test against the sun with sun in the frame, no lens hood nor other protection, on EOS 5D:

at f/4 (wide open):


at f/11:


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 5:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Wow! Seems this the LENS!


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 5:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Very impressive!


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 6:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
damn good Shocked


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 6:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Not bad, eh? Smile
There are the unavoidable ghosts, but very faint.
And absolutely no flare haze or loss of contrast.

On the negative side, there is some persistent vignetting also at f/11, which was not apparent in my previous tests. But if that's the tradeoff, I can accept it: resistance to flare is more important for me.
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 6:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Yes, very nice even at f/4 and especially stopped down. Interesting to see results for some intermediate apertures to ....

Does the six-ray star mean that this lens has a straight-sided hexagonal aperture?


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 6:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
ChrisLilley wrote:
Yes, very nice even at f/4 and especially stopped down. Interesting to see results for some intermediate apertures to ....


There is not much difference between them, because the lens is slow, so it starts at f/4... only three stops away from f/11.
Here's f/8, which is similar to f/11 (f/5.6 is similar to f/4):


ChrisLilley wrote:
Does the six-ray star mean that this lens has a straight-sided hexagonal aperture?


Yes, six-blade aperture, normal shape.
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 8:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
looks like you're on to a winner there Smile great results


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 9:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
You can fix vignetting easily - flare cant be undone. What a gem of a lens!


patrickh


PostPosted: Tue Mar 11, 2008 11:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Now, that's impressive.


PostPosted: Wed Mar 12, 2008 9:13 am    Post subject: Reply with quote


Impressive


PostPosted: Wed Mar 12, 2008 9:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
I want one and I can get one but the price of $1150 makes me hecitate even if it is in great shape ... I need to decide how hungry I want to be in the near future if I take all the weight out of my wallet Very Happy


PostPosted: Wed Mar 12, 2008 9:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
OMG, what a crappy lens! Flares all over the place!

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. Twisted Evil Laughing

Just kidding. This lens behaviour is amazing! Congratulations! I guess this is the 18mm lens to look for!


PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 2:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Fotal wrote:
I want one and I can get one but the price of $1150 makes me hecitate even if it is in great shape ... I need to decide how hungry I want to be in the near future if I take all the weight out of my wallet Very Happy


$1150?
That seller is a plain thief.
This is a $400 lens. Maybe $500 if MM and with the custom lens hood.
Not more!


PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 2:36 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Not as torture test as the above, but interesting. This is a closeup of Forsythia with the lens stopped down to f/11 to achieve good DOF.
The f/11 of course sacrifices some sharpness if compared to f/5.6 or f/8, but it's more interesting test for a superwide because they are often used very much stopped down.

Here's the whole image resized. Some residual vignetting, but not horrendous. Good colour saturation and excellent spacial rendition (3D) for such a narrow aperture:



A centre detail showing good sharpness for a 18mm lens. There is a little purple fringing but consider that the situation is extreme (bright yellow over cobalt blue sky):



Another centre detail, that shows good resolution also in the bokeh part and very little purple fringing, almost imperceptible:



Centre detail again, and again, good sharpness and no visible CA:



Good definition of aerial antennas and no visible CA:



Difficult detail, branches over blue sky, here we are closer to edge but still no visible CA:



Centre detail in the lower part of image, good res:



And now some edge/corner performance:

Edge performance in the middle (away from corners) is quite good I think for a 18mm lens:



Again, edge performance in the middle, quite good I think:



Another edge performance in middle point, quite good, only slight coma distortion:



The right lower corner shows definitely coma distortion:



I believe however that it might be a defect of my copy, because if I look at the left lower corner, I see the coma, but not even nearly as bad as in the right:



So probably my copy suffers from some slight misalignement of elements, that penalizes the right lower corner.

Overall, a lens that is surely not without defects, but I think, more than acceptable, or otherwise said, the defects are minor when compared to the qualities. In my opinion, of course.

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PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 4:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Orio
This has to be one of your best lenses.


Smile Smile Smile patrickh


PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 10:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
Orio wrote:

$1150?
That seller is a plain thief.
This is a $400 lens. Maybe $500 if MM and with the custom lens hood.
Not more!


In which mount?


PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 1:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
ChrisLilley wrote:

In which mount?


Contax/Yashica.

The lens also exists in the Rollei version, and in the older Contarex version. Don't know about the performance of these, they seem to be quite rare in both versions.

Today Zeiss also makes the Leica M version - of course for rangefinder cameras.
Apparently, no plan to release a ZF or ZS version for the moment.

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PostPosted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 4:24 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Orio, this lens' performance is amazing!


PostPosted: Wed Feb 17, 2010 8:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
i like to revive this thread caus i asked myself if this lens has any mirror issues with an unshaved 5D. is anyone using this lens in that way?


PostPosted: Wed Feb 17, 2010 8:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote
Holy cow, great results!!


PostPosted: Thu Feb 18, 2010 5:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote
The Distagon 18mm is an absolutely wicked lens, I love the look. It's super sharp center frame and by f/8 and f/11 has good border performance.

Unfortunately it's a pain to get working on the 5d. As far as I know the MM version does not clear the mirror and you can also damage the back of the lens as the rear element can get scratched by the mirror.

The AE version of this lens many users report working. Unfortunately I have tested two AE copies of this lens, one works and one doesn't, major bummer because I still don't have one for my 5d and it is an amazing piece of glass.
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