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Hexanon 50mm f1.4 or f1.7?
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Prefferred Hexanon 50mm version?
f1.4
53%
 53%  [ 15 ]
f1.7
39%
 39%  [ 11 ]
f1.8
7%
 7%  [ 2 ]
Total Votes : 28



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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:42 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:42 am
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Indeed, the 1.8/50 is very common and very cheap on ebay.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:01 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:01 am
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TBF i have to say i have two AR 50 F1.7, 1x Ar 50 1.8 a 57mm F1.4 and the 40mm 1.8
And personally as per Ian, i like the 1.8 more than the 1.7 is sharp as a laser at 1.8 infact its probably my sharpest WO lens, only comparable to the Minolta 50mm PG F1.4 and the Minolta 58mm 1.4 PF.
Price is a lot cheaper than the 1.7 and the 1.4.
And yes i know everyone rates the 1.7 more than the 1.8 but i choose that lens.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:34 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:34 am
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I agree with Eddie, the 1.8/50 is probably my favourite too, the 1.7 is also laser sharp but I think the 1.8 is sharper wide open. The 1.7 has a little more 3d dimensionality to it's rendering but if I had to chose which one was better, I couldn't, they are different but one isn't better than the other, it's subjective. The 1.7 feels and looks like a higher quality item, it's larger, heavier and has a larger front element, but I like the small size and light weight of the 1./8/50.

I'd also consider the 1.8/40 as well, it's also excellent.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:56 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:56 am
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iangreenhalgh1 wrote:
I agree with Eddie, the 1.8/50 is probably my favourite too, the 1.7 is also laser sharp but I think the 1.8 is sharper wide open. The 1.7 has a little more 3d dimensionality to it's rendering but if I had to chose which one was better, I couldn't, they are different but one isn't better than the other, it's subjective. The 1.7 feels and looks like a higher quality item, it's larger, heavier and has a larger front element, but I like the small size and light weight of the 1./8/50.

I'd also consider the 1.8/40 as well, it's also excellent.


I have the 1.8/40 and i like it although i find some shots soft. Not sure if its my copy or probably more likely my skills, seems like the dof is razor razor thin on close subjects wo


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 3:34 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 3:34 am
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ramcewan wrote:

I have the 1.8/40 and i like it although i find some shots soft.

I believed that I would go through life never ever hearing a sentence like this Shocked


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:19 am
Post subject: Re: Hexanon 50mm f1.4 or f1.7?
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:19 am
Post subject: Re: Hexanon 50mm f1.4 or f1.7?
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Hi!

I have both an AR 50 1.4 and AR 50 1.7. I love the handling of the 1.4, as well as the rendering. It's as good as my (excellent) FD 50 1.4 copy. My copy of the AR 50 1.7 is only so-so, and I wouldn't recommend it. Perhaps I have a bad copy of the 1.7 or something.

Cheers!


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 7:51 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 7:51 am
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I have/had several 1.8/50, 1.7/50, 1.4/50, 1.4/57 and one 1.2/57... all of them are great. While the 50's may a bit sharper wide open, I would say the 57mm Hexanons have a nicer bokeh.

Hard to tell which one to get.. they can be found cheap (except the 1.2/57), maybe get all of them Wink


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 8:07 am
Post subject: Re: Hexanon 50mm f1.4 or f1.7?
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 8:07 am
Post subject: Re: Hexanon 50mm f1.4 or f1.7?
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glasslover wrote:
Hi!

I have both an AR 50 1.4 and AR 50 1.7. I love the handling of the 1.4, as well as the rendering. It's as good as my (excellent) FD 50 1.4 copy. My copy of the AR 50 1.7 is only so-so, and I wouldn't recommend it. Perhaps I have a bad copy of the 1.7 or something.

Cheers!



In my test for resolution:- crops of shots (at about 100yards) and the Canon 50mm f1.4 was just very slightly better than the AR 50mm f1.7...erm work that one out Wink The AR 50mm f1.7 is a very sharp lens (at least stopped down the way I use it) and when compared to lenses like Meyer/Pentacon or Helios 50mms is a better buy if bought for the same price.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 10:43 am
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 10:43 am
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iangreenhalgh1 wrote:
I had two copies of the FD 1.4/50, one had some fungus, neither was sharp wide open, both my Konica 1.4/50 and Miranda 1.4/50 are a lot sharper wide open.

FD 1.4/50 wide open, 100% crop, pretty soft and in many shots it had quite a lot of CA on oof areas, I sold mine after one test shoot as it was highly mediocre:
Hexanon 1.8/50 wide open, this is what I call sharp:


The usual caveat about sample variations applies. However, I had 3 FDs 50/1.4 and they were all the same, so I believe my copies are representative. Here are the shots from my Canon FDs 50/1.4 . Hexanon 50mm/1.7 is a great lens, but not on the same level as FD 50/1.4.

First, wide open shots. Note that the wedding picture was intentionally softened with negative clarity and contrast.






And here are some stopped-down shots. The wedding picture is a heavy crop, so what you are seeing is, in fact, 50% view.





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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:16 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:16 pm
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really nice photos.. I like the rendering of this FD 1.4/50!


But I'm you could do the same with a 1.4/57 Hexanon too and I still think the 50mm Hexanons are even a bit sharper.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:56 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 12:56 pm
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Added a poll to the thread - the options are limited to the three common 50mms from hexanon.


aspen wrote:
ramcewan wrote:

I have the 1.8/40 and i like it although i find some shots soft.

I believed that I would go through life never ever hearing a sentence like this Shocked


not sure how to take this so I will explain that to me imho sharpness is not the end all be all of the lens it is more about character, color, and feel often times. I kinda subscribe to the ken rockwell sharpness ( http://kenrockwell.com/tech/lens-sharpness.htm ) belief about people taking pictures of brick walls to show how sharp their lens is instead of taking pictures of interesting things. I am pretty much a newb but I have shots of bluebirds taken with new hightech lenses that have amazing sharp contrast untouched to the point where it is different from what my eyes saw, while this is not always bad it does become unnatural, over the long haul I find I prefer a shot that has more resemblance to what my eyes saw.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:25 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 1:25 pm
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Why don't you just take all 3 lenses? They do have differences.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:17 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:17 pm
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No point in a poll unless you own or have used all 3, I've only got the 50/1.4 so can't really vote lol


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:21 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:21 pm
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Tedat wrote:
really nice photos.. I like the rendering of this FD 1.4/50!


But I'm you could do the same with a 1.4/57 Hexanon too and I still think the 50mm Hexanons are even a bit sharper.


Thanks! Just wanted to get the word out that FD50/1.4 is one of really great lenses. I would expect f1.4 Hexanons to be similar in performance. And the other point is that 1.4 lenses usually are a bit of higher quality than 1.7/1.8 in addition to being faster. For example, FD 1.4 has 8 bladed aperture, while FD 1.8 is only 5 bladed.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:47 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 2:47 pm
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I really don't agree that the FD 1.4 is on a higher level than the Konica 1.7/50, I also strongly disagree that faster lenses are higher quality, this can easily be disproved.

I didn't keep any of the FD lenses I've owned, I found them pretty average, on the same level as the Kiron and Tokina lenses I've owned.

If the OP would like me to, I will take my Hexanons 1.4/50, 1.7/50 and 1.8/50 and do a side-by-side comparison shoot.

However, I would suggest that you would be very happy with any of the three and differences are not very large at all.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:00 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:00 pm
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iangreenhalgh1 wrote:
I really don't agree that the FD 1.4 is on a higher level than the Konica 1.7/50, I also strongly disagree that faster lenses are higher quality, this can easily be disproved.


Easily disproved? Interesting. How?


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:34 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:34 pm
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Tervueren wrote:
No point in a poll unless you own or have used all 3, I've only got the 50/1.4 so can't really vote lol


Indeed...I only have the hexanon F1.7 and F1.8 and anyway rarely use them wide open, so it would be a stop down comparison and just to add I can't see the difference in these two lenses........... but then I haven't bothered to test them with large crops.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:51 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 5:51 pm
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By comparing fast lenses to slower counterparts. The Hexanon 1.4/50 isn't better than the 1.8 or 1.7 versions, the Miranda 1.4/50, despite having 8 elements, isn't better then the 6-element Miranda 1.8 and 1.9/50, the Pancolar 1.8/50 isn't sharper than the Tessar 2.8/50, there are countless examples.

Maybe with Canon the faster ones are better, Canon are a mass market maker and their standard lenses are usually competent but uninspiring so it makes sense that their faster lenses, being niche items of a much higher price level would be better than their mass market items.

Anyways, back to the topic at hand, here are some unprocessed wide open shots I just took with the Hexanon 1.8/50 in poor light. No way can the Canon FD 1.8/50 match this level of performance, as Forenseil would say, they play in different leagues. As they are around the same price on ebay, no sense in picking the FD 1.8/50 over the the Hexanon:


#1

#2

#3

#4

#5

#6

#7

#8

#9

#10

#11


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:22 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:22 pm
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iangreenhalgh1 wrote:
By comparing fast lenses to slower counterparts. The Hexanon 1.4/50 isn't better than the 1.8 or 1.7 versions, the Miranda 1.4/50, despite having 8 elements, isn't better then the 6-element Miranda 1.8 and 1.9/50, the Pancolar 1.8/50 isn't sharper than the Tessar 2.8/50, there are countless examples.

Maybe with Canon the faster ones are better, Canon are a mass market maker and their standard lenses are usually competent but uninspiring so it makes sense that their faster lenses, being niche items of a much higher price level would be better than their mass market items.

Anyways, back to the topic at hand, here are some unprocessed wide open shots I just took with the Hexanon 1.8/50 in poor light. No way can the Canon FD 1.8/50 match this level of performance, as Forenseil would say, they play in different leagues. As they are around the same price on ebay, no sense in picking the FD 1.8/50 over the the Hexanon:



I hope you realize that your personal experience can not prove or disprove anything. Simply because the experience of other people (for example mine) is just as valid and could be (and in this case it is) totally different. So what we exchange here is opinions and experience, but not the absolute truth.

It is true in general that faster lenses were more expensive, not just for Canon, but for any other lens maker (with caveat that specialty lenses such as macro play by different rules). Therefore, it is reasonable to expect higher optical quality from them. Canon is the line that I know best, but I see this trend in other lines as well, for example, Minolta MD.

In my experience, all 50mm f1.8/f1.7 from top tier Japanese manufacturers play in the same league and that definitely included Canon FD/FL, Konica 50/1.7 and 52/1.8, Minolta, Yashica ML all of which I own or owned in the past. I also have 50mm MD 1.4 and several copies of FD 1.4, and they do have an edge over all of my 1.7/1.8 normals. I wouldn't say that it's a huge edge, but I do see it consistently.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:25 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:25 pm
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I have the 1.8, 1.7 and 57/1.4
The difference isn't big in sharpness. They are all good. I never made a direct comparision but I think the 1.8 is sharpest. They all have slight CAs and a slight glow when used wide open.

My tip: Go for theyr successors Minolta MD Rokkor 50/1.4, Minolta MD Rokkor 58/1.4 or the Minolta MD 50/2 (best CA control, contrast and colors) - they are all sligh tly better for my taste.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:41 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 6:41 pm
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Where is the CA and glow on the wide open samples from the 1.8/50?

I can see a tiny bit of CA on the oof areas on one of the shots but it seems absent on the others, I don't see any glow either, not like you get from the Biotar 2/58 or Pancolar 1.8/50 or Meyer 1.8/50.

I have tried the Minolta Rokkor-PF 1.7/50 and it's excellent, I think as good as the Hexanon 1.7/50 but different in rendering, both are quite cool in colour tones.

Minolta Rokkor-PF 1.7/50:



Bottom line, you can't go wrong with any of the Konica or Minolta 50mm lenses, they are all great, same for the Konica 1.8/40 and Minolta 2/45 pancakes.

It's hard to find a poor 50mm lens, another option that is very cheap and great is the Pentacon Prakticar 1.8/50:



I'd rate the Pentacon, Konicas and Minoltas as better than the Canon FD 1.8/50 and as they are all dirt cheap, they are all good choices, just pick what you can find at the best price in the best condition.

If I had to pick just one cheap 50 I'd go for an early Jupiter-8 2.50 in M39, it's absolutely stunning:



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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 7:50 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 7:50 pm
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ForenSeil wrote:
I have the 1.8, 1.7 and 57/1.4
The difference isn't big in sharpness. They are all good. I never made a direct comparision but I think the 1.8 is sharpest. They all have slight CAs and a slight glow when used wide open.

My tip: Go for theyr successors Minolta MD Rokkor 50/1.4, Minolta MD Rokkor 58/1.4 or the Minolta MD 50/2 (best CA control, contrast and colors) - they are all sligh tly better for my taste.


Minolta MD not a successor of Konica , Konica and Minolta exists as invidual companies , Konica was oldest and most expensive maker like Zeiss or Leica. Later they did join to Konica-Minolta company if I remember as well it did happen in AF lens years . Both are good company with good products. After many Zeiss lenses I still love Konica Hexanons and Minolta Rokkors both.


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 8:13 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 8:13 pm
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Ups, yes, you are right Attila! They fused after the MD lenses were produced so the Rokkors are no successors!
I thought they fused much earlier because I have some Minolta SR bodies which look nearly identical to my Konica AR bodies.

iangreenhalgh1 wrote:
Where is the CA and glow on the wide open samples from the 1.8/50?

iangreenhalgh1 wrote:


#5

All my Konica lenses around 50mm tend to do something like that (slight colored glow) espeically wide open (disappears when stopped down a bit more).
I don't know Pancolar and Meyer 50/1.8 but my Helios 44-2 has indeed a lot more glow than the Konicas Smile

I hope I didn't get missunderstood. I really like all the Konica lenses, but the Minolta MD 50/2 is optically slightly better than the 50 1.7- and 1.8 from Konica and I also think that my Minolta MD 50/1.4 is slightly better than the Konica 57/1.4 (I don't have the Konica
50/1.4 though).

To also spam with some Minolta examples (Minolta MD Rokkor 50mm 1.4, 49mm filter screw version, no sharpening):

Psychedelic Circus
(f/5.6)

(f/1.4 - wide open)
And the Minolta MD 50/2 is even visibly superior (mostly in contrast and colors).

Last edited by ForenSeil on Wed Mar 21, 2012 2:36 am; edited 3 times in total


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 9:14 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 9:14 pm
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Aah, I see it on the red sign now, thanks. It is indeed slight compared to some others, hence I didn't see it.

I think it's worth repeating that any of the Konica or Minolta options will be more than adequate, they are all really good and the differences slight indeed.

I'd still go for a 1950's Jupiter-8 ahead of all of them though...


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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 11:16 pm
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Posted: Tue Mar 20, 2012 11:16 pm
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ForenSeil,

nice shots with the minolta lenses only thing is I have a konica ar adapter, a nikon adapter, and a m42 adapter but no minolta md adapter... hmm
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