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APO Summicron 50mm, too sharp!?


trond

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Just got my long waited APO 50 today, and boy, is this lens sharp!

 

Pardon the less interesting shot, but the scene was easy at hand, and with a lot of detail.

 

I have never ever seen a lens this sharp from any make, not even Leica, it is pin sharp, edge to edge from f2.0.

 

However, moire seems to be a big problem on the M9.

 

The brick wall in the scene is located at a distance of 350 meter.

 

Untouched DNG here: http://www.saether-online.com/L1005727.DNG

 

Best regards

 

Trond

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Guest WPalank

I'm on an iPad, so I don't know what software you use to process the file.

If LR 4, take a look at your Sharpness Settings. Could be it's cranked up a bit. Try setting to 0 and see how that looks at 100%

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Guest WPalank

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Great photos, also noticed purple green moire on the adjacent building's roof.

Look at the side of the church, unless they painted it in a Safari homage pattern. ;)

Also, the tiled portion of the church roof.

As others have mentioned, shouldn't be a problem in LR 4, assuming you have the software.

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That's an interesting "unintended consequence" of the high resolution of the lens. A good sign that your lens is performing as designed by in effect being able to out-resolve the sensor. I expect moire with this lens will be more common on the M8 and that both the MM and M240 will make it less common. Of course, the MM has the same number of pixels as the M9 but removing the need to de-mosaic will, I think, increase the spatial resolution.

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You just found out why most digital cameras have anti-aliasing filters.

 

Did you shoot in DNG+JPG format or DNG only? If the latter, try using DNG+JPG next time.

 

The shot is DNG only.

 

I always do jpg in post processing in LR.

 

However, that does not change the moire.

 

Best regards

 

Trond

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Look at the side of the church, unless they painted it in a Safari homage pattern. ;)

Also, the tiled portion of the church roof.

As others have mentioned, shouldn't be a problem in LR 4, assuming you have the software.

 

The "Safari camouflage paint" on the roof to the left came as a big surprise to me, looking at the shots on my screen after the shoot.

 

The roof is actually bright white snow as seen by the naked eye.

 

There is an underlying pattern of roof tiles, but they are covered by 10cm of snow.

 

The day yesterday, was particularly clear and contrasty, close to 0% humidity and -15 degree Celsius, no pollution and no wind. So there is noting between the lens and the scene to blur the image.

 

I have never seen anything as sharp from any camera or any lens, as the APO50 on the M9!

 

However, the bright color in the snow on the roof, surprises me a lot, since the very subtle pattern from the roof tiles is not visible through the snow by the naked eye.

 

If you only want one single lens for your M camera, the APO 50 is clearly the one to own!

 

Best regards

 

Trond

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You can always use a soft focus or 'portrait' filter if you don't like the sharpness. Or just mis-focus :)

 

I don´t complain about the resolution, that is exactly what I hoped for when I ordered the lens on the 10th of May 2012.

 

I´ll rather take the moire challenge and work on that in post.

 

Best regards

 

Trond

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I've seen threads like that on other sites: "Is my Ferrari too fast?", "Is my Rolex too bling?", "Is my Hermes bag too cheap?"... Just kidding and jealous not to have this superb lens i guess. Having to remove moiré in spades might be a problem though. Wait and see how it behaves on the M-240.

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Lightroom by default applies +25 sharpening on all imported files. Unless you have made your own profile that is applied upon import that removes the default sharpening these files are sharpened. Try setting sharpening downt to 0 manually.

 

What lens did you use previously? I am seeing this kind of sharpness from my MM + 50 Lux ASPH combination. So I guess the sensor makes a big deal in perceived sharpness as well.

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Hei Børge!

 

Resetting the sharpness in LR to 0 does not change much, and does not impact the moire.

 

I previously used the Summilux 50mm ASPH, and this comes close to the APO50 in the center area at f5.6, but falls short in the edges.

 

The whole pint with the APO50 for me is to be able to shoot wide open without any loss in image sharpness all the way to the edges.

 

Best regards

 

Trond

 

PS: I see that we are almost "neighbors", you are welcome to drop by to have a peek ;-)

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Of course not. But in-camera JPEG may. Just give it a try.

 

interesting. while some cameras out there have internal moire reduction, i wasn't aware the M9's JPEG engine also applies the reduction as well. i will have to try, thanks!

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Of course not. But in-camera JPEG may. Just give it a try.

 

I will give it a try another day.

 

It is snowing heavily today, so the images comes out very "soft" no moire whatsoever :D

 

BR

 

Trond

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