Godfrey DiGiorgi wrote: >On Jun 29, 2006, at 1:19 AM, Toralf Lund wrote: > > > >>>That would be me. I compared the price of a Pentax FA50/1.4 with a >>>Leica Summilux-M 50mm f/1.4 ASPH. The Pentax holds up pretty damn >>>well for a lens that that is priced at less than 8% as much as the >>>Leica lens. >>> >>> >>> >>In what ways? I mean, where you talking about the sharpness, or >>contrast, or... Or just the performance in general? >> >> > >Overall performance. The Leica lenses generally have some of the best >imaging characteristics around, as well as being sharp and contrasty, >which they should for the prices they charge for them. The Pentax >FA50/1.4 is amazingly close to that standard and is almost being >given away by comparison, on price. > > > >>At any rate, perhaps a comparison with Canon or Nikon would be more >>relevant. I've noticed that both these producers offer 50s that are >>considerably less expensive than the FA50/1.4. >> >> > >Canon and Nikon both produce very low cost 50mm lenses in the f/1.8 >and f/2 range. While they're not 'bad', they're nowhere near as good >as the FA50/1.4 on rendering, or even the Pentax 50/1.7 series. The >comparable lenses are the Nikon 50mm f/1.4D AF lens at $280, and a >Canon EF 50mm f/1.4 USM at $295 (B&H Prices). I've used both of them. >These are built with the same mount quality as the Pentax FA50/1.4 >but aren't quite as good on imaging performance. The only other 50mm >f/1.4 lenses in the 35mm SLR range that I think are comparable in >performance was the Contax mount Zeiss Planar and the Leica Summicron- >R, both of which are substantially more expensive. > >Pentax continues to offer the budget minded A50/2 lens at $70. It's >nowhere near the performance of the f/1.7 and f/1.4 lenses, but it's >still a good lens. > >Godfrey > > > >
There's also the ZF mount Zeiss 50mm f1.4 Planar, which is improved over the contax mount version due to a superior aperture design. It's a little pricey at ~$500USD. An M42 version is due shortly. -Adam -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
