The Zeiss Otus 100mm f/1.4 ZE Lens is like most Zeiss lenses: it has absolutely astounding image quality with a price tag to match. Is that stunning image quality worth the high price of admission? This great video review seeks to answer that question.
Coming to you from Dustin Abbott, this excellent video takes a look at the Zeiss Otus 100mm f/1.4 ZE lens. Traditionally, wide aperture, short telephoto portrait lenses have either been 85mm or 135mm, but in the past few years, a few manufacturers have split the difference, including Nikon and Sigma with their respective 105mm f/1.4 offerings. Zeiss' 100mm f/1.4 follows in the tradition of most of their lenses, using a manual focus design and a metal lens barrel and featuring stunning image quality with a matching stratospherically high price. Of course, we all want sharper lenses with creamier bokeh and fewer aberrations, but it's also usually a balancing game with price, but with Zeiss, there is no such compromise, and generally, if you want the absolute best glass for a full frame camera, they're a good place to look. Is it the lens for you? Check out Abbott's review above to hear his full thoughts.
No one qualifies Image Quality.
They say weasel words like stunning or awesome. Give numbers like lines per mm ..
Don’t be a weasel ..
He starts the video by correcting the harsh vignette the lens has. Now maybe this is just me, but for $5k, there shouldn't be any. I kinda checked out after that.
It does have a relatively small filter size (86mm vs. Sigma 105/1.4 with a 105mm filter). So I’m not surprised there’s some vignetting.
Zeiss has always prioritized most everything else over vignetting, as it’s easily correctable.
For that much money, I want autofocus. My son uses several Zeiss lenses (wedding/event/portraits), but if there's a lot of motion involved, he has his trusty 24-70 or 70-200 mounted.