old Sonnar, two rolls and an almost-disappointment

[Pherdinand]

I got this 50/1.5 sonnar with busted filter ring originally for my Kiev. But i used it lately on the 'new' contax iia. There are signs of desperate wiping on the front glass surface (on the coating) but nothing too serious. Otherwise it's a great little lens.

Sso, i loaded a roll of iso100 slide film and took some shots with the gear. Had high expectations...
however, the sharpness was so-so, the colours were sometimes okay, sometimes gone, but there was a strong vignetting visible even at f/4. Very strange. (I metered with a reliable handheld!!) This is the half-disappointment. I had a similar lens before but did not notice vignetting.

Then, i loaded a roll of fuji reala andused it in amsterdam and home on the wild east. Big snow and such.
No sign of vignetting, very nice (accurate) colours, and the sharpness is excellent. Even some shots which I remember were at f/2 or f/1.5, show a great sharpness when well focused, and no vignetting at all (on the neg, not the print!).

I don't understand it!

The only thing I understand is, Fuji Reala100 is an excellent film, and the results can be better than on the kodak e100sw slide. And i also decided not to get rid of the contax+sonnar combo:)

Is the slide just more sensitive to lens and photographer errors, or what??

[waterlenz]

Trannie film is more sensitive to exposure variation than color neg.
Hope this helps
Happy 2006
Tom

[taffer]

>Then, i loaded a roll of fuji reala andused it in amsterdam and home on the wild east. Big snow and such.

Obvious, cold means less mollecular movement hence firmer hands hence less risk of camera shake :D

Now serious, Ektachrome has always been a delight to use and in many occasions has brought out the best from a lens, so I'm really puzzled, maybe that film you have there went thru the X-rays at max power for 100 times ??? :confused:

[wlewisiii]

Slides are much more sensitive to variations from the expected exposure. If your shutter speeds are a bit off, that would be enough with most slide film. You might try another roll to see if the results are consistant or see if there is anyone near you with a shutter speed tester.

William

[raid]

I recently had a dissapointment with a Zeiss 5cm/2 lens, and I got some muddy looking color prints/scans back. Brian Sweeney suggested to me to shoot other color rolls with the lens, and it could be that thwe roll of Fuji 100 that gave me lousy results had been exposed to heat. Maybe this happend to you too?

[JoeFriday]

lately I've been shooting E100SW in my Leica and have gotten excellent results.. on the occasions that the results were not so good, I knew it was my fault, and not the equipment

slide film has much less exposure latitude than negative film and color could be affected.. but it shouldn't affect the sharpness.. it sounds like potential operator error, or a bad roll of slide film

I'd keep using it and see if the problem recurs.. I know my Sonnar 50/1.5 is my favorite lens.. its image quality is in the league of the 35mm Summicron.. the only issue I've had with mine is severe flare when shooting into the sun.. but that might have been exacerbated by a UV filter I've since removed

[Mike Kovacs]

Recently somebody showed me by email some horrid photos of a CZ Opton 50/2 Sonnar group - centering on the middle triplet looked about 10-20% off!

I find it hard to believe it left the Oberkochen factory this bad, but who knows?