[Theme] Your best shots with the 58/1.2 Noct

[Airy]

Some very nice ones can be found here and there on this forum. As a recent thread showed, many like it but few own it, and many think that the current second hand market price seems too high with respect to the expected added value.

Brushing aside all pros and cons (incl. usability spectrum, competition with more recent lenses, etc.), I'd like to ask lucky owners or users to post what they think makes this lens special, as far as pictorial qualities are concerned. No (or few) comments, just photos, indicating aperture and other relevant shooting params if deemed useful.

Unfortunately, I cannot contribute (the test shots from the shops are just shots, not photographs).

[Bjørn Rørslett]

On the surface there is nothing special with the Noct. On the contrary it's tempting to add. The lens does poorly on the classic 'brick wall' tests and the truth to be told, is very difficult to focus manually on most modern DSLRs. It handles bright light sources quite well, but so do many of the modern Nikkors. Image contrast is more aptly described as 'rounded' than 'high'. Add to this its scarcity and often elevated price and one might rightfully ask why people are so obsessed by this old optic.

This is a lens you need to love in order order to have it work your way. It has something intangible in its rendering that only actual use can show you. The Noct makes photography different simply because it is so removed from clinical perfection and thereby alters your mindset. I find many of my playful images result from the use (or abuse, depending on perspective) of the Noct, very often for IR photography. The latter field it doesn't do very well either, but that pretty much sums up the allure of this Nikkor. It's like loving a petulant child. A lens that grows on you as the relationship deepens and matures.

[Bjørn Rørslett]

Just a snapshot to indicate the Noct works at night scenes as well. No surprise perhaps given its name? To tell the truth, it's only early afternoon, but December in Norway is a dark time of the year.

Despite its older coatings, strong point-light sources are handled pretty well. This is with an AI Noct from the late '70s, by the way.

[Bjørn Rørslett]

Despite its name, the Noct is legally used in daylight as well ...

The outline shape of the Fantoft Stave Church outside Bergen is seen through the leafing beechwood. A popular target for Satanists to torch, by the way (the Stave Church, not the spring beeches).

[Andy]

Found a few on my web server. Were part of camera tests I did years ago.













rgds,
Andy