50 mm Nikkor shootout (1) : organ in church

[Airy]

In the lower left, the difference is smaller: the 50/1.4 seems abit more contrasty, while the 50/1.2 seems to reveal more detail. That is probably because of the lesser vignetting of the 50/1.2, rather than a difference in sharpness (see the bright pipe mouths - not that good).

Along the lower right edge, the 50/1.4 is sharper and more contrasty (see for instance the suspended contraption, from a former gas-fed heating device). And in the bottom right corner, the 50/1.4 is much better, i.e. much less bad, but it does not matter a lot.

[Airy]

That leaves us with the 50/1.4 AIS vs. 50/1.8 G, at f/2.0. Overall rendition: the G is slightly cooler, but still "neutral" in my opinion. Of course it vignettes more.

[Airy]

Center : it's a tie. I would tend to think that the 1.4 is sharper, but the difference is not significant given the uncertainties of the whole process (focussing, camera shake...).

[Airy]

Off center, the results are clearly to the 50/1.8 G's advantage. There is more detail to be seen, and sharper edges.

[Airy]

In the top, the reverse is true. This is an out-of-focus area (less the case in the bottom, since the horizontal distance to the pipes etc. was greater than in the center). So I won't say that the difference in sharpness is the result of a difference in focussing plane; if any, it must be secondary. I have no explanation.

[Airy]

On the bottom edge, and taking into account the difference in illumination (effect of vignetting), the 50/1.4 also seems sharper. This is an area well in front of the focus plane.
I have seen some reports where increased sharpness off center would be attributed to mechanical vignetting (effectively reducing the aperture), but I do not see such an effect here. See also the corner picture: performance is about the same (except illumination); the G might have less coma (but the lower illumination certainly helps in this comparison).

[Airy]

Bottom line: in the present situation,

• the wide apertures 1.2, 1.4 are not really useful;
• the 1.8 aperture delivers usable pictures;
• at f/2.0, the old 1.4 AIS and the recent 1.8 G show similar performance, with a slight advantage to the AIS that seems to exhibit deeper DOF, versus the 1.8G that seems to handle point light sources a bit better. Color rendering is about neutral, with the G being slightly cooler;
• the 1.2 does not live up to its reputation of being the best (MF) Nikkor at 2.0, but beware of sample variation. Since my two 1.2 are identical, they are probably average, so maybe the 1.4 is stellar?

[Airy]

For reference, we have not yet reached ultimate sharpness. The center at f/4 looks like this (1.4 AIS and 1.8G). Note that the screen capture and jpg saving do some damage.

[Akira]

Airy, as mentioned in (2), thanks for sharing your effort.

One question: which coatings do Ais f1.2 and f1.4 lenses have, the newer SIC or the older NIC?

[Airy]

No idea. How can I make the difference? some kind of reflected color under certain lighting conditions?

[Akira]

I'm afraid I myself haven't tested side by side.  If you happen to have the same lenses (say, Ais 50/1.4), the rendition of the pipes might be different in terms of the flare...

The difference between NIC and SIC in appearance is fairly obvious.  NIC looks differently in beautifully saturated colors according to the elements.  SIC shows generally dull green color, which suggests the lower reflections in wider range.

[Frank Fremerey]

A wonderful organ. 3 sets of pipes echoeing the form. Wonderful.