105 mm Z MC Availability

Best Buy in the U.S. is showing that they have it in stock.

Thanks, but looks like they are sold out now. o_O

Hopefully other dealers may get some stock soon. Could be a bunch of them sitting on some container ship somewhere.

Could be a bunch of them sitting on some container ship somewhere.

 

Are relatively light, somewhat delicate, and high dollar value items like lenses, cameras, etc. shipped by ships or by air freight?

or by air freight?

+1... hopefully!

Well, a miracle has occurred. Early this morning I got a call from the local shop saying they had a 105 macro Z with my name on it. Apparently they are trickling in very slowly and unpredictably, though this is the first I've heard of it. Picked it up this afternoon but haven't had time to do much. Focusing works very well. I grabbed the first thing handy, stuck it under a lamp and shot it. Need to find some worthy subjects and the time to shoot.

 

Conrad, congratulations on your new lens. I am sure it is worth the wait, 3+ months?

Sorry Conrad, but I see some red-green fringing on the OOF edges of that watch case. Not what I would expect from a top of the range macro lens.

 

I hope you haven't waited all this time for a 'lemon'.

Edited November 5, 2021 by rodeo_joe|1

It's not strictly an APO lens, so a little bit of LoCA is expected. Probably in most cases you stop down the lens to get sufficient depth of field and this should go away.

 

Here is a review showing the results with a ruler for reference:

 

Nikon Z MC 105mm f2.8 VR S review | Cameralabs

 

Personally I love the 105 MC and I find its overall image quality very pleasing. Many highly-corrected macro lenses produce quite ugly bokeh, but this lens produces very beautiful out-of-focus rendering. I'm happy to give up a tad of APO correction to get a more pleasing lens overall. The AF and VR functions are also almost silent, and it does a good job with in-camera focus shifting (for stacking in post).

Edited November 5, 2021 by ilkka_nissila

Are relatively light, somewhat delicate, and high dollar value items like lenses, cameras, etc. shipped by ships or by air freight?

 

Some years ago in Sweden there was a theft of whole shipping container of tamron lenses, I wonder where all those went. But I suppose that official importers order merchantice by containers that ship trough world seas. Collectors and such often order specialty items thru air mail even overseas.

Now for us "Zoomies" there is the 24-120 f4. Hmmm I want 1, not both. They may have missed a sale by the problem with availability.

Sorry Conrad, but I see some red-green fringing on the OOF edges of that watch case. Not what I would expect from a top of the range macro lens.

 

I hope you haven't waited all this time for a 'lemon'.

 

Sharp eye my friend! Very interesting about the fringing. I saw what I thought was a moire pattern on some screening of a barn I shot. I was using the raw image processing in Affinity Photo. After much messing about I noticed that the box for chromatic aberration was checked. I unchecked it and the problem disappeared. Sure enough, I went back to the watch image and unchecked the box- it seems checked by default. Edges now perfect, no fringing. The out-of-camera jpeg is also perfect, which reinforces what I often say about the assumed superiority of raw. You better be pretty good developing raw or Nikon may beat you with their excellent jpegs. Another oddity about Affinity is it thinks the lens is a Cosina 24mm 2.0 Macro because the Z lens hasn't been added to the Lensfun database yet. It should really come up empty and you have to remember to uncheck corrections or things will be made worse instead of better. It's still my current choice of editors.

Here is a review showing the results with a ruler for reference:

 

Nikon Z MC 105mm f2.8 VR S review | Cameralabs

But the fringing shown on the above image is far in excess of those ruler shots:

Anyway, I'm glad it turned out to be a false alarm and due to a software glitch.

Because for a minute I thought I was looking at one of those red-green anaglyph 3D pictures. :p

I'm guessing the wrong lens ID and using the corrections for that lens has indeed induced some CA!

Unfortunately both images I recently posted have the fringe problem because I didn't uncheck the box. The image of a pencil sharpener I posted has a red edge on one of the grinders that shouldn't be there. I did remove the erroneous lens correction. I'm going to do some tests using various raw converters to confirm, then send a bug report to Affinity. I don't know how the chromatic correction works, but it's disturbing that it can make things worse or better, depending on the image. It's also disturbing that it doesn't seem to be adjustable, which I would think is a requirement. The worst possible case is they got the state of the button wrong and the lens is really that bad, and the software is correcting it. All manner of things get corrected in software these days so I need to run enough independent tests to convince myself of what's going on. I hate to waste the bandwidth, but see if this is better-

What are the exposure details and focus points for the latest shot?

It's the same raw file as the first, just with the chromatic correction in Affinity unchecked. ISO 360, f/11 and 1/125 sec. The focus point is through the balance bearing and far end of the speed scale. One shot, handheld. Obviously I can do way better with stacking, which is the next thing to learn. I've done lots of stacking manually, but have never tried the automatic focus steps of the camera. The watch was a handy subject but doesn't please me because it's in rather poor condition and I've never had the time to work on it.

Well, waiting since announcement. Just snagged one from Adorama, delivered today. Very nice lens. Not quite as sharp as my zeiss 100 f2 on FTZ adapter but so much lighter than the zeiss +FTZ. Pretty easy choice for back packing. Should be fun to get to know it over the next few weeks.

Partial correction. The nikon z105 f2.8 is as sharp or sharper than the zeiss 100 manual focus. The zeiss is about 1/3rd stop brighter in exposure at the same settings. The autofocus and lighter weight makes the nikon lens a winner.

I cancelled my pre-paid (at a slight discount) order after 2 months. I couldn’t really justify the £££ not being in my bank account heading up to Christmas.

 

There seem to be very few in the UK.

I would be interested in how the lens performs as a portrait lens, bokeh, blah blah, vs another "portrait" short tele. I have the 105/2.8 VR AFS and use it on occasion for close work, but definitely prefer other lenses for people photos.

I haven't tried mine as a portrait lens yet. I think Nikon uses that as a selling point but the thing is so sharp I might want to put a diffuser on it! I'm sort of old school when it comes to portraits, fuzzy lenses and printed on paper with a surface resembling leather!

It is quite okay as a lens for head shots, and of course it allows one to frame tighter than a regular lens. The contrast of skin texture can be managed by using appropriate lighting and retouching. The out-of-focus rendering is outstanding. I don't think any of the S-line Z lenses are going to be "kind" to skin imperfections, it's the modern look where you have to take measures instead of assuming the optics and printing process makes people look good. ;-)

 

The compact prime lineup doesn't seem to have quite as piercing sharpness or as high contrast as the S-line lenses. Perhaps there will be a non-S short tele later on, which might produce a bit more old-school rendering, or you could simply use an older lens to get the look. Third party options might also be suitable.

Can't speak for the lens in question, but using the "portrait mode" with my S lens does reduce that unbearable sharpness typical of modern lenses - that is easily toggled on or off in NX-Studio. If it wasn't for the comfort of eye-focus, I would use vintage glass for people photography.

Best Buy shows the lens in stock again.

None here officially in the UK....:(

 

But available Grey, how daft is that..?