Can good macro lenses be used as regular lenses?

Hi all,

 

I was curious to know if a decent quality Macro lens could be used as an "all around" lens?

 

Thanks,

 

F Stop

Sure. Some are better than others at multi-tasking.

Yes, of course. Macro lenses are often some of the best optics available in a lens line-up and make excellent all-round performers. Their drawbacks (besides price) are the weight and slowness when compared to regular lenses at their focals length.

Lenses are optimised for a specific magnification. Most are designed for infinity but specialized ones like macros are optimised for close-up. Usually using a close-up for infinity produces poor results just as using one designed for infinity will give poor results if used for close-ups. But exceptions are symmetrical designs, those that have the same layout of elements before and behind the shutter, such as Symmars. Another exception are the newer macro lenses, which incorporate a group of floating elements whose location within the lens changes with where it is focused, the Canon 100mm macro being a good example. So if a macro is either of a symmertical design or has floating elements, it should work equally well for both infinity and close-up work.

Here's a <a href="http://www.photo.net/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=000PxL">LINK</a> to a discussion regarding the 120mm Makro-Planar. Dr. Fleischer (head of lens applications at Carl Zeiss) has some remarks that are very informative. Basically, the answer (for this lens) is that it is not so sharp at infinity. I had one, and I agree.

Macro lenses CAN be used as regular lenses, but may not give as good a result at the longer distances. One exception is the 120 Zeiss for Hasselblad, which is a great lens for anything. Was very disappointed when I bought a 100mm Leitz macro and used it as an all purpose. Though very expensive it was not nearly as good as their regular 90mm's

I can speak only for Bronica. The 110PS macro is an excellent lens at infinity, and matches or beats my other mid-focal length lenses across the board. However the bulk of my work is stopped down to f11 and beyond. But of course with max. magnification of 0.25x and focussing down to 2 feet the "macro" capability is less extreme than some and this might be a generalised influence on macro lens performance at greater distances.

As said above: the difference is marginal, ... if at all. Differences will become noticable the greater the film is enlarged. Many will be identical up to 10x8 inch. Top of the line apo-macro lenses such as the best of the Leica R 100 lenses will be true all-rounders.

 

However, I can certainly vouch for the performance of the above-mentoned Zeiss 120mm Macro Planar. I use it for portrait as well macro.

The discussion Rob is linking to is comparing a particular macro lens to one (!) particular (!) other lens. So not quite an universal answer to F Stop's question.<br>And that other lens, the 100 mm Planar, is indeed very good at infinity. But so is the macro lens it was compared to, the Makro-Planar: the difference in performance is marginal.<br>And compared to other lenses, like the 150 mm Sonnar that is the 'natural' alternative for the 120 mm Makro-Planar, the difference is even harder to detect (if at all).<br><Br>Generally, macro lenses are very good when used at infinity too. But you may have heard the advice not to use a 'regular' lens wide open when used in the close-up range. The reverse may apply: don't use a macro lens wide open at infinity.

But of course portrait does not involve critical imaging out towards the edges, and head & shoulder shots are not far beyond the 1:10 region for which the 120 is optimised. For architecture I reach for the 100mm Planar or borrow a Superwide with 38mm Biogon. The Distagons are retrofocus designs, and whilst will suit general wide-angle applications, can never compete with the optimal designs of the Biogons and Planars. The MTF graphs of the 38, 100 and 120 mm planar verify the best performance.

 

In practice, I have found the distortions of the others, including the 80mm planar unacceptable for reproduction work, whether it's an engraving 10 x 8 inches, or a painting 6 feet(2metres) square.

 

However, black and white landscape permits greater use of the other "bread and butter" Distagon lenses because the distortion at the edges is insignificant. It is usually lost in natural forms, and apparent sharpness is always improved with the use of filters, reducing the wave-lengths trying to arrive at the same place (focus) on the film plane.

 

Whilst I'm making internegs and copies of my own slides for my own applications, I could never expect the 120mm Macro Planar to deliver the same as the Apo Rodagon D objectives, optimised for 1x and 2x.

 

For critical work it's all about "horses for courses".

Hi, this is of course not a universal answer either, but here's a couple of other examples supporting specific macro lenses as all-round lenses.

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First thing is a lens test written up in an old Calumet catalogue I have (from the mid-80s). The author did systematic comparisons of a Sironar-N and a Makro Sironar, both 210mm, on distant subjects. Both performed about the same.

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Second, Erwin Puts has some data on 35mm macro lenses at <A HREF="http://www.imx.nl/photosite/technical/lensdesigns/t003.html">this URL.</A> In his hands, Canon FD 50/3.5 macro lens actually performed a bit <i>better</i> at infinity than it did for close-ups. However, the big difference was that at close range, it performed much better than regular non-macro lenses. (The other surprise to me was that this 30-year-old lens performed about as well as the modern Canon EF macro lens, as well as Leica and Zeiss macro lenses.)