Minolta MD 50mm f2

How sharp is the Minolta MD 50mm f2 ?

 

Is it worth buying ?

Not bad, but not as good as the md 1.7, but better than the md/mc 1.4. The best however is the mc rokkor 1.7. I've just finished testing about 8 different versions, including the 58 1.4, 1.2 , 50 1.2 and the 45 f2. It's ok but the mc rokkor 1.7 is better.

Ivan,

 

You praised the MC Rokkor 50/1.7 in a previous thread I had about the 50 macro. Could you elaborate a little on your tests of the eight lenses and what made the MC 50/1.7 so special? Have you ever used another copy of that lens to know whether you just lucked out on sample variation? What were the 8 lenses you tested and can you rank them in order?

 

Thanks, Larry

<P>None of these lenses is a dog, so when it comes to "Is it worth buying", it's a question of price. If you want a fast standard lens for a MD body, the MD Minolta 50/1.7 is probably the commonest and cheapest on the market. There's usually a price premium for the extra fast ones (1.4 and 1.2) and for the rare ones - I don't know if the 50/2 is in the latter catgory.</P><P>For what it's worth, I've got the 50/1.7 MD, and the 58/1.4 MC PF. I cannot fault either for sharpness. Both cost about 25 GBP.</P>

Larry, All were tested on an xd7/11 (with zero'd focus), on a tripod with cable release on a still day. Overcast lighting, delta 100 film, scanned on 5400 at 5400, sl levels change, but the same for each shot. The target is a large board mounted on a wall, with targets in the centre, side and each corner. They are basically like a Snellen chart (for eye testing) with letters that get smaller on each line. Each lens tested from wide open and at each aperture down to f8. I tested the 58mm 1.2 (two versions) the 50 1.2, 50 1.4mc, 50 1.4md, 45mm f2, 50 mc 1.7 (two versions) 50 mc rokkor 1.7, 55mm mc 1.7, and 50 md 1.7 (two versions)and 50 md f2. Rather a sad collection I've built up over the years! I'm particularly interested in wide open (or about f1.7 performance) as I shoot a lot of low light stuff. The three 1.2's are very blurred until down to about f4. the 1.4's are a lot less sharp than the 1.7's until down to f2.8. The 45/2 is very poor until f5.6. The 1.7's are all very similar and the f2 is close. You are quite right to ask about sample variation. Where I can compare as I have more than one copy, I see that the mc's are better than the md's. Best of all by a small head was the 50 mc rokkor 1.7 (not the one without the rokkor in the title). I have no doubt that if I had six copies of each lens, I might find a different answer, although there was not a lot of variation between the 1.7's I tested. Sample variation is important, but I only test, so that I know i'm using the best lens I can. Take what you will....

Oh I forgot to include the three copies of the 58mm f1.4 that I included. These are odd, as I had one which the diaphragm failed on me, that was by far the sharpest of any of the 50'ish lenses. The three copies I've now got are quite decentred and nowhere near as good wide open as the 1.7's. that's all I've tested though, never got a copy of the 45 f2.8!

The 50mm f2 was designed to be the low coast basic lens to allow the retailer to sell a camera/lens combo at a certain price point.

As the 50mm f2 is the same size as the 50 1.7, and I bought the latter for 5gbp on ebay, I can see little point in bothering with the less sharp, smaller aperture lens - at least with the examples I've got.

Ivan,

I'm not familiar with the 45 f2.8. Is this an MD series lens?

I'm not familiar with it either. It was listed on a site that showed the optical breakdown of all the minolta lenses. They described it as hugely better than the f2 45mm. They don't seem to come up on ebay or camera shops, but I'm on the look out. Let me know if you find one.

Hi Ivan,

 

Thanks for the detail. I wanted to clarify one statement. You said, "Best of all by a small head was the 50 mc rokkor 1.7 (not the one without the rokkor in the title)." To the best of my knowledge, there is no MC version without the Rokkor, only an MD non-Rokkor. So you do mean the 50mm/1.7 MC Rokkor(-X), right?

 

I know none of these lenses (beside an f/1.2) is expensive. I just want to try to eliminate testing them all myself. What I am looking for is an astrophotography lens I can use wide-open. I usually use f/2.8 as a standard aperture, but it would be nice to be able to use a wider aperture to get more stars (# stars is dependent on the absolute aperture in mm) while using a shorter exposure to avoid tracking, reciprocity and sky fog. That would mean little or no light fall-off or astigmatism/coma in the corners and no spherical aberration in the center. Such a lens probably does not exist.

 

I have the 58/1.2 (which I have not tested but probably is not great for astro work) and the 58/1.4 (which was sharper than my former MC 50/1.4 at f/2.8 in a test of the specific two lenses I had; by most reports, I may have a particularly good copy of the 58). I would be willing to swap out the 58/1.4 for the MC Rokkor(-X) 50/1.7 if there's a chance the 1.7 is better at f/1.7 and f/2.8 both.

 

I just guess I'll have to buy the MC 50/1.7 from KEH and try all three together. Then, I will continue waiting for a clear night in my neighborhood.

Larry, thanks for pointing out my error. I answered the query from work without the lenses in front of me. I have two mc 1.7 pf lenses, one with rokkor and one rokkok-x on them. The x is the better lens. I have compared 3x md 1.7 and 2x mc1.7' and both of the mc's were better than the md's. They are all preetty similar and excellent sharpness from 1.7 onwards. I've tested 4x the 58mm 1.4 of which one (the broken one) was better and three worse. You certainly should find the mc1.7's to be useful wide open. They vignette a bit but have very little spherical aberation and no decentring (unlike the 58/1.4) in any of them. Like you I use them for low light photography (rock bands) and want to use them wide open. Hope this clears up my mistake and sorry for confusion.

I had the 50mm f/2 lens for a short time and I found it to be a decent performer. My standard Minolta lenses are: 55mm f/1.7 MC, 58mm f/1.4 MC, 50mm f/1.7 MD (2), 50mm f/1.4 MC Rokkor-X and 50mm f/3.5 Celtic Macro. These are all decent lenses. The MC lenses have an earlier coating so they may show more flare in certain situations. Even having three examples of a certain lens does not tell you, in general, whether a particular lens design is better or worse than another. It just tells you how those lenses are performing on the camera bodies you have and according to the test procedures you are using. I don't know whether scanning film is a good way to test the sharpness of a lens. Years ago Modern Photography would examine the film with an Olympus Vanox microscope and then make photographs through the microscope on Kodak Panatomic-X film. This method would give a better analysis of what a lens is capable of.

 

Testing the f/1.2 lenses is even more difficult. When Minolta introduced the 58mm f/1.2 lens it was available only with an SRT body. This is because manufacturing tolerances were not as good as they are now and a poor match between such a fast lens and a body would give very bad results. Over time these lenses and bodies got separated and they are, of course, available on the used market separately. Camera magazines in the 1960s sometimes bracketed focusing when testing a very fast lens. Even a small change in focus,in the right direction, could dramatically improve the performance wide open. I have three f/1.2 lenses in my collection. One is a 55mm f/1.2 Canon FL and the other two are 57mm f/1.2 Konica Hexanons. The Hexanons are early models with the chrome and black cosmetics and the EE lock pin. Later all black models had the same optical design but were coated differently. I would say that the Hexanons are sharper wide open than the Canon but that is based on the camera bodies I use them with and the way I use them.

 

I also have a 45mm f/2 Minolta MD lens. This small and inexpensive lens is surprisingly good. I have not found that it needs to be stopped down to f/5.6 to give good results. Most amateur lens testing involves the use of a flat test target. Flatness of field is desirable in a macro lens which might be used for copying flat subjects but it is not necessarily the best indicator of a the sharpness of a lens which is not used for this purpose. Leica was late in using floating element lens designs for fixed focal length lenses. This was at a time in the 1970s when Canon, Nikon and Olympus had already used them. The floating element design did improve performance in the near and of the focusing range but it did little to improve performance for photographing distant subjects. With manual focus equipment selling for so little these days, it would be better for someone to buy a separate purpose built macro lens than to worry about the flatness of field in the close range of a 50mm f/1.7 or f/1.4 or f/1.2 standard lens.

Another 45mm Minolta lens was mentioned. In the early SR SLR days Minolta took some lenses which had been in rangefinder mount and attached an SR mount to them. One of these is the 135mm f/4 TC Rokkor. I have one of these and it is a decent performer but it is pre-set as the other lenses all are, if I am correct. There was also a 100mm or 105mm TC lens. A friend of mine has a 45mm f/2.8 TD Rokkor. This is an extremely compact lens but it has such a short helical mount that it only focuses to about five feet. It is unlikely that this lens is sharper than the 45mm f/2 MD and it certainly doesn't have as modern a coating. The novelty is that it is so flat. It doesn't seem to have the same cult following that the 45mm f/2.8 GN Nikkor has but I would like to get it myself if I can find one.

Jeff, you make some interesting points. Mostly I agree but a couple of things are worth comment. Firstly, you say scanning may not be the best way to test a lens. As I scan and digitally print my pictures, then it certainly is the best way for me to test MY lenses. Secondly you say the 45mm maynot be very good with a flat field. That's true, except that it's not very sharp in the centre either until stopped down. It's probably acceptable until you compare it with a very sharp lens. I've posted the link to the site that mentions the other 45mm lens.

http://members.aol.com/xkaes/502.htm

Hope this is interesting.

I can't say what the performance is of all 45mm f/2 MD lenses but mine seems decently good at full aperture. If I ever have enough time I might compare some of my standard lenses. Lately I have been interested in the slower normal lenses. These are a few of the different slower normal lenses I have: 52mm f/1.8 Konica Hexanon, 50mm f/1.7 Hexanon (1st version), 50mm f/1.7 Hexanon (2nd version), 50mm f/1.8 Hexanon (metal), 50mm f/1.8 Hexanon (plastic barrel), 50mm f/2 Nikkor H, 50mm f/2 AI Nikkor, 50mm f/1.8 AIS Nikkor (last version), 55mm f/1.8 SMCT Takumar, 55mm f/1.8 SMC Pentax, 50mm f/1.7 SMC-M Pentax, 50mm f/1.8 Canon FD (chrome front), 50mm f/1.8 Canon FD (black front), 50mm f/1.8 Canon New FD, 50mm f/1.8 Canon FL (1st version), 50mm f/1.8 Canon FL (2nd version), Olympus 50mm f/1.8 (several versions), 50mm f/1.7 Mamiya-Sekor (NC 1000) 50mm f/2.8 Rikenon, 50mm f/2 SMC-M Pentax (2 versions), 50mm f/2 Sears K mount (Ricoh). I think that the slower normal lenses are a very good buy optically. Some of them are helped by stopping down a little and others are quite good even wide open. If I am hiking or taking a long walk, the lighter slower lens is often preferable.

Jeff, that's an incredible collection of "normal" glass! I thought that I had a problem. :-) No wonder you're not sure when you might get around to comparing them. Certainly I find the slower lenses are sharper, but that's to be expected from their optical design. I was interested to test the minolta 50 f2 to see if it was better, but it was sl worse than the 1.7's so they seem to offer the best compromise as they're a lot better than the 1.4's and are incredibly cheap. I've recently also tested a Voitlander Nokton 50 1.5 which was very good wide open and an f2 leica 50mm which was incredible in the middle but not so good at the periphery. Still the best lens though is the Contax g 45mm f2 which although a little slower than the minolta 1.7's is considerably sharper. The Minolta af 50mm f2.8 macro is almost as good though.

Ivan, one last quick question...

 

"They vignette a bit but have very little spherical aberation and no decentring (unlike the 58/1.4) in any of them. "

 

What exactly do you mean by decentering?

Decentering is where the centre is in focus and perhaps the left edge but the right edge is poorly focused (for example). Many modern Voigtlander lenses show this problem and the 58 1.4 seems to be prone to it, as all three examples that I have show it. Basically the plane of focus is not parallel to the camera pressure plate. On an actual subject it's less critical because we don't photograph flat things (except I suppose astronomy) and because this only normally shows up badly at fully open apertures.

I should add that it's produced by the lens not being assembled with one or more elements being fully centred in thier mount.

Thank you Ivan. Now I understand what was wrong with a Canon EF 35/2 I had years ago. FWIW, my 58/1.4 does not show this problem. --Larry

I like my (borrowed) MC Rokkor-(PG?) 50mm f/2, an older version of the lens. Smooth bokeh, if a little flare-prone. Because of the bokeh, I'd say I might even like it better than my MD 50mm f/1.7.

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I made one mistake in an earlier posting (other than a typo). I have a 50mm f/1.4 MD Rokkor-X, not an MC. Comparing rangefinder lenses with SLR lenses is also tricky. A rangefinder lens will normally have to focus down to about three feet. This means that the designer does not have to correct for problems which might show up at 18 inches. In addition to this, rangefinder lenses do not have to be made with an auto diaphragm. This allows them to have more aperture blades without the worry that they have to close and open quickly with each exposure. The extra aperture blades will not make a big difference when shooting something flat but will affect the bokeh. It is also more difficult to make a visual inspection of flare at the time you are shooting when you use a rangefinder lens. You can get a general idea of whether a rangefinder lens is coated well but comparing it directly to an SLR lens in a flare situation is more difficult.

 

An exception to the use of rangefinder lenses in the close range is the old 50mm f/2 Dual Range Summicron. By all accounts this lens compares favorably with the best 50mm standard (non-macro) lenses available today. Its coating might not be as good as that of a more modern lens but it has high resolving power. I have an old Leica brochure in which the issue of floating element designs is discussed at length. At the time Leica thought that lenses not typically used in the very close range had advanteges if they did not have floating element designs. This is another reason why the "newspaper" test can't tell the whole story.

 

When you get into the area of bokeh things become even more complicated. Each manufacturer has a different idea of how many diaphragm blades a lens should have. Most on the Minolta standard lenses have six. All of my 50mm Canon FL f/1.8 lenses have six blades and most of the FD ones do too. Only the final version of the f/1.8, the New FD lens, had five. Its bokeh? Not too good. Otherwise the lens is good. All of my Canon 50mm f/1.4 lenses, FL and FD, have eight blades. Their Nikon counterparts mostly have seven. At some point I will probably add a 50mm f/1.7 MC lens to my collection but for now the 50mm f/1.7 MD is my favorite slower Minolta manual focus SLR lens.

My MC Rokkor-X 58/1.2 has far better bokeh than the other "normal" lenses I've used: MC Rokkor-X 50/1.4, MD 50/1.7, MD 50/1.2, MD 45/2, MC 55/1.9, MD 24-50/4. The eight-blade aperture holds a definite advantage over the 5- and 6-blade apertures of these other lenses.

Two comments:

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1. unless you have a particular application that is pushing some aspect of the performance of one of these lenses to or beyond its limit, it probably doesn't matter which you get-- they're all good. If you need to shoot handheld wide-open and need even illumination to the corners or sharpness to the corners on a 2-D subject, then you probably care which of these lensens you use. Otherwise, finding one in clean condition at a fair price should be your primary objective. Moreover, these lenses are not expensive, so it is by no means a once in a lifetime experience to buy one.

<p>

2. There is alot more to bokeh than number of aperture blades. Bokeh is one of the design tradeoffs in making a lens, that also includes contrast, and wide-open correction of the periphery of the image. Nikon generally designs prime lenses to be as sharp as possible to the corners wide open, and contrasty, at the expense of bokeh. Minolta seems to have made the right choices with the f/1.2 lenses-- you want as even illumination as possible wide open, a contrasty image, but you probably can sacrifice a little corner sharpness wide open, which means it won't be as good for 2-dimensional subjects wide open, but that's ok. DOF is so shallow at f/1.2, that poor bokeh would be a problem for far more images (3-d subjects) than loss of corner sharpness (2-d subjects). A near-circular aperture is more important in fast lenses since they have more shallow DOF apertures where the aperture is activated (wide open the aperture has no effect whether 8 blade or whatever).