Nikkor 105mm f/1.4 another review

[JDMvW]

<p>There has been previous discussion here of some aspects of the 105mm f/1.4 ( http://www.photo.net/nikon-camera-forum/00eAeB ), but I thought people might like to see LensRentals November 1 review at<br>

<a href="https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2016/11/nikon-105mm-f1-4-e-mtf-bench-tests/">https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2016/11/nikon-105mm-f1-4-e-mtf-bench-tests/ </a><br>

where he (Cicala) says</p>

<blockquote>

<p>From an MTF standpoint, this is the sharpest f/1.4 lens Nikon has made. It may be the sharpest f/1.4 lens, period.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>I am still a huge fan of my ancient, non-AI Nikkor-P 105mm f/2.5, but I am perhaps too nostalgic. ;)</p>

<p> </p>

[Andrew Garrard]

<p>Thom Hogan liked it too, though like him I'd rather have a 135mm than a 105mm. Not that I'll be shopping in a hurry. Thom noted some LoCA, although he described it as both "clear" and "modest" in the same review, which confuses me - I don't expect perfection here, and the Zeiss 135 and the Otus lenses aren't free from it either. In sample images I actually thought it wasn't too bad; I found the LoCA on my 135 DC to be beyond what the digital heuristics were designed to fix even at D700 resolution, and hopefully these new lenses bring it down to a "fixable in software" range. If only someone would bring out a nice fast portrait super-apochromat - I have hope that Nikon adding fluorite to their mix of optical materials might allow this. (Not that the 200 f/2 is bad here, which is why I bought it...)<br />

<br />

Shame about the extreme cat's-eye bokeh, but having recently bought a Petzval I suppose I have to believe I like the effect!</p>

[Dieter Schaefer]

<p>Realizing how little I actually use my 85/1.8G, I most certainly can't justify splurging on the 105/1.4E, no matter how good a lens it is.</p>

<p>Isn't cat-eye bokeh caused by mechanical vignetting?</p>

<p>LoCA is something that makes me not use the 85 anywhere near wide open; it's also why I like the Sigma 150/2.8 OS a lot better (it performs even better in that regard than the non-OS version).</p>

[User_4754088]

<p>I got a chance to play with one, it's a really nice lens, beautiful images and OOF rendering. Pretty heavy though, in weight and cost. So there won't be one in my bag any time soon.</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p>Well to talk about the LoCA of the 105/1.4 is about as academic as nit picking can go ... LoCA is at a very low level. One of the advantages of well corrected LoCA is very precise AF, as the AF sensor is not distracted by the different phases of the different wavelengths of light. The 105/1.4 autofocus is very consistent for a fast lens of its kind, especially on the D5. LoCA on the 85/1.4G is a bit more visible than on the 105/1.4 but it's not at a level where I'd be bothered by it. The 85/1.4G doesn't display noticeable cat's eye highlights. I see the cat's eye issue on perhaps 1% of the images I've shot on the 105/1.4, so it's not a common issue for the kind of subject matter that I shoot, but when there are, e.g., leaves in the foreground, or traffic lights in the background, whoom, it just hits you. At first I paid a lot more attention to this problem but after a while of using the lens, I've just forgotten about its existence, except for those few images where the effect is significant. The 105/1.4 is fantastic in that it gives such a high quality image wide open. But I really like the 85/1.4G images as well, and wouldn't necessarily pick the 105 as my preferred lens in this range except if for some reason I need to crop, as the 105/1.4 images do provide a lot of potential for cropping while still maintaining excellent image quality. The 85/1.4G is a lot smaller and less ridiculous in size than the 105/1.4. I am happy Nikon made the 105/1.4 even though I would've been perfectly happy with an AF-S 105/2 or AF-S 135/2, which I believe would have been significantly less expensive and slightly smaller in size (or quite a bit smaller, for the 105/2).</p>

<p>The 105/1.4 is not as forgiving of blemishes in the skin as classical Nikon "portrait" focal length lenses. So I think I'll keep the 105 DC and shoot head shots with that instead of the new lens. I prefer the 105/1.4 for whole body images though, and for event photography (due to the better AF).</p>

[Andrew Garrard]

<p>Ilkka: Good to know. The LoCA makes me nervous about my 85mm f/1.8 AF-S too (like Dieter, I use a Sigma 150 OS when my 200 f/2 isn't handy): I switched from my Samyang f/1.4 because I was finding manual focus too tedious for candids, and the Nikkor makes me happy in most ways except the tendency to turn backgrounds green. Images from the 85mm f/1.4 AF-S showed LoCA at a level that bothered me, especially for the money; I need to check out the Sigma Art, because otherwise the Tamron 85mm f/1.8 VC looks much better controlled than the Nikkors. I guess the 105mm should lurk on my NAS list, though.<br />

<br />

I've never bought the "soft lens for portraits" argument. It's so easy to apply a selective blur digitally that I'd rather go down that route; it's much harder to sharpen without increasing noise or making bokeh look worse. But I appreciate that some prefer a softer image out of the lens.</p>

[anthony_schellenberg]

<p>The Tamron 85mm 1.8 is wonderful, plus if you use it on a crop body it nicely takes the place of a 135mm (127.5mm)</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p><em>I've never bought the "soft lens for portraits" argument.</em></p>

<p>The 105 DC renders skin nicely, but is otherwise very sharp (particularly at f/3.5 to f/11 which I would normally use for a head and shoulders images) and still very good wide open though a little low on contrast at f/2. In the studio the 105 DC gives sharper results than the 70-200/4, for example, the hair is clearly sharper, but the skin blemishes are hardly perceptible. I use the zoom quite often in practice because it is easier to work with in a space constrained studio, but the 105 DC gives more pleasing images (to my taste). I shoot about 60000 images (most of which are of people related subjects) per year and it already strains me to edit them in a timely manner and adding a time consuming selecting softening procedure would be something I would never have time for nor want to do. It would take a long time to figure out the parameters where it actually looks good - why do this when I can get it out of the camera? I prefer using lighting and optics that are suitable for the task and avoid the lenses that accentuate details on tight portraits. When I look at the subject with my own eyes, I don't notice skin blemishes in the way that a Zeiss 100mm Makro Planar would render in a photograph. I think Canon and Nikon have understood in their lens design the concept of a pleasing image, and that it's not necessarily something that results from minimizing all aberrations to score well on a bench test. I think this is probably one of the reasons there brands are so widely used.</p>

<p>Anyway, the 105/1.4 is definitely a regular part of my camera bag now, as it fills in my long standing need for a 105 or 135mm with precise autofocus. It may not be exactly what I was looking for but because of its high technical image quality, it does work well for shots where I am in very low light and may need to shoot a subject at not a precisely defined distance. I did some confirmation images in a dimly lit church from the middle of the audience beside the center corridor. I selected the position so I could shoot the incoming precession (with a 35mm wide angle) yet close enough to the altar to be able to get some shots of the proceedings (moving was not permitted). With the 105/1.4 I was able to shoot at a fast shutter speed and crop to get the shots that I needed and the large aperture also isolated my main subject from the background (which could not be controlled otherwise since I was at a fixed position). I don't think I could have done this as well with any other lens. A 70-200/2.8 would have thrown me into the ISO 25600 territory which is not good in a contrasty lighting situation with the subject's face not well lit. I had to adjust the image selectively increasing the luminosity of the subject's face but that came out well. However, in smaller spaces such as restaurants or homes, I regard the 85/1.4 the longest that I use. 105 is just too tight quite often in small rooms.</p>

[Andrew Garrard]

<p>Understood, Ilkka. I've simply found that hiding skin blemishes and keeping eyes sharp are typically contrasting requirements, and observe that in post-processing it's typically easier to blur than to sharpen - because I've rarely been happy without doing at least something to the image retrospectively (which is why it takes me forever to deliver images). But I had so many problems with my 135mm DC that I can't really extrapolate from it to how the 105mm DC might behave - most of my post-processing was spent trying to fix the LoCA, there. Even so, I'm a little surprised to hear of the 105 outperforming the 70-200, but I suppose that is a semi-consumer zoom, even if it's a very good one, and it's certainly harder to constrain the performance of a zoom. I do trust that Nikon and Canon pay attention to the rendering of their lenses beyond benchmarks (as described in the 1001 nights articles), although I wish they paid as much attention to ergonomics - and I sometimes wonder how many lens features are the product of marketing rather than design.<br />

<br />

Still, good to hear the 105mm has earnt its place, especially to show that Nikon knows what it's doing and can make more than 18-xxx DX zooms. I'll keep saving up.</p>

[ilkka_nissila]

<p><em>hiding skin blemishes and keeping eyes sharp are typically contrasting requirements</em></p>

<p>I don't find that to be the case. I don't want the eyes to be so sharp that they pop out of the head. The attenuation of blemishes in the skin simply calls for a lower MTF in the red wavelengths in the lens design (blood vessels under the skin are probably the most important part that I don't want so much to see) and the eye will still be sharp. I find 105DC studio portraits to be very sharp in the eyes, hair and clothes at apertures that I use for head and shoulders shots and still I find the skin to look more pleasing and beautiful than with regular lenses that were not designed for this purpose, or the "modern" lenses which aim to make <em>any</em> detail shout at the viewer. I would like the subject to like the image rather than start thinking they have a skin problem and need to apply more make-up. The more pleasing the image out of the camera the less I have to do afterwards. And I do have to show the images to the subject at times so it's better that those issues never show up. Many people actually think I do some Photoshop magic to their portraits, which I don't.</p>

<p>The 135 DC isn't like the 105 DC, the latter is better corrected for aberrations. The 70-200/4 is an exceptionally good zoom lens (most of the time I prefer it to the 70-200/2.8 II, especially for its bokeh and handling) but it is not at its best at close-up portrait distances, and it should not be surprising that a prime designed for a specific purpose is better at that specific application than a general purpose zoom.</p>

[Andrew Garrard]

<blockquote>The attenuation of blemishes in the skin simply calls for a lower MTF in the red wavelengths in the lens design (blood vessels under the skin are probably the most important part that I don't want so much to see) and the eye will still be sharp.</blockquote>

 

<p>Hmm, good observation, although I'd kind of expect a potential red ring around the eye in that case. (I'll correspondingly tend to blur chroma channels rather than luma, if I'm keen enough, but it's true that a lens with low red contrast will be a good step to that.)</p>

 

<blockquote>The 135 DC isn't like the 105 DC, the latter is better corrected for aberrations.</blockquote>

 

<p>I believe you, although I was under the impression that some spherical aberration was part of how these lenses were supposed to work; I may be confused (now I re-read the <a href="http://www.nikkor.com/story/0032/">article</a> on them). Maybe I should have listened to Gray's, who wanted to know why I was after a 135mm rather than a 105mm in the first place (I <i>do</i> prefer the focal length), but then I gather there are happy 135mm owners out there. Mine was enough trouble - which I put down to the age and complexity of the design - that I'd expected a good modern zoom (<i>not</i> the 80-200 AF-D...) to outperform it, but despite Nikon swearing my lens was fine, I can believe other options are better, especially at more moderate apertures.<br />

<br />

Now, I wonder whether the 200mm f/2 is due another redesign? (The last one was mostly coatings, and while I've never been unhappy with mine I'd be interested to see what Nikon's new design capabilities could do, after seeing the 400 f/2.8 improvements.)</p>

[bob_h]

<p>They can argue all of the test numbers that they want, especially between the Nikon and the Zeiss, but before buying either of them, I would rent both and rely upon my visual results and feelings about handling. For me it would be do I like the results enough to spend the money to own one.</p>