Are all Zeiss lenses MF only?

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Stany Buyle
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Are all Zeiss lenses MF only?

Post by Stany Buyle »

And if yes, why?

Personally I would never buy a MF lens these days, TMHO it's outdated. About outdated I mean the "exclusive"- MF lenses. Even for macro shooting I started to use nearly exclusive AF since I changed my tamron 90mm for a 105AF-S VR. The 180 mm Sigma is even forfilling better my expectations for AF while shooting macro . I was trying out and AF is nearly always more accurate than my own MF focusing, upto that there isn't too much chance to capture a flying insect tacksharp while using MF...
I agree that for extreme magnifications, MF is the way to go, @ a certain point of magnification, the AF simply doesn't function anymore..

I started this thread after some interest of mine to buy a 100mm macro Zeiss, when I saw it's MF only though, I quit... BTW: I had the nikkor 200mm F4 as well, but I changed it for the fast focusing Sigma 180mm, with much better results and much more "keepers".

I'm interested in your opinions about this...

Some of my macro samples, all captured while using AF:

Image
Image
Image

And much more in these topics:

http://www.fotografie.fr/fotoforum/view ... f=21&t=376
http://www.fotografie.fr/fotoforum/view ... f=21&t=348
http://www.fotografie.fr/fotoforum/view ... ?f=21&t=58
http://www.fotografie.fr/fotoforum/view ... f=21&t=285


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kindest regards,

Stany
I like better one good shot in a day than 10 bad ones in a second...
http://www.fotografie.cafe
James
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Re: Are all Zeiss lenses MF only?

Post by James »

Not on Sony bodies :) I am sure that Pam will testify to the quality of Zeiss AF glass on that system!
pam.meier
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Re: Are all Zeiss lenses MF only?

Post by pam.meier »

There you go, James. Sony somehow can produce Zeiss-designed lenses with AF functionality.
I once read that all other Zeiss-designed lenses would be too expensive with AF for license reasons.

Cosina makes the ZF line, but it is another Japanese company that produces for Minolta.
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