Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#141

Post by cratermoon » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:03 PM UTC

formerly_proven wrote: post #79

cratermoon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> DPReview largely seems to write for the crowd that doesn't even care about the art aspect and just wants validation that they have better photo gear than others. DPReview, FStoppers, PetaPixel, and back in before the web the Popular Photography and Modern Photography magazines. There's a big market for prosumer gear that costs a lot, has ideal technical specs, and hangs around the owner's neck like a prize. Of cour…

DPReview seems to have rather balanced reporting (I'm not a regular reader), so they do seem to be at least somewhat independent of being directly sponsored by whoever they're reviewing at the time. Compare this to pretty much every photo-vlogger/blogger/grammer out there, which have massive audiences while making unclear claims of independence and un-biasedness while shilling very hard.

> DPReview seems to have rather balanced reporting

It's big enough and has a diverse enough community that it can avoid the worst excesses of pay-per-review.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#142

Post by seanicus » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:03 PM UTC

reader_mode wrote: post #4

lmilcin wrote: post #3

I have a bunch of full frame lenses. Recently I looked at some very old ones I haven't used in a long time. I thought they are faulty (soft). After some diagnosing I found that it is not the fault of lenses but rather in the meantime I have started looking at images at 1:1 in Lightroom and gotten used to ridiculously sharp images from new cameras. Have you ever watched an old TV show and despaired how unwatchable it…

>Have you ever watched an old TV show and despaired how unwatchable it is because of low quality of image? Yes, that's the same thing -- our tastes change. I've had the opposite reaction - I'd watch something I've seen before in 4k remastered or something and it would be a worse experience because the extra details reveal the low quality tricks you can get away with on lower reproduction quality. I've even noticed po…

The Thing is probably my favorite movie and the practical creature effects are still largely considered the gold standard of the craft. But in 2K the artificiality is getting a lot more noticeable and while I will certainly be getting it in 4K I'm starting to realize that maybe 720p is the best way to view it for the sake of full immersion. YMMV.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#143

Post by cratermoon » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:04 PM UTC

jgalt212 wrote: post #89

cratermoon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> DPReview largely seems to write for the crowd that doesn't even care about the art aspect and just wants validation that they have better photo gear than others. DPReview, FStoppers, PetaPixel, and back in before the web the Popular Photography and Modern Photography magazines. There's a big market for prosumer gear that costs a lot, has ideal technical specs, and hangs around the owner's neck like a prize. Of cour…

slight correction: In good light, great photographs can be taken with any camera.

"Light makes photography. Embrace light. Admire it. Love it. But above all, know light. Know it for all you are worth, and you will know the key to photography." -- George Eastman

The trick is knowing what can be made with available light.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#144

Post by cratermoon » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:10 PM UTC

jcun4128 wrote: post #134

jk7tarYZAQNpTQa wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A while ago I read a comment that was really eye opener: most big YouTube photography channels out there are mostly about gear, not about "taking pictures". It shows how much money the industry moves (or how prevalent GAS is).

> GAS Haha... I was getting sucked into this, still am in a way. I spent about a year (2019) with a now cheap Sony Nex-5n with an 18-55 kit lens... but wanted to upgrade, more MP, higher video quality... got an A7II (24MP, 1080P) and then an A7RIII (42MP, 4K) ... I bought a 12-24mm F4 G lens at $1.3K __USED__ which to me is insane and that's not even that much in this space. It's just my car is $2K... I still can't c…

The most I've ever spent on a camera was just under $2K, in July of 2019, for a 35mm manual rangefinder, without a light meter, built in 1953.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#145

Post by subhro » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:11 PM UTC

lmilcin wrote: post #3

I have a bunch of full frame lenses. Recently I looked at some very old ones I haven't used in a long time. I thought they are faulty (soft). After some diagnosing I found that it is not the fault of lenses but rather in the meantime I have started looking at images at 1:1 in Lightroom and gotten used to ridiculously sharp images from new cameras. Have you ever watched an old TV show and despaired how unwatchable it…

In the other news, /me is supremely happy with his Schneider 300mm 8x10 Large format and Hasselblad/Zeiss medium format lenses.

The world is not just 35mm in size.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#146

Post by subhro » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:14 PM UTC

salimmadjd wrote: post #139

Matrixik wrote: post #85

Roger Cicala knows a lot about lenses and pushed lens manufacturers to have better testing and quality, he created https://www.lensrentals.com/ because he got sick with low quality checks of lenses: When I started Lensrentals I had a lot of conversations with service centers that went like this. Me: "That lens you repaired still sucks". Person at service center: "No, it’s within specs". Me: "What are the specs?" Serv…

His lens tests are excellent. The lens rentals blog is the best place to find them [0]. If you're in market for high quality lenses, lens rental blog is a great resource. I also like cameralabs' lens tests [1]. Not as scientific as lensrentals, however, it has real samples and images of charts for comparison, so you can get a sense for what the different resolution means in image resolution. It also tests things beyo…

He does break down technical stuff is average Joe language. But, one this that does tick me off is his lens analysis does not consider larger formats.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#147

Post by sparsely » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:16 PM UTC

ajross wrote: post #24

What I don't understand isn't the design of the lenses, which are chasing ever-tightening windows of precision in a competetive market with high margins and discriminating consumers. Of course they're going to be overdesigned. What gets me is that lens distortion is a fully reversible convolution. It's not lossy, at all. Or rather, it's only lossy in the sense that the existing quantization in the sensor is already l…

Lots of m43 cameras do some of the corrections in software, which does keep lens sizes and prices down.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#148

Post by foldr » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:16 PM UTC

bitL wrote: post #117

lmilcin wrote: post #3

I have a bunch of full frame lenses. Recently I looked at some very old ones I haven't used in a long time. I thought they are faulty (soft). After some diagnosing I found that it is not the fault of lenses but rather in the meantime I have started looking at images at 1:1 in Lightroom and gotten used to ridiculously sharp images from new cameras. Have you ever watched an old TV show and despaired how unwatchable it…

Now do the same with Sigma SD1 and quality lens and you'd be frustrated with the "sharp images from new cameras" the same way you consider old ones "faulty". Some things can't be unseen once you see them the first time.

I think a lot of this must be psychological. Anyone can generate an extremely high res image nowadays by using a longer focal length and stitching four images together with a consumer grade SLR. Expensive bits of gear can be superior to that method in terms of the workflow (and sometimes results, given the limitations of stitching) but they aren’t magical.

I know some will vociferously disagree with this statement, but I’d like to see that backed up by proper side by side comparisons.

We know for sure that people do rationalize the purchase of expensive gear with reference to spurious properties (such as the mythical “medium format look”).

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#149

Post by subhro » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:17 PM UTC

Sharlin wrote: post #73

ben7799 wrote: post #37

I love 50mm lenses but a lot of this stuff is ridiculously academic since photography is artistic & creative in nature. DPreview largely seems to write for the crowd that doesn't even care about the art aspect and just wants validation that they have better photo gear than others. These new 50mm lenses often defeat the point cause they're enormous, heavy, very expensive, and have little benefit over the slower versio…

> DPreview largely seems to write for the crowd that doesn't even care about the art aspect and just wants validation that they have better photo gear than others. To be fair, the author of this article is Roger Cicala of LensRentals fame [1]; optical testing is his bread and butter. He's also the first to point out that optimal lens performance is neither necessary nor sufficient for good photography, and is famousl…

This is so much correct. Modern lenses feels very clinical to me. It is like showing someone a passport photograph and asking if it is a good portrait.

Re: Why are modern 50mm lenses so damned complicated?

#150

Post by breischl » Mon, May 10, 2021, 5:17 PM UTC

kergonath wrote: post #120

breischl wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of photographers buy amazing gear, and ignore the fact that they lack the skill that would use it well or even require that gear. I think the closest analog might be someone that reads the reviews, buys the latest-and-greatest computing hardware... and then uses it to surf the web and play Tetris.

Even if it were the case, what is wrong with that? I mean, we can buy fancy cars without having a background in engineering, right? All the sneering about people being bad photographers and not needing the latest gear is out of touch. Average photographers benefit immensely from fast autofocus with full frame coverage, better sensors and better optics that make taking pictures in difficult conditions easier. Besides,…

Average photographers can certainly benefit from better gear to a degree. But for many people (myself included) a $300 lens will work as well (or even better) than a $3000 one. Which I think is the point the original commenter was making.

The sneering is pretty typical for any hobby that lumps practitioners and collectors under the same heading. The former group tends to see the gear as mere tools, to be used as needed to achieve some other end. For the latter group the gear is the whole thing - or perhaps talking about the gear.

Neither is bad, but it would probably work better to call the hobbies by different names. Perhaps "photographers" and "camera collectors" or something. But then, being a collector doesn't have quite the same cachet as being an artist.