Customer Reviews

Zeiss 50mm f/1.4 Planar T* ZE Series Lens for Canon EOS Cameras

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I fell in love with the lens on my old Rolleiflex camera, a 75mm planar, which on a medium-format camera is about the same field of view as this 50mm planar on my 5D Mark II. It has that magical, hard-to-describe 3D look. Super-sharp in the middle, softer on the edges. Wait, is it softer in the corners, or is the contrast just lower? Beyond my technical expertise. But it looks fabulous.
Some say it is soft / not as sharp as one would expect. My bet is that they just didn't just hit the mark (more on that below). I don't shoot architecture or other technical work, I mostly do environmental portraits. I want it soft in the corners. So I'm not even looking for edge sharpness.
Also, you can really fine tune the focus - more spin of the wheel to change the focal point compared to a standard Canon lens. Which should make it great for video, although I've only done a little with that.

I suspect that some people try these and then don't keep using them; they do pop up on ebay and other places used quite often. There is nothing wrong with the glass. Zeiss has mastered that. But if you want to shoot wide open, or close, you have to be very good at manual focus. I have 20/10 or even 20/5 vision in my right eye and I still usually take 3 images to make sure my subject is in focus when shooting at f2 or wider.

They say the lens "out-resolves" the focusing screen in your camera. I did install the Canon EgS focusing screen in my 5D Mark II, a roughly $40 and 2 minute process, and that does make accurate focusing, quickly, much easier. I recommend trying one with a lens like this.

There is pretty heavy vignetting at f1.4. By f2 its not that noticeable. But wide open you lose almost a stop of light due to vignetting. I think it looks great, but it is surprising at first. And I doubt you'll have that effect with a less than full frame sensor.

Bottom line - I love it. The contrast, sharpness, bokeh, and color rendition are amazing. I use this and a 70-200 IS II to cover most scenarios. Both incredible. This Zeiss just takes a little more time, but the results are worth it. I'm in medium format quality territory with the Zeiss - the images are that fine.

If you are looking at a 50mm I guess the question is which one? This is better build quality and better glass than the Canon 1.4, and obviously more money. The Canon 50mm 1.2 (L) is incredible, but I'm not sure it's better in image quality than the Zeiss - maybe, I haven't done a head-on test - but you pay a TON more for the Canon, which admittedly gets you autofocus (a big deal), and from 1.4 to 1.2. $ aside, I like the Zeiss, unless autofocus is a must.

p.s. I also rented both the 28mm Zeiss and 21mm Zeiss for a few days, and had the same reaction.

Follow Up -
The (all-metal) lens hood has a tension ring of sorts and mine got out of place, making it impossible to keep the hood on. I contacted Zeiss support and they emailed me back in 2 hours with instructions on how to fix it. A small screwdriver and 20 seconds and it was fine again. I would have preferred the problem never happened, but the service and serviceability of the Zeiss product still leaves me very satisfied.

I shoot video (and therefore only speak from that perspective) with the Canon Rebel T2i, and I bought this lens as an upgrade to my Canon 50 f1.8 II.

Initially I was leaning towards purchasing the Canon 50mm 1.2L, but after watching numerous video examples I decided to instead go with the Zeiss. What most moved me in this direction was the color rendering of the Zeiss. The Canon skewed towards a red hue, whereas the Zeiss rendered out a more natural color.

The bokeh is stunning, and even at 1.4 this lens is incredibly sharp. Also, as the product description indicates, this lens handles overexposed backgrounds extremely well; ghosting was a big problem with the 1.8 II, but no longer is that an issue!

The build quality of this lens is peerless. It has a sturdy build, and I especially appreciate the fact that the lens hood was metal; perhaps a superficial point to harp on, but it is minor details like that which demonstrate attention to every detail.

I upgraded to this lens having used the Contax 50/1.4 Planar as my main lens for about 20 years.

Upgrade well worth it. If there is one lens to have, this is it. Razor sharp to a degree that can be unbelievable. Bokeh that is smooth and silky.

Excellent for nearly any type of work.

Super solid construction, smooth focusing, perfect sharpness except wide open at 1.4

Canon viewfinders do not match the resolving power and thus when critical focus is needed with razor thin DOF additional tools can be necessary. Not fault of lens, quite the opposite.

Manual focus can be daunting but gives faster better performance when you're accustomed to it.

This lens produces film-like results. In great form with Zeiss quality. I've used it about 6 months everyday. It's easy to fell in love with him. Images are sharp, colorful, with amazing DOF and nice blurred background. ZE version worked perfect on my EOS 5D mk.II unfortunately there is one cons here. Focus. Don't worry it's smooth but slow.
At the end ... it's lens for you if you are looking for build and image quality with specific like film-colors... just don't forget to buy better focusing screen.

This is probably the best 50mm lens I have yet used so far and I've used/owned the Canon 50 f/1.8, Canon 50 f/1.2L and Sigma 50 f/1.4. I must say that the quality and build of this lens is top notch. The all metal lens and lens hood feels like a piece of art. The focus ring is smooth and you're able to make minor turns with this barrel with ease (unlike the other lens) and the infinity focus is where it should be, at the very end and not a half millimeter or so from the end (once again like the lenses). But I must say that I am pretty disappointed in the plastic/cheap lens cap (front and back). The front lens cap isn't all that great and tends to fall out if you don't make sure that it's in.

The color that this lens produces is just magical. I'm sure you'll read this at other places but it's comparable to the Leica version. Now, I'm not saying that they're exactly the same, but this lens definitely gives you that Leica look and feel in how the lens captures color. CA is minimal and focus is razor sharp. Granted once you get into the f/2.0 or higher, it's unbeatable.

Now there are reasons why I decided to buy this and sell all of my other 50mm lenses. Comparing with the Canon 50 f/1.8, though a great, less expensive lens, the color reproduction wasn't quite what I was looking for. With the Canon 50 f/1.2L, even though it's an awesome lens, for it's price, I was hoping for more sharpness without having to dial up the f-stops too high. Also, because I'd become accustomed to autofocus in general and manual focus on that lens is mediocre at best, the focusing on the 50L was just way too slow. I found I was able to focus faster manually with the Zeiss lens than with the Canon 50L, especially in low light situations. Yes, I will miss the extra stop on the L lens but considering that it's so slow in focusing (and I've missed many opportunities). And the Sigma 50, is a good lens, and a beefy one at that too, but I just had way too much to deal with especially since it was front focusing. I did have to mail in the lens for new ones 3 times and the one I ended up keeping had the least amount of front focusing issue, but over time, the lens started to front focus more and more often and severely.

This is priced pretty much in the middle of all these lenses. Being almost 2x cheaper than the Canon 50L, it's an amazing deal.

Size wise, the Canon 50L is probably the largest and heaviest lens and the Sigma 50 comes very close to it as well. This is definitely a lot more compact than those two but larger than the Canon 50 f/1.8

Word of caution though, you probably already know that this is a manual focus lens, I would highly recommend switching out your focusing screen to the the Eg-S version. It's about $40 dollars and it takes less than 20 seconds to switch it out from you camera. Once you switch them out, to focus, since the lens is made to communicate with the camera, either choose your focus point on the camera or just use all, press the shutter button halfway and focus until you see/hear the red beep in your viewfinder. It'll take practice but you'll learn to focus faster and appreciate the lens even more.

I must say, I've own(ed) several L series lenses and was a diehard Canon L guy but this Zeiss lens and a few others that I've tried out have made me a convert.

Another absolutely amazing lens by Zeiss is the 21mm. Probably the best wide angle lens, hands down.

This lens will most likely rarely come off of my 5DM2.

The focus shift issue is the Achilles' heel of the Zeiss 50mm f1.4 Planar. While it is outstanding for landscapes, i struggled with it for a long time unable to take any proper closeup shots with it. Just recently i learnt how to mitigate this issue and with a few simple techniques this lens performs flawlessly for closeup shots (stopped down to f2.2 or more)

So what is this focus shift issue exactly ? Basically it means that means that that lens's focus shifts as you stop down. Normally (with any lens) you will focus with the aperture wide open and then while pressing the shutter the camera will stop down the lens to its desired aperture value to take the shot. But sometimes (with some lenses) stopping down shifts the focus to a different point resulting in an Out Of Focus (OOF) shot. The focus shift issue is reduced if your subject is far away or if you use smaller apertures with larger DOF to compensate for the focal shift. So that means that while the lens works without any issues for landscapes, if you shoot closeup and with larger apertures (f2.0, 2.8, 3.2... etc) and focus through the viewfinder or through liveview then you might end up getting an OOF shot. Ofcourse there will not be any focus shift while shooting wide open.

To avoid the focus shift you can try 3 different techniques.

1) Use the DOF Preview button in your camera for focussing. By focussing your lens with the DOF preview button pressed you are focussing at the aperture with which the image will be taken. Thereby avoiding the focus shift issue.

2) Use the Still + Movie mode (with the screen setting option selected as Movie Display) for the Live view setting. If your camera supports this option and you shoot using live view then this option should be permanently set on your camera. Basically it will stop down the lens to the selected aperture value while in the Live view mode and all your focussing done will be when the lens is stopped down.

3) Use AF microadjustment : If you are comfortable with the AF micro adjustment feature then you test your lens using a focal chart and set its AF micro adjustment value accordingly. This is a tricky method (as the focus shift could be different for different aperture values) and i suggest that you generally avoid it and follow the above two methods.

I've written more about this focus shift issue on the Kettik gear reviews page for this lens.

If u have 700 box, please, do not doubt to buy it. The best option. I'm very happy with it.