…and if Zeiss had suddenly decided to insert chip into its lenses because they heard that Nikon is about to release new ones in such lenghts?

Your ignoring a very important aspect of MF lens design vs. AF/MF lens design. Most DSLR lens designs place AF design considerations well ahead of MF design considerations. AF speed, a desirable feature in an AF lens, is achieved in part by designing the lens with a very short throw. The less the lens elements need to rotate from zero focus to infinity the quicker the AF system can lock on to the subject.

With a MF design focus speed is generally not as important as focus precision. Precision can be achieved, again in part, by using a longer throw. A quarter turn of the focus ring on a MF lens may be short enough to allow the photographer to move the point of focus slightly to one side or the other while the same quarter turn on a AF lens would result in more of a jump. This is an oversimplification but it helps to illustrate that simply throwing a chip in a class leading MF lens is not going to get you a class leading AF lens.

Bob

why don’t you look over the edge of the plate (as we say in Germany).

These lenses are perfekt for motion picture. Zeiss has a Huge legacy in this area.

We use Zeiss/Arri Ultra Primes and Highspeeds at work (for shooting on film) wich are manual focus only, They don’t even have a CPU. Aperture is set manually and focus….
Well focus is done via external Autofocus aka the Focus Puller (1st AC).
These highly trained Professionals can do amazing things with the Focus during shot. You won’t see an automated focus control as versatile adaptable or precise anytime soon.
Think about the DSLR Movie crowd as potential customers for these lenses and these Zeiss lenses make perfect sense.
They are a bargain compared to the Arri Primes and all other movie specific lenses.

For stills though, they make sense for anything not action related wich is still alot of applications.

Greetz from the movie crowd

I wonder if we should consider Sony as the “new” Contax? Especially if they come out with a model that retains the famous Contax handling- get rid of the superfluous buttons and menu options, keep the aperture ring on the lens, and the AE lock on the On/Off/AE lock lever.

Ali knocked Liston down in the first round. Liston was on the canvas with Ali standing over him apparently yelling at him to stand up and fight. Or perhaps to tell him I told you I would knock you down in the 1st round.

There is currently a joint photography exhibition of Neil Leifer and his rival Walter Iooss at Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles. You may not know it but you have seen their work either in SI or Times Magazine. Their work are not just sports photo, they are iconic images.

They are my idols and I think AF will be a hindrance to them.

My 2 cents: try the lens and stop discussing about them

Imagine, no one would be buying DSLR or screaming for AF-S primes. Everyone will be shooting LCD paneled F2, F3, FM and I am sure Nikkormat too, with chipped AI, or AIS primes.

Some new Korean co. makes a killing converting old Nikon gear to digital. Nikon sales collapses and became a Nikon camera restorer to survive and constantly have to sue the Chinese for making fake F3s.

teh coating are different, questionably”better” than nikon. the focus is much more fine and precise. a lot people use them on the RED cameras. I sold one to a videographer. they are expensive, but very nice,

It would be good to have one to play with, but I doubt it would get much use out of playing / still life type of stuff.

Had a go at the Leica M9 over the weekend. Nice camera, love the compactness of the lenses but again – lack of AF would be a killer for me. At least it has the rangefinder/split screen thingamebob.

I wish another third party lens maker, like Sigma, would join forces with Zeiss and offer AF VR lenses with real Zeiss optics for Nikon and Canon.

Also, I don’t get it why DSLR can’t implement proper MF focusing viewfinder, what I meant is, in AF mode, it will be back to the default AF points, while in MF mode, the viewfinder will remove all the AF points and give you something similar to the Leica Rangefinder viewfinder or the old SLR viewfinders.

Anyone care to explain? I still haven’t found out why.