PRICE DROP! Olympus 12mm f2.0 now $704!!

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dtzfilms

Well-known member
yes, add to cart to see the price...

Is the Olympus that much better?
Hyperprime is one stop faster, $200 cheaper. There ends its advantage. (correction 2/3 of a stop faster, cheers Mike@AF)

Olympus - AF works on the AF100, no distortion, sharp wide open, anti-flare coating. Lighter, more compact and forgiving on the arm if you're flying a blackbird... With the hyperprime, yeah you get an extra stop for those moments where you need light and can't add any, but the Olympus has autofocus which means you don't have to close down to f5.6 on a steadicam: you can follow a subject wide open and blur out the background. Face recognition also means you can track a slow moving subject, i.e bride/groom/dog without pulling focus...Much better lens, the only Con is the price (which is coming down). If both were the same price - $499 I don't think anyone would buy the hyperprime just because of a f1.6 that practically isn't really F1.6 when you constantly have to stop down to reduce flare. It's also not sharp wide open - the olympus is - a true f2. The hyperprime isn't bad, it's a helluva lens - the Olympus is just better in my opinion.

Here's what EOSHD says:
The Olympus 12mm is an F2 lens not quite as fast as the SLR Magic 12mm F1.6, although I often stop that down to F2 to get flare down to an acceptable level and increase contrast. I can use the Olympus wide open and it is sharp and very flare resistant. I like both lenses but the Olympus is a MUCH more expensive. However as you’d expect it has better image quality, with hardly any distortion and it’s very sharp wide open. AF is of the next-gen video optimised variety, it is extremely stable in video mode and never hunts randomly in the middle of a shot.
Amazingly I actually left it on for most of the shoot! I never use AF, always manual, but in this case it was just so rock-solid that it got out of the way and did the job for me. It is also extremely fast and silent. Focussing is all internal, nothing moves. This is what Canon need to work on with their future lenses.
http://www.eoshd.com/content/5476/t...scott-with-the-hacked-gh2-and-olympus-12mm-f2
 
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A T-stop?? Interesting, I wonder why they wouldn't list that on the box, specs?
That would be a huge selling point that I don't think a manufacturer would be remiss about.
That's almost like listing a 0-60 acceleration a full second slower on a car manual. Why undercut
on a bragging/sellng point? I'd be surprised if that were the case.
 
GrahamH said:
I think they claim that the 1.6 is a T-stop and that in physical size it's F1.4. Not that it changes your point ...
Click to expand...
I think I found the review that makes your point. You're absolutely correct, it's apparently a f1.4 by design and the f1.6 refers to its T-value. So it's no attempt at any prestidigitation on the manufacturer's part, (we hope! LOL)

ARTICLE EXCERPT HERE:
Andrew mentioned that it is actually a f/1.4 lens by design - f/1.6 refers to the T-value thus the transmission characteristic. The lens extends almost 2mm when focusing towards shorter distance. A screw-in metal lens cap is supplied instead of an ordinary clip-on type - which is certainly something to get used to. According to SLR Magic there is an optional circular lens hood available, the "SLR Magic 58/77 RING", which doubles as a 77mm filter adapter to avoid vignetting.
 
It would concern me that they don't advertise it as T1.6 or even have it in the specs. Is it a manufacturing variance issue where some are T1.6 and some are worse, so they can't advertise it? And if so, would that not mean there would be variances in the optics and image quality? Could it be similar to how Zeiss takes the best of the optics from the ZF/ZE manufacturing and uses them for the CP.2 line, except with the Hyperprime you get a really good one or potentially a not so good one?
 
http://kanauru.net/blog/?p=126 Cheers Timtorpedo. Amazing review. Not technical, just straightforward practical review. My mind is definitely set on the Olympus, I don't care about the so called "cinematic look" of the hyperprime, I can grade that in easily, easier than trying to grade soft edges aberration and whatnot. What I like about the Olympus is it almost turns my AF100 into a run N gun camera for events, perfect on the blackbird stabilizer. The hyperprime is even soft at f2! What's the point of it being f1.6 then? It has some good points and I have my voigtlander 25mm for bokeh should I need it, or I can rent. For my kit, however, I'm all over the Olympus as soon as that price drops sub $700. They should just rollover already and make it $650 and watch those things fly off the shelf. All in all, I love all these products that undercut 'Lexus' price equipment. Better for us, if they force prices down. See how TV prices dropped like lead balloons? Man, 60 inch TV for $600, can you believe it? Not that I'm in the market for that, but still.
 
Mike@AF said:
It would concern me that they don't advertise it as T1.6 or even have it in the specs. Is it a manufacturing variance issue where some are T1.6 and some are worse, so they can't advertise it? And if so, would that not mean there would be variances in the optics and image quality? Could it be similar to how Zeiss takes the best of the optics from the ZF/ZE manufacturing and uses them for the CP.2 line, except with the Hyperprime you get a really good one or potentially a not so good one?
Click to expand...
There goes another salient point. I wonder, too. But not really! I'm getting the Olympus! Muhahahahaha!
 
Going through that review http://kanauru.net/blog/?p=126 I was absolutely sold on the Oly f2 - Until I saw the manual push focus shot. Not being able to smoothly change focus is a big deal to me.
Now I'm back to coin tossing to figure out which one I should order.
 
Rowy said:
Going through that review http://kanauru.net/blog/?p=126 I was absolutely sold on the Oly f2 - Until I saw the manual push focus shot. Not being able to smoothly change focus is a big deal to me.
Now I'm back to coin tossing to figure out which one I should order.
Click to expand...

One, this is an GH2 Olympus review and two that's operator error, mate. Fact is you can go into a local camera store and try out the Olympus yourself, even at Best Buy! Here's another review that might be relevant to that push focus shot. This is an AF100-Olympus review from B&H:

THE REVIEW:

I purchased this lens to be used on my Af100. I was tired of using adaptors with mixed results. This is a nice looking lens though when mounted on the AF100 it looks tiny and silly. If your EGO is easily affected by the size of your lens, don't get this!


Auto focus works well with the Af100, especially when using the focus selection square on the Af100. Aperture switches smoothly and quickly via the iris wheel.The manual "switch" on the lens, which reminds me of the way many Tamron lenses switch to manual focus,causes issues with the Af100. In order to manual focus you need to switch the camera to manual AF. Just switching the lens doesn't work, it causing this un-smooth motion when pulling focus. Smoothest manual focus is had when the camera is set to manual and the lens to Auto focus.
With such a high price and rave reviews I expected superior sharpness. It is sharp but it can't match my Tokina 11-16mm on the Af100. I also own the Olympus 45mm 1.8 and the Nokton 25mm. These two lenses are razor sharp and that is what I expected from the 12mm.
​
 
Setting the camera to manual and lens to autofocus gives the smoothest manual focus. It is obvious that wasn't the recipe used in kanauru's review..
 
If any of my local camera stores stocked any 4/3 gear, I would have been there like a shot to test but it's all Canon, Nikon and point & shoots.
Now that the stepped focus issue has been cleared up for me, it looks like I'll be adding the Oly 12mm to my ever expanding lens arsenal.
 
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