Lenstip and L-Mount

[SimonC]

I've just noticed that Lenstip.com have started testing L-mount lenses. The first one tested is the Panasonic S Pro 50mm F1.4.

Panasonic Lumix S Pro 50 mm f/1.4 review - Introduction - LensTip.com

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www.lenstip.com

 

[pdk42]

That's good to hear. Lenstip can be pretty acerbic, but their testing is pretty extensive and technical so I trust them.

 

[sefen72]

The issue is they only test one sample each time (like many reviewers).

By example I had two copies of the Sigma 28-45mm DG DN, neither copies were similar to the test of Lenstip. By exemple at 45mm my second copy is much sharper than on the Lenstip Sample, it's not even close, it's even sharper at 45mm than at 28mm, and very close to the sharpness at 35mm.

I can see the same with the 50mm S Pro, my current sample is much sharper wide open than on their test, sharper than my Nikon 50mm Z f1.2 at f1.4 and my Nikon 50mm Z f1.8 wide open.
I know there are lot of "so so" copies of the 50mm S Pro as I owned one slightly soft wide open. But a good sample of the 50mm S Pro is much sharper than on their review.

My 35mm GM is also very similar to my 50mm S Pro wide open and slightly sharper than my Nikon 50mm f1.8 Z, so yes they make good tests, but sample variation is a real thing and it's hard to really test a lens sharpness with only one copy, especially when lenses are subject to sample variation like the S Pro line.

 

[Andreas]

The issue is they only test one sample each time (like many reviewers).

...

This is an important point. I can see why most reviewers only test a single sample--there are budget and time constraints--but it limits the usefulness of the reviews, particularly as regards sharpness.

Some decades ago the U.S. Air Force ran tests on fast 50mm lenses from the major manufacturers to see which lens would work best for a specific surveillance application. Their budget was less constrained than that of the typical lens reviewer, and so they ordered a large number of lenses from each brand. They found a very large amount of sample variation within each brand, which exceeded the variation between brands. I suspect that these were all standard double-gauss designs common to that era, so perhaps this result is unsurprising. This didn't stop the lens testing divisions of camera magazines from declaring that a particular brand's fast 50 was superior to some other brand's fast 50, based on a single sample of each lens.

Most reviewers also fail to perform preliminary testing of the test lenses they receive to see if they have an obviously bad sample. Fred Miranda is an exception. To his great credit he tests each sample he receives for proper centering before subjecting the lens to the full battery of tests. If the lens is badly decentered--a common problem--then he rejects it and waits until he gets a properly centered copy. I have seen reviewers present their findings, and then mention that the lens is badly decentered. So what are these results supposed to tell us? That you can get a bad copy of that particular lens? Most of us already know that, which is why we test for decentering (and other obvious flaws) when we first receive a lens, before the return window has closed. What I would like to know is how a decent copy performs. The best way to determine that is with a large sample, but barring that it would be helpful if the reviewer at least conducted an initial screening to weed out the worst copies. They can then report on how many copies they had to examine to find one that isn't decentered.

 

[Babylonia]

The issue is they only test one sample each time (like many reviewers).

If one as a tester met problems, they have to ask for another -or more copy sample lenses-, before posting a review.

As @Andreas wrote, check for "decentered" lens errors in first place.
There are many "faulty" lenses.

Over the years (about 60 years), in general over the years personally I met many "faulty" copies of lenses. No brand excepted.
As also well known reviewers, that are precise and exact in their testing procedure met one or the other "copy" problems.
(E.g. Lloyd Chambers ----> https://diglloyd.com ).
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