I believe it has 8 diaphragm blades (but I cannot be bothered finding mine to check.). I may adjust it once my latest lens gets in - the Sigma 50/1.4 HSM - with a 77mm (!) thread diameter. Yeah, I guess it really depends on what else you have to compare it with. One day, when I can be bothered, I'll probably try and track down one of the Rokkors that seem, on what I've seen, to produce the smoothest fast-lens bokeh. Personally my IQ rating would be 4 rather than 5 because although it's currently still the fastest lens I own, I remain ever-so-slightly unhappy with the bokeh in some situations (it has a tendency, shared with several OM designs, to brightlining at the edges). But end up using 50mm/f1.4 more because of speed. its soft (compare to Tak f1.4), and pretty good wide open,īut I like its little brother more, Oly 50mm f1.8 (sharp wide open). Originally posted at 7:57AM, 4 November 2008 PDT More photos on the way, with some examples of quality stopped down. Physically, the lens is built like a tank, with heavy positive feedback on the aperture ring and a well-damped, grippy textured rubber focus ring. I've noticed very little chromatic aberration though, which is a pleasant surprise. The lens does seem to suffer from some flare problems, often noticeable even when the offending light source is reasonably far off frame. Like any lens of this type, it is softer wide open.Īt f/2.0, you can see that sharpness is dramatically improved, even towards the outer edges of the photo: Since the most common usage of this lens will be low light photography, most examples will reflect this. That says good things about the later model! Incidentally, that review of the earlier lens shows that the performance of the Zuiko often matches or exceeds that of the Canon EF 50mm f/1.4. A comparison between the early lens and a few others can be found here.

For more information on the earlier version of this lens, a good resource can be found here. It's generally considered to be far superior to the previous version (early versions have 'G.Zuiko' imprinted on the lens instead of 'Zuiko'). Right off the bat I'd like to specify that this review is for the later, multi-coated version of this lens. Product Ratings (1=miserable, 5=excellent): Name: Olympus OM Zuiko MC Auto-S 50mm f/1.4

Olympus om lens review